Author Topic: Keywords and image descriptions (Read 3003 times)

chasingescape · « **on:** February 23, 2019, 10:22 »

I have two questions about the images I uploaded.

I uploaded most of my image portfolio all at once to shutterstock.

And I have not been so carefull with the description and keywords and I think this is a reason I am not selling so well.

For example for my Dubai trip I uploaded like 200 photos and used a general description like like: dubai travel photography

And also for keywords, I used the same ones on each image.
Now for a few images I did add a proper description and keywords, and those are the images that are selling now, the ones with the general description barerly sell.

So I guess a specified description is super important?

Also is there any point in changing the description from the images I uploaded months ago?
It will take some work changing descriptions of a few hundred images, but if this will lead to a lot more sales its worth it.

Uncle Pete · « **Reply #1 on:** February 23, 2019, 10:42 »

Image description is fairly important if you want your images to be found in a web search, not so much if you don't care about appearing in searches.

davidbautista · « **Reply #2 on:** February 23, 2019, 16:01 »

Quote from: Uncle Pete on February 23, 2019, 10:42

Image description is fairly important if you want your images to be found in a web search, not so much if you don't care about appearing in searches.

That doesn't apply to Adobe Stock. They only use keywords.

increasingdifficulty · « **Reply #3 on:** February 24, 2019, 07:09 »

Quote from: davidbautista on February 23, 2019, 16:01

Quote from: Uncle Pete on February 23, 2019, 10:42
Image description is fairly important if you want your images to be found in a web search, not so much if you don't care about appearing in searches.
That doesn't apply to Adobe Stock. They only use keywords.

In the INTERNAL search, yes, but Google (and other search engines) pick up the descriptions, so they are very important there too. I have seen it mentioned several times that a rather large portion of traffic/sales comes directly from Google.

I would argue that the #1 most important thing in selling stock (and everything else for that matter) is the metadata - descriptions and keywords.

Furthermore, not just relevant (obviously), but also UNIQUE (as much as possible) descriptions/keywords are very important. Google does not like duplicate content. Google hates duplicate content. Google penalizes duplicate content.

So, good descriptions and keywords are more important than the actual content, or at least as important. If you are lazy and don't spend any time on that, well, expect low sales.

A good image that is found, will outsell any very good or perfect image that is not found. Actually, many times mediocre to bad images will also outsell the good if they are more visible.

Uncle Pete · « **Reply #4 on:** February 24, 2019, 22:07 »

Quote from: davidbautista on February 23, 2019, 16:01

Quote from: Uncle Pete on February 23, 2019, 10:42
Image description is fairly important if you want your images to be found in a web search, not so much if you don't care about appearing in searches.
That doesn't apply to Adobe Stock. They only use keywords.

Wrong... want to try again?

Read below

Quote from: increasingdifficulty on February 24, 2019, 07:09

In the INTERNAL search, yes, but Google (and other search engines) pick up the descriptions, so they are very important there too. I have seen it mentioned several times that a rather large portion of traffic/sales comes directly from Google.

I would argue that the #1 most important thing in selling stock (and everything else for that matter) is the metadata - descriptions and keywords.

Furthermore, not just relevant (obviously), but also UNIQUE (as much as possible) descriptions/keywords are very important. Google does not like duplicate content. Google hates duplicate content. Google penalizes duplicate content.

So, good descriptions and keywords are more important than the actual content, or at least as important. If you are lazy and don't spend any time on that, well, expect low sales.

A good image that is found, will outsell any very good or perfect image that is not found. Actually, many times mediocre to bad images will also outsell the good if they are more visible.

Good points all. However I want to add Adobe also gives a better rank to an image with the same words in the Title and the Keywords. So let me say, yes it matters in many ways.

Google has been penalizing repeating metadata on websites since about 2000. Although that's about SEO and being found, they figured it out a long time ago. The same applies to photos being found.

chasingescape · « **Reply #5 on:** February 27, 2019, 15:49 »

Thanks for the input, I will put more time into filling in more specific descriptions and keywords for coming uploads.

Does anyone know if changing the description for old images will have a big impact on the search results?

davidbautista · « **Reply #6 on:** February 28, 2019, 06:45 »

Quote from: chasingescape on February 27, 2019, 15:49

Thanks for the input, I will put more time into filling in more specific descriptions and keywords for coming uploads.

Does anyone know if changing the description for old images will have a big impact on the search results?

I think so.

And thanks about the Adobe insight. I actually put complete descriptions in Adobe so luckily I don't have to change everything

Enviado desde mi ALP-L29 mediante Tapatalk

Uncle Pete · « **Reply #7 on:** February 28, 2019, 13:54 »

Quote from: davidbautista on February 28, 2019, 06:45

Quote from: chasingescape on February 27, 2019, 15:49
Thanks for the input, I will put more time into filling in more specific descriptions and keywords for coming uploads.

Does anyone know if changing the description for old images will have a big impact on the search results?
I think so.

And thanks about the Adobe insight. I actually put complete descriptions in Adobe so luckily I don't have to change everything

Enviado desde mi ALP-L29 mediante Tapatalk

Yeah, a small detail with Adobe being different, where all the rest read description. And then the search issue.

Here's something interesting, stop words, ignored by search engines: https://www.link-assistant.com/seo-stop-words.html

Those descriptions and titles become ALT text for some agencies: Google for example says this,

Alt text (text that describes an image) improves accessibility for people who can't see images on web pages, including users who use screen readers or have low-bandwidth connections.

Google uses alt text along with computer vision algorithms and the contents of the page to understand the subject matter of the image. Also, alt text in images is useful as anchor text if you decide to use an image as a link.

When choosing alt text, focus on creating useful, information-rich content that uses keywords appropriately and is in context of the content of the page. Avoid filling alt attributes with keywords (keyword stuffing) as it results in a negative user experience and may cause your site to be seen as spam.

Also, even if the size of alt text on a website is 300 characters, some search engines seem to truncate at 16 words. https://www.hobo-web.co.uk/how-many-words-in-alt-text-for-google-yahoo-bing/

Since title or description becomes a searched Alt Text, it's good to not spam and keep in mind that the first 16 words are used, the rest ignored. This might vary by search, I'm not saying that Bing isn't different from Google, and maybe Bing truncates at 40 characters instead.

The point is, that in general, title and description do matter, everywhere, and don't try to trick searches with spam or your rank will be dropped.

Until agency searches become more sophisticated, none of this may apply or some of it might, but on the big picture of the Internet, spam will hurt you and your rank.