How to Optimize Images in Your WordPress Website

Images are crucial to ensuring that your content is more accessible, attractive, and engaging to users, but they are equally important in terms of SEO. First, they give search engines important contextual information. Second, optimized image speeds up page loading, which increases user engagement and search-engine rankings. To give your brand the best opportunity to succeed with SEO, you should understand the basics of image optimization. So, what is image optimization? 

Image optimization is the process of creating and delivering high-quality images in the ideal format, size, and resolution to increase user engagement. It also involves accurately labeling images so search engine crawlers can read them and understand page context. 

What’s more, when optimized images take up less storage space on your server, site backups will be completed more quickly. Now, if you are wondering how to optimize images in WordPress websites, Then this article will give you an unforgettable experience.

Because, in this article, we will break down how to optimize images in your WordPress website. So without further ado, let’s dive into the juicy part. 

Optimizing Images on Your WordPress Website

Optimized images play a very crucial role in the ground of Search Engine Optimization (SEO) ground. If you somehow don’t know how to optimize images on your WordPress website, then have a deep dive into the following parts.

#1. Resize your images 

Image size and file size are not the same things. Image size refers to the dimensions of an image. The file size is the amount of space needed to store it on the server. 

Images with higher resolution and larger dimensions ( Often created with a professional camera) slow your page load times considerably. While they work well for print reproduction, you need to scale down the file size without losing too much quality for them to work well on the web. 

#2. Optimize image file names

Choosing the right file name is important for your page SEO and for ranking in image search results. Before uploading any image, name the file with relevant, descriptive keywords to get the most SEO power. 

Include target keywords at the beginning and separate them with hyphens. Don’t use underscores because search engines don’t recognize them and won’t be able to “see” the words individually. 

File names should make sense to both search engines and humans. For example, the original name for an image of a woman’s hair salon is “salon234.jpg.” Rename it with a clear and more descriptive title such as “woman-having-a-haircut-in-a-salon.jpg.” 

#3. Use alt tags

Viewers may understand what a picture is about, but search engine spiders still need clues. Without alternative text, it is impossible for search engines to accurately index your image content. A good tag provides context and helps visually impaired users too. Even when images aren’t loading because of a glitch, search engines can still read the alternative text to help rank a page. Brand-relevant words can be included here to boost visibility. Just avoid keyword stuffing. 

Again, provide more detail than you included in the file name. While no ideal number of words exists, aim for 10 to 15 to convey something about the image. 

#4. Optimize the image title

If you use WordPress, the image title is usually taken from the name of the file so you can sometimes leave it as it is. If you don’t use WordPress or the title doesn’t explain the image, rename it with the appropriate keywords in the same way as file names.

Image titles are less important for SEO, but they can provide additional context to the alt text. Image titles are more helpful in terms of user engagement. Consider adding a brief call to action such as “buy now” or “download today.”

#5. Include captions

Image captions- the words directly beneath images may not have a direct impact on SEO, but, unlike file names and alt text, captions are visible on a website page. For this reason, they can add to the user experience. 

Most people are drawn to image captions to get a feel for the overall content. Without image captions, your bounce rates could increase, damaging your credibility with search engines. 

#6. Use unique photos 

Using stock photos is fine, but they won’t necessarily help your search rankings, as other websites often use the same images. In the same way that unique written content is better for SEO, it is a good idea to upload unique images whenever possible. 

#7. Ensure that your text complements the images

The copy on the page can help search engines determine the relevancy of your images. If it doesn’t include enough information to explain an image, add more relevant text, and describe the image if possible. 

#8. Add image structured data

Adding structured data to your pages helps search engines display your images as rich results. Google images support structured data for product images, videos, and recipes. For example, if you have recipes on your site and you add structured data to your images, Google can add a badge to your image showing that it belongs to a recipe. 

#9. Use site maps

According to Google, a site map is “a file where you can list the web pages of your site to tell Google and other search engines about the organization of your site content.” In other words, it is a file that contains a map of your site’s content. 

Site maps are an important part of SEO because they tell search engines about all the pages of your site. To ensure that search engine crawlers notice every image-an infographic, meme, photo, video thumbnail, etc. – include them in your site map. 

For these image map entries, include the title, description, URL location, caption, and license information. For video entries, include the title, description, URL location, thumbnail URL, and raw video file URL. 

If your website is hosted on WordPress, you can use Yoast SEO, which will automatically add your visual content to a site map. 

Conclusion on How to Optimize Images in Your WordPress Website

If you are struggling to get your content noticed, keep these strategies in mind before you upload any image. These image optimization techniques will improve the likability of your content to both search engines and human users. 

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