Why?

Most photography websites contains mainly images and are often flash based. Google likes text but doesn’t like flash based websites at all. Actually, Google probably have nothing against flash as such, but it just can’t understand what it is.

Text on the other hand is easy for Google to understand so Google is very efficient in gobbling and understanding text based web sites.

So is it hopeless to get a photography website ranking high on Google?

No, it’s not. In fact Google is pretty good at understanding images and have started to like them even more lately. In fact, nearly 30% of my website traffic now comes from Google’s image search and it’s growing fast. You just need to help Google to understand what the images are all about.

Here’s how you can help Google to interpret your images:

1. Include a descriptive file name including the keywords for all images (for instance angkor-wat-temple.jpg)
2. Include a descriptive ALT tag including the keywords (for instance angkor wat temple)
3. Give non relevant graphics (bullet points etc.) a number instead of a name (1.gif or 55.jpg etc).
4. Include caption text for each image (of course including the keywords (or synonyms)

You should of course also do the “standard” SEO for your webpage:

• All webpages on your site should be optimized for different keywords.
• Include the keyword(s) between the TITLE tags (for instance <title>Angkor Wat Temple</title>)
• Include the keyword(s) between the H1 tags (for instance <h1>Angkor Wat Temple</h1>)
• Include the keyword(s) in the filename (for instance angkor-wat-temple.html)
• Include the keyword(s) and synonyms if you have some text on the web page.

These small tricks are fast and easy to do and gives you good value for the small amount of time it takes to do it. There are more advanced tactics but they’re more time consuming and often not worth the time it takes.

Note: don’t keyword spam because Google is not stupid. Only include relevant keywords.

Of course, getting incoming links to your website is also needed to rank high on google but i’ll cover that later in a separate blog post.

Cheers!

SEO For Photography Websites is a post from: PhotoBusinessGuide.com