Images are a largely forgotten, yet important, part of SEO

Most people that build their own website are familiar with the basics of SEO. They understand the importance of keywords, title tags, and site maps. An area that often gets neglected, however, is images. Certain information that is attached to your images can be indexed by search engines like Google, thus providing you with another opportunity to get ranked.Alt Tags and Metadata An alt tag is a very important addition to your website images. Like its name suggests, alt tags offer an text alternative when the user is accessing your blog or site with a screen reader. An alt tag should describe what is in the image, and that information can be useful in ranking images on Google. Furthermore, Google just seems to prefer images with alt tags to those without them. Metadata is an entirely different type of information. It primarily serves the purpose of helping image owners identify and classify their photos. Some information that can be classified as metadata would include a copyright date, the date a photo was taken, and the name of the photographer. Some programs like Photoshop will also allow you to add keywords to the metadata for your image. Where SEO is concerned, alt tags are far more relevant than metadata. Google doesn't index metadata, so it's unlikely that including it on your image will have an affect on your SEO. Alt tags, on the other hand, will be indexed and can even help you rank for image searches. This can be useful when you are trying to drive traffic to a web page or blog post. It should be pointed out that image SEO, particularly that involving photographs, is not a well-defined science. You can find informative guides online that will help you with the basics, but the process is still a guessing game. There are those who claim Google reckons metadata in its rankings and those who claim it is useless. Trial and error will likely provide the answers you need when it comes to SEO for your images. For more information click here https://www.reddit.com/r/SEO/comments/8menjp/doeswritingsomethinginapicturesmetadata_has/.