How many images should be optimised for 1 keyword?
-
Hello Moz,
I have a product category page and I have optimised 4 images around 1 keyword - is this bad practice? I worry Google will penalise me. Should I instead optimise them for other keywords?
Cheers
-
There are two reasons to optimize an image...
-
you can use file name, alt attribute and captions to improve the SEO relevance of your page with the goal of ranking in the organic websearch results for a specific keyword.
-
you can use file name, alt attribute and captions to improve the SEO relevance of your image for ranking in the image search results.
How many images should you use? Again, we have two goals... 1) ranking the page in the organic search results, and 2) ranking the image in the image search results.
For goal #1, I would not start manufacturing images just to increase the number of them that you have on your page. Just as I would not publish a ton of yada yada yada text just to pad the word count. However, if you have a lot of good relevant images that people will actually appreciate, then you should use as many as you think will be useful for your visitors or as many as is needed to properly illustrate your articles.
For goal #2, there are two things to consider. First, image name, alt, and caption will qualify you for image search but they are of minor importance for ranking you. The amount of searcher engagement is what will rank you. So, tossing up a bunch of crappy images isn't going to do any more for you than publishing yada yada yada text on your page. You need images that people will engage. How many? I would publish as many as you can economically produce and that can be justified with what you can do with the traffic that they will pull. If you have two highly competitive images google will rank both of them. If you have five, six, seven highly compeitive images, google will rank all of them. If you are not capable of producing highly competitive images then don't bother producing any more than you need to illustrate your article. They have the same value as yada yada yada text. But, you can publish images optimized for the same keyword on different pages of your website and all of them have the potential for ranking for their optimized keyword in image search - if they are competitive enough in terms of searcher engagement.
I firmly believe that if your images perform well in image search that will help your page rank better in web search. Google knows that people who have access to good images often are the same people who have the experience and knowledge to rank well in websearch. That is a personal belief. Some might argue, but I am convinced.
-
-
Never heard of a penalization around over-optimizing images, I think that's a very small concern.
Like EGOL said, optimizing the file name with keywords and dashes is actually one of the best ways to go. Google's image search engine is very rudimentary so it uses the filename as a large % of the image ranking algorithm. Would take the approach of describing the image succinctly in the alt text while including and image.
As far as helping the page rank in the normal SERP results, images have a very small contribution. So it's a best practice but don't waste too much time on it unless it's a massive site where you can apply scalable changes all at once.
-
I would use image names, alt attributes, and captions that fit the images as closely as possible.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
How many css and Javascript on ecommerce site?
Hello, I want any tool which seach css and javascript of whole ecommerce cite? Please suggest. Thanks! Dev
On-Page Optimization | | devdan0 -
To Many Links & Long Titles
One of our clients currently has a number of pages that "Too many on page links", Now her menu in itself has the majority. With it being an eComerce website it has quite a few categories. How harmfull is this to search rankings. The other side of thing's, Currently the client has a large number of pages where the title of the page is the product, However her products for example could be "The pink fluffy bear 2x4 with extendable arm and voice activation ( batteries not included )" Again, how Harmfull is having a large volume of pages named like this.
On-Page Optimization | | bmkdigital0 -
Positioning the keyword in two pages
Hi there! I've decided to use four criteria (keywords) for my website. The "problem" is that I have to use the same keyword (criteria) in two different pages. Is there a problem If I do this? On the other side, there are two sections of the web that (I assume) must have title and description tag as well as a keyword/criteria (Contact and Registration)....any advice?¿should they have a ttile and a description?¿Should they have a keyword associated? Thanks in advance for the answer.
On-Page Optimization | | juanmiguelcr0 -
Navigation causing too many links
If I add pages to my site to cover major cities/towns/counties in the UK where I offer wedding bands and link them from the navigation using drop down menus/categories ( I believe this is the best option to allow users to find what they are looking for) I get a'too many links on page' flag. How can I best get around this problem?
On-Page Optimization | | SamCUK0 -
Help on Avoid Keyword Self-Cannibalization
i ran the on page test and i got the avoid keyword self-canabilzation alert one example is for http://www.deporvillage.com/shimano maybe is because a'm not a native speaking english person but i do not understand what it exactly means the targeted keyword for this page is shimano and the alert i got for the links like the one below that i have in my page http://www.deporvillage.com/ciclismo/zapatillas-shimano which has a anchor text like zapatillas ciclismo shimano
On-Page Optimization | | deporvillage0 -
Existing good authority LP with multiple keywords, how to optimize for these keywords?
Hi Mozzers, Currently I am optimizing ONpage after I made a report for which keywords the website already ranks in the serps. I was surprised about the numbers of keywords the website ranks in Google. The website ranks for multiple keywords in 1 landing page. They get a lot of traffic, but has a position #5 or #7/#8, onpage grade is for most of the keywords a C or D and lots of them a F, so it's worth to optimize it. How should I do that when the landing page is domain.com/category and the 5 different keywords are partofcategoryname. Should I put all these keywords in the title and landing page body content as the onpage tool recommend me that? I was thinking about the option I described above OR to create a new landing page for the specific keyword each. However, the already ranked landing page has a PA of 38. When starting to build new landing pages is starting to build from PA 0. Anyway, it's definitely I chance to do onpage, I just don't know what I should do since there are 5 different keywords that already ranks for the landing page with good traffic. I want to let it rise in the serps to increase the traffic of course. Looking forward to recommendations! thanks in advance
On-Page Optimization | | Falcopa0 -
Strategy for dealing with keyword variants
I'd like your opinion on the strategy of dealing with key phrase variants: I've got a page that is ranking in the top 10 and top 3 for about 10 different variations of the same phrase. Seomoz gives it terrible grades for all but one of the keyphrases. Which course of action do you recommend : ----------- create new pages ------------ Create new pages for each variant and get them to grade A. If I go this route what sort of cross linking scheme should I use between this pages? ---------- improve existing page ----------- Try to make my single page rank better for all the phrases by doing extra on-page work so the page has a better grade for all of the variants? Many thanks for your ideas and opinions.
On-Page Optimization | | PillarMarketing0 -
What is the effect of too many internal links on a page?
Hi there! We have been doing a great effort during the last year but our main competitor is still above us in search rankings. Basically, the main differente remains now in the number of internal links, specially in our homepage. We have more than 200 and they only have around 100, so I think we are wasting too much link power among some irrelevant pages. What could be the effect of this?
On-Page Optimization | | bodaclick0