Optimize your images for Social Media

We are in an age where social media is becoming extremely visual. Images are playing a huge part in the creation of the new social media influencers. Socials like Instagram and Pinterest are leading the way providing the mobile experience required in this new socially visual world. In this HowTo8App article, we will be covering how to optimize your images to get the best results you can on all your social channels.

Now to optimize your images you must first cover all the basics.

For example

• Use great images that are visually appealing.
• Keep to a theme, to build consistency and build your audience.
• Be aware of the best image size for the site your sharing to… and so on and so on

But there is a whole other level that will really have a huge impact to help build your social influence and it’s all to do with optimizing your images, naming them and using relevant hashtags.

Now, none of the above is important if you are just sharing images to Instagram because you can’t name an image and you just add tags as you go. But if you have your own site or blog then there are a few things that you can do to increase your potential reach and traffic to your site. If you are a Pinterest user then you definitely should be doing what we outline below.

Optimize your images for Pinterest

When you pin an image from a site to Pinterest a description and a link back is generated. without adding any additional information. The description in the example below is automatically generated by the article title.

When you share to Pinterest the text generated will look something like this if you have not optimized your image.

Now you can, of course, edit this and add tags. But how often is that done when someone other than you pins one of your images. Hardly ever.

But what if you could do that work for your site visitor, and target the tags and keywords of your choice. Well you can, if you can name the images on your site. Take a look at the screen capture below. Take note of the differences in the image description to that of the first image.

When this image is pinned on Pinterest the result is an optimized image that uses tags, keywords, and the article title. This helps the right people find your image and provides Google with important information for indexing your images. More importantly, drives traffic to the original image on your own site.

Tweet This HOW DO YOU OPTIMIZE YOUR IMAGES FOR SOCIAL MEDIA?

It’s simple, particularly if you’re using WordPress or a blogging platform that allows naming of images. All you have to do is to add the required description and tags into your Title Attribute box as shown below. And to also add an Alternative Text Description to help Google Index your image for Google Image SERPs

Every time you or a visitor Pins your images the hashtags are transferred across giving you the best chance for your content to be found by the right people.

Now let’s try this out

Click the Pinterest share button below and select the lead image. Pin the image to a board of your choice. Check the description and tags. It’s all been set up for you 😉

Conclusion

Ok, so it is going to take you a bit longer to set this all up. But you will be glad you did when one of your images goes viral.

Regards

Dexter

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