Image Search Statistics
Image search accounts for nearly 27% of all queries according to Moz, which is crazy to think about given that it’s the last thing that most medical practices optimize when creating their websites.
Google Images Update
Nearly a year ago, Google made an update that changed the button from Visit image to Visit Page, which navigates to the original landing page. This enabled Google to better measure this traffic, so we now see just how important they are as a source of traffic.
Our Top Guidelines for Image Descriptions
Image file name
Choose relevant keywords separated by hyphens, eliminating common words such as: a, of, etc, the, on. Next, for your Alt and title of the HTML tag you can take the image file name, removing the hyphens.
What file format should I use?
JPEGS are the most SEO friendly and page load times are least impacted. We don’t recommend using the following formats given that they aren’t compatible with most browsers still: JPEG 2000, JPEG XR, and WebP.
What is the recommended maximum file size?
Under 100Kb or less for optimal loading times.
What are the best image dimensions for web?
Width should not exceed 2,560 pixels.
What is the best image compression tool?
We recommend using TinyPNG: for PNG and JPG files
How to check that your images are following best practices
Simply sort by size. You can use the free version Screaming Frog to do this quickly.
How can I check how my images are performing?
Utilize Google Search Console. Go to performance report, image, then click apply to see queries, clicks, impressions and other great metrics.
Last words
Images are a much greater source of traffic than we thought, so it’s key to make sure that you fully optimize them, as it impacts your ranking and visibility across Google.
