It seems that everyone is in pursuit of new and effective way of promoting their ventures in digital marketing and improving their SEO ranking on the Internet. There is one issue that is rarely discussed as often as it should – is there any SEO benefit to image geolocation data. Since images are the essential part of the content marketing, the issue of how geolocation data tied to the images can influence your SEO marketing is quite significant. Here, this blogger seeks to shed a light on is there any SEO benefit to image geolocation data and the interaction between image geolocation data and SEO discussion of which theoretical components is given, as well as its practical considerations. Geolocation is applied to images it is the incorporation of geographical coordinates, mostly the coordinates of geo –reference system- which include longitude and latitude. Incorporating such data into your images means that you are supplying the search engines with valuable text that may help improve your local search ranking.
Benefits
This may be advantageous for commercial premises with a tangible business, for example shops or services, and thus for clients who may be interested in targeting native audiences. The use of geolocation in images is particularly relevant to SEO in as much as it concerns local SEO and optimization of tags to improve on the experience of periods of search by browser engines. For local businesses in particular, the capacity to portray your location in words in terms of visuals really beats the rest. It helps search engines with identification of where your business is located making it provide you with a competitive advantage when it comes to local search results. However, the usage of image geolocation data for increasing the SEO position still has certain characteristics with the help of which it is necessary to use this information.
Understanding Image Geolocation Data
The location information of an image which may be coated to the attributes of the image file in certain formats such as EXIF (Exchangeable Image File Format). Apart from the position expressed by coordinates, other information can be included such as date/time, picture settings and the device used when making the picture. Though mainly focused to the audience of photographers and graphical artists, benefits for the SEO purpose are not negligible. For example, if you have a café in a busy area and often share photos with geotags, then your blog with such images will appear higher if people are searching for coffee shops in that area. In particular, search engines are not only searching for keywords but for looking for local content as well of which include images. When the images are geo-tagged on a particular location which relates to your business location, the results may assist search engine in ascertaining your relevance to local queries. Moreover, images that contain location information can be shown in Google Images search if the two major conditions are met, namely the connection of the image with the content relevant to the place and the user’s search. This means that attributing perfect geolocation tags will help enlarge the circle of your target audience and bring to your local business consumers it hasn’t previously met on your website.
Enhancing User Experience
The projection of the landmark image can also help the website to increase user engagement, this can be of impact to SEO. In contrast, it has been established that it is the content which reigns supreme and the manner in which it is utilised can determine the place of a website. When images are properly optimized and when these images relate or are related to what is written, the viewer is sure to be drawn to them while the quality helps in understanding the content as well as adds to the enjoyment of the content. This will help maximize the amount of time you have your target audiences’ attention, lower bounce rates and higher chances of making the call to action. Furthermore, by making use of location information about users, the navigation can be made more effective and individualized. For example, travelling bloggers usually publish pictures that can be associated with a certain place to relate to the viewers. In so doing, they enable the reader expand on a destination in terms of visual and gain accurate location information. When users have checked the images of the place they are interested in visiting especially when they are geo-tagged they are likely to read other contents, subscribe to newsletters or share the content. In addition, when accessing image search, users find attractive and relevant pictures for their queries, they are more likely to visit the website containing those images. This click-through behavior can certainly indicate to the search engine that the content is very useful and ultimately, improve the SEO even more than a simple click through.
Practical Applications of Geolocation Data in Images
The use of image geolocation data for SEO is fairly easy to integrate into your strategy strategy and can be done using the following steps. First of all, check that all the photos on your site were taken in the local area or if depicting your region, business premises. This may require the services of professional photographers who appreciate value of taking the right pictures with the corresponding locational details or where the use of geotagging techniques if one is using his or her gadget to take the pictures. Secondly, before joining images to your site, ensure that the images have the right location data recorded. Pasting geolocation data, geography data and following its transformation to an image importing it into another is also doable by using certain tools and applications. For instance, if you have a series of images from any event, you can type the coordinates of the event location so that each image has a geographical context of the event place. However, in addition, it is necessary to add key parameters such as the images’ descriptions in the alt text, which is closely linked to its geolocation information.
Read Also: Navigating Brain-Computer Interface Gadgets Next Frontier
Local SEO and Google My Business
There is another reason that will make you include image geolocation data, of relevance to your Google My Business ( GMB) profile. Underpinning these important services, the well-known GMB is useful for local SEO, which helps get your business name on Google Maps and local search results. As mentioned before, when you add photos into your GMB profile with the information regarding the location the photos were taken, this has a positive impact on the credibility of your business and increases your rank on the SERPs of local searches. Google defines high-quality images as signals for the reliability of a business and when geo-tagged, such images add relevance to local queries. Interacting through the specific and general networking sites such as GMB enables you not only get across your products or services but reveals sucient testimonials and events associated with the location. Immediate help seekers can easily find images that are related to the current environment and offers them to make them more interested in the business.
The Limitations and Considerations
However, when it comes to incorporating image geolocation information into the SEO plan of your business, there are certain limitations and issues that should be addressed. To begin with, there seems not to be universal compatibility of geolocation data in the different formats or platforms. Besides, privacy and data protection laws may come into force if images are acquired from people or off the web, and therefore, depending solely on geolocation data may be counterproductive. However, companies having outlets in many areas or companies mostly operating online may rarely use geolocation tagging. For example, if your business is just an internet-only store, there can be no location-based traffic targeting at all, but geolocation data will be helpful if the content is to cover certain geographic areas. Lastly, one has to note the proper relationship between geolocation data on the one hand and other SEO considerations on the other hand. Using only this factor might ensure that you lose other important factors knowledge of which also lead to increased search rankings such as back links, site organization, and even quality of articles or posts.
Conclusion
All in all, if image geolocation data may be considered as not very traditional in the set of tools that can be used in SEO, the potential impact of is there any SEO benefit to image geolocation data method for businesses that are located in certain geographic area seems rather promising. Nevertheless, local SEO effectiveness, improving the user experience, as well as the extra details resulting from images mentioned above can be considered as the benefits of geolocation. As we are all aware, the world wide web is extraordinarily image-centric, so incorporating geo coordinates to your images should not be lightly dismissed. Since search engines continue to improve to meet customers’ needs and make search results more relevant, insight such as location data is crucial. When you are working on search engine optimization, it is beneficial to start including image geolocation, and see how it completely alters the way your content is presented on the net together with changing the way your target demographic interacts with it.