Archives > May 1, 2009

Using Images to Increase Traffic

By James Martell

Last weekend, Arlene and I headed out for our second car show of the year.

Yes, Spring has finally arrived.

I bought a new 10 megapixel camera a few weeks ago and thought this would be a great time to get some use out of it. Best of all, it’s small enough to fit in my pocket and it takes great photos.

Arlene and I left the kids at home and made our way to the show. While I was planning for a fun day, I also wanted to collect photos for my kit car site.

The images don’t just look great, they also help to bring targeted and on-topic traffic to my KitCarConnection.com website.

I simply post the images to my site and then wait for Google's spiders to gather them up and then add them to their index.

In addition to providing a massive database of photos and pictures, Google Images can easily become an exceptional source for targeted traffic.

Unfortunately, it’s often overlooked by website owners.

If you have a website that can benefit from the use of images, consider yourself lucky. Although you may not realize it, those images could easily generate free traffic.

Of course, there’s the visual aspect, too, since images can really bring a page to life.

There’s a good chance you have a digital camera – most of us do. Try taking 100 photos and adding them to your site with an easy-to-use uploading tool.

There. You’ve just created 100 pages of new content.

Four Tips to Creating Search Engine Friendly Images

It’s also important that your photos are search engine friendly, and it's easy to do by following these four simple tips.

1. File Path - Give your photo an appropriate file name. For example, if your photo displays a 1955 Porsche Speedster Spyder, then it makes sense to name it 1955-porsche-speedster-spyder.jpg

2. Alt Tag – Don’t forget to describe your photo on the alt tag (I.e. 1955 Porsche Spyder Replica)

3. Descriptive Text – If your images will appear in an online photo gallery, add a descriptive paragraph to better explain what your photo is about. This adds a nice touch and will be appreciated by your visitors.

4. Title Tag - If your photo will appear alone on a page, be sure to add an appropriate title tag (I.e. A Nice Photo of a 1955 Porsche Speedster Spyder).

If you’ve yet to add a few images to your site, give it a try. Don’t get too caught up in the details, though. It’s important for it to be set up properly, but it’s also nice to have fun with it.

Afterwards, just sit back and watch the traffic build up.

Adding photos is one of the easiest ways to bring attention to your business. In the next edition, I’ll be revealing other ways to drive traffic to your website using images, so be sure to stay tuned.

All the best,

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