Image optimization is a technique that Is used in reducing the file size of images as much as possible without destroying or sacrificing its quality so that while loading your page, displaying the picture takes less time. It is very commonly used in digital marketing for e-commerce platforms. This aspect is associated with image SEO, which means getting your product image and another decorative image to rank on image search engines like Google or Bing in a prompt manner.
Google image search is an excellent method using which a product can directly pop up in front of image searchers. Through this, an e-commerce site can create branding for itself. E-commerce has various SEO press focus strategies that are text-centric usually such as guest editorials and blogging, unique product descriptions, better titles, and H1 tags that play their crucial role in ranking. But such portals need to have visually-oriented strategies that are more design-centric for various product lines such as clothing, jewelry, food recipes, home interiors, furniture, artwork, gadgets, and much more.
Importance of image search for e-commerce sites
Image search is great for e-commerce sites as studies have proved that human beings are visual creatures which means they remember and recognize the products they often see rather than about which they often read.
Customers are loyal toward visual images of a brand and its products and feel more comfortable buying the same. Image search creates an easy path for the discovery of any e-commerce product and conversion into sales finally.
Most common queries associated with image search
Various questions must be hitting you hard such as why only a few images show up when you do a Google image search? If you are on the digital platform for selling your products, why your product images don’t show up?
Or you must be thinking what the difference between various image formats such as JPEG, GIF, and PNG is?
Which format should you often use for your image to rank higher on Google image search and much more?
If images SEO(search engine optimization) is adequately leveraged, could be very beneficial for e-commerce purposes as the browsers would be able to find them promptly on the image search page and that will probably entice them to buy the product without words being said for its promotion.
Here is the list of a few tips that can help you optimize images for e-commerce purposes:-
1) Combine Image and text
Using the image to represent text is quite a bad idea because Google can read text easily but takes more time and resources to read images. So, including text in your product image is actually a good idea to help your product image on Google image search.
The text can convey documented information to the people who click on images. And they can end up buying your product if your text can convince them as visuals cannot communicate every necessary information.
So it is better to focus on the type of image that shows up during image search and finally draw the user onto your page rather than on focusing on just good-looking images that would not lead anywhere.
2) Choose the dimensional image specifications and product angles wisely
Usually, e-commerce sites show multiple angles of their products such as front, back, top and side profiles so that customers are convinced enough. The best way to capitalize on these extra photos is to fill out your alt attributes as potential image searches would land on your website through these description base alt attributes. If you are doing extra work chances would be likely that Google will reward you with searchers.
The rule is not to place the largest image on your web page and shrink the dimensions using source code because this will decrease your page load times and make it more comfortable for Google to search your images.
Google uses image loading time as a factor in their algorithm so better be cautious with the file size of your images.
3) Choose the right format of the file
Three common file types can be used to post images to the web, namely JPEG, GIF, and PNG.
As far as image optimization is concerned are GIFs are great for simple and plain images on the web page.
- JPEG format offers decent quality of the photograph at low file size.
- PNG images are gaining ground very rapidly as in better alternative to GIFs as this form it supports many colors and does not degrade over time when the same image is re-save or reused. The only drawback is the size of files in such a format is quite large so you have to be very careful with PNGs.
- Use GIFs for thumbnails and decorative images only and JPEG is for the Best quality for small file size images.
PNG’s are a better alternative for both PNG – 8 over PNG – 24 should opt as far as possible.
4) Produce images of content producers as that will help you earn links
Content is undoubtedly the master key for Google ranking and if images are produced to keep in mind the kind needed by content producers and sort them accordingly, then image optimization for the e-commerce would undoubtedly shoot up.
Few tips to keep in mind while producing images they should cleverly showcase the statistics of the e-commerce site should be crisp and clear, should be present the most important points that need highlighting, and should be an answer to a question.
5) Keyword research
Thorough keywords research is very important in this aspect as one needs to be selective with their keywords and ensure that the images are properly optimized to use them. Use keywords links organically over the period to create a Google ranking of your product’s image.
6) Using a CDN
How quickly your image is quite an important factor for potential consumers and for building ranking on search engines. CDN is a network of servers located around the world and is responsible for delivering multimedia content such as images and video: By reducing the number of network points between the user and the server, the content can be delivered quickly. If your content is accompanied by images, it means showing up promptly on image search internationally.
7) Try using unique images
Usually, the e-commerce site’s marketplace uses images provided by the product manufacturers on their product pages. Google hardly displays duplicate images in the search result but rather indexes them. Including unique product images on your product page can help you get the solution to this problem. Higher are some unique images, and better would be the ranking of the products.
Leverage on image optimization for the benefit
Image optimization various techniques are being used so that e-commerce portal’s product images rank higher on the Google image search. Above mentioned tips are a few examples of such practices that can help e-commerce sites whereby the list is inclusive of many more. Use the services of a professional photographer for e-commerce shoots of the products so that most of the SEO practices can be taken care of. Ecommerce Image optimization is quite a complex concept, so use expert advice for the best results.