Optimizing photography for digital strategy

OPTIMIZING PHOTOGRAPHY FOR DIGITAL STRATEGY

User Experience, Lead Generation & Social Jared Beasley - Creative Director, Istoria

We operate in an image-driven web.

USER EXPERIENCE

Delight your users.

THE BIG PICTURE, WHAT ARE WE AFTER?

The right image served up super fast.

➤ Beautiful imagery adds credibility

➤ Emphasizes post title and text

➤ Triggers reader to view post

➤ Used in OpenGraph tags, helps sharing

➤ Fast loading time saves lives

➤ Retains readers

➤ Makes you feel awesome

WHERE TO GET THE RIGHT IMAGE

➤ Premium Stock Websites ➤ istockphoto.com, gettyimages.com, stocksy.com

➤ Free Stock Websites (CC) ➤ photopin.com, pixabay.com, stockvault.net

➤ Google Search ➤ Click usage rights under images / more tools

➤ Take the Photo Yourself

WHAT TYPE OF IMAGE TO USE?

➤ File Formats—3 Primary types of images on the web

JPG Unlimited Color Palette*Offers Most Room For Compression

PNG Offers Transparent BackgroundUses Lossless Compression - Larger File Size

GIF Mostly Used for Animated ImagesForces Colors into a 256 Color Palette, Limited Transparency

HOW TO OPTIMIZE IMAGES FOR THE WEB

➤ Photoshop - Save for Web and Devices

➤ Could use GIMP, ImageOptim, RIOT, Fast Image Resizer

➤ 72dpi, RGB, 60% quality

➤ Shoot for Good Balance (quality vs. image size)

➤ Tip: Add heavy fade or overlay to reduce image size

➤ Try tinypng.com for png compression

BEFORE YOU UPLOAD AFTER YOU UPLOAD

➤ Optimize for SEO: Proper file name, title, alt tags, caption, description (lead generation)

➤ Wordpress Plugins

➤ Smush.It

➤ Lazy Load

➤ W3 Total Cache

Photoshop break?

HOW IS MY SITE PERFORMING?

➤ Google Pagespeed ➤ developers.google.com/speed/pagespeed

➤ Pingdom Speed Test ➤ tools.pingdom.com/fpt

➤ Yahoo ➤ yslow.org

SPEED OPTIMIZATION PLUGINS

➤ Minit

➤ Remove Query Strings From Static Resources

➤ WP Optimize

LEAD GENERATIONCapture users, cultivate fans.

PHOTOGRAPHY SEO - EXTENDING YOUR REACH

➤ Pick the right file name

➤ Make sure image dimension matches the image size displayed.

➤ Add a caption for easier scanning of the page

➤ Use an image alt text, title is optional (Make sure the alt text includes your SEO keyword and relates to / describes the image)

➤ Add OpenGraph and Twitter Card tags for the image

➤ Be conscience of your EXIF Data

➤ Use images in your XML sitemap

➤ It all comes down to this: if you want your photo’s to tell a story, please tell that story to Google in writing.

➤ An image that is surrounded by related text, ranks better for the keyword it is optimized for.

PHOTOGRAPHY BLOG POST OPTIMIZATION

➤ Relevant Title, Including Names and Location

➤ Relevant Featured Image That Is Gorgeous, Hopefully :-)

➤ Use Proper Blog Category and Tags

➤ Text Content Describing Shoot

➤ Display Photos So They Tell A Story

➤ Give Credit To Assistants or Thanks to Vendors

➤ Link To Store

➤ Optimize Post for SEO

➤ Example From My Blog?

SOCIAL PHOTOMEDIAHow to conquer Instagram with

images that tell your brand story.

HOW TO CONQUER INSTAGRAM

➤ Should I Insta? ➤ Engage With the Community

➤ Follow, like, comment, respond, hashtag

➤ Be social

➤ When to Post? ➤ Post. Test. Learn.

➤ Iconosquare provides analytics.

➤ Collaborate ➤ Reach out, tag, create with others

INSTAGRAM DO’S AND DON’TS

➤ Have a private profile

➤ Post too many personal images

➤ Use multiple images to create a gallery image

➤ Post too many images per day

➤ Beg for likes and/or followers

➤ Use irrelevant hashtags

➤ Spam people, or hashtags

DO DO NOT➤ Choose an Account Name tied to your

business

➤ Put your location in your profile

➤ Be consistent, think gallery

➤ Include location on images when possible

➤ Be personable in your captions

➤ Use hashtags like a crazy person, in a comment immediately after your post

➤ Reward followers (deals, insight, freebies)

➤ Run contests

➤ Include employees

➤ Connect w/ Facebook and your website

➤ Have a content calendar

GOOGLE CHROME

THAT JANKSome extensions to make your

browsing experience more productive.

MY TOP 10 FAVE EXTENSIONS

1. Last Pass

2. StayFocusd

3. Adblock Plus

4. Awesome Screenshot

5. ColorZilla

6. WhatFont

7. Grammarly

8. Sidekick by Hubspot

9. Whisker for Gmail

10.Boomerang for Gmail

RESOURCES & LINKAGE

Helpful Articles elegantthemes.com/blog/tips-tricks/optimize-images-for-your-wordpress-website wpexplorer.com/optimize-images-wordpress-guide/ premium.wpmudev.org/blog/why-trying-to-get-95-on-google-pagespeed-insights-will-drive-you-mad/ premium.wpmudev.org/blog/speeding-up-wordpress/ digitaltrends.com/computing/whats-the-difference-between-a-gif-a-jpg-and-a-png-file/ yoast.com/photography-seo and yoast.com/image-seo http://blog.hootsuite.com/how-to-manage-instagram-in-20-minutes-a-day/

Plugins For Improved Image Performance Image compression - wordpress.org/plugins/wp-smushit/ Lazy load - wordpress.org/plugins/lazy-load/ Caching - wordpress.org/plugins/w3-total-cache/ (enable Gzip)

Speed Optimization Plugins  Clean up WP database - wordpress.org/plugins/wp-optimize/

Resources For Instagram Analytics and desktop functionality - http://iconosquare.com/ Track hashtags across platforms - https://tagboard.com/ Track follower interaction - Followers+ (mobile app)

* My plugin guiding principle: Use as few as possible. Test after each one is installed.

HOLLER AT ME:

JARED BEASLEYEmail: jared@istoria.co

Agency: istoria.co

Photo: jaredbeasley.net

Twitter: @jaredbeasley

Insta: @jaredcbeasley

Insta Hub: @757Collective

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