If you’ve got a website with lots of images, then it is in your best interest to be found in the image search results. Some stores make up to 20% of their sales from image searches. However, if your picture isn’t labeled correctly, it will probably never become part of a search engine’s visual catalog. Google even has an image labeler game that it uses to get a better understanding of what images are about, and as computers get smarter they will be able to identify images by themselves, in the same way newer digital cameras can identify faces and smiles.

Here’s some basic advice for labeling images:

• Give your pictures a name. Whenever possible, make the filename for the picture into a brief description of the content.
• Use the right alt tags. Image alt tags should also describe the content of the picture, especially if you’re using a website design program that gives numerical filenames to images. The alt tag should be fairly brief. If you selling vintage TV sets, you could label the image “RCA XL100 Color TV Set” and you’d be more likely to get found in image results.
• Make the image directory readable. Many sites exclude the image directory in the robots.txt file. If your images can’t be seen, they won’t become part of the image search.
• Write a descriptive caption. Captions get associated with images and may be part of the image search algorithm.
• Add context on webpages. If your web page content talks about a certain topic, the search engine may associate that topic with the image.
• Use the “IMG Title” attribute in your source code, and describe the image here as well.

Optimizing your images can be a great way to get extra search engine traffic, or just to make the web a better place. Naturally, if you don’t want your images to be part of the search experience, you can always exclude them from the search engine spiders, but most people are trying to attract more customers through every channel possible. If you’ve got an ecommerce website with thousands of pictures, it may be worth the time investment to ensure that every picture is sufficiently descriptive to get itself properly placed in Bing’s Visual Search. As search engines look to serve more people from a visual standpoint, you can give your site a clear advantage with proper image labeling and searchability.

Note: Optimizing images should be one part of a larger search engine optimization project. Web.com Search Agency can help you structure your site for optimum search engine readability, and help you identify aspects of your site that may be preventing it from getting the best possible search engine positions.