Alternative Traffic Source - Google Image Search

**John Scott** · 06-30-2006, 08:05 PM

One site I manage, Yamaha Motorcycles.org, is in the dog house with Google. The search engine referral stats look like this:

Yahoo 42.4 %
MSN 30.7 %
Google Images 18.9 %
Google 2.9%

Interestingly enough, it was getting all this traffic from Google images even when most of the pages were not indexed by Google.

Just another great source of traffic, which doesn't seem to have any "sandbox" issues.

sitionweb · 06-30-2006, 09:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JohnScott

Google Images 18.9 %

I absolutely agree with you John, how in your opinion can we trasform visits from Google Images (or Yahoo images or MSN images) into customers (or contacts or whatever else our aim is)

**John Scott** · 06-30-2006, 09:53 PM

Well, whenever I do an image search, I usually end up on the page that has the image on it. So, if you were selling plasma TV's, I would think you could opyimize your images, and when the searcher ends up on yopur page, treat him like any other potential customer and have strong marketing copy on the page.

sitionweb · 06-30-2006, 10:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by JohnScott

Well, whenever I do an image search, I usually end up on the page that has the image on it. So, if you were selling plasma TV's, I would think you could opyimize your images, and when the searcher ends up on yopur page, treat him like any other potential customer and have strong marketing copy on the page.

Absolutely

Talkin' about user conversions, which of those two you prefer:

- an image (as the example above);
- a description among Google' serp: TV Plasma from $299

and which of the two above you think could better transform users into customers?

So, definitively, is so important for a website thinking about images positioning into Google Images?

**John Scott** · 06-30-2006, 10:40 PM

Quote:

- an image (as the example above);
- a description among Google' serp: TV Plasma from $299

You'd think the latter (Plasma TV for $299). But, a lot of image searches are more specific. So, instead of just "plasma tv", an image search might be "Pioneer PDP-425CMX". In my experience, the narrower search terms yield the higher conversion rates.

Manish Pandey · 07-01-2006, 12:00 AM

Absolutely... well people are looking for there needs... like when i want to buy a mobile phone i would go online and search for the latest phones...in the market and then buy the most suitable one...

BILZ · 07-03-2006, 09:48 AM

In my experience using image searched. I dont end up on the original page. I end up on the "shortcut" that just displays the image.

How do you convert that traffic?

**John Scott** · 07-03-2006, 12:05 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by BILZ

In my experience using image searched. I dont end up on the original page. I end up on the "shortcut" that just displays the image.

How do you convert that traffic?

How do they get there without viewing your page?

I do a Google image search for Suzuki Katana, click on the image, and I get my webpage in a frame.

http://images.google.com/imgres?imgu...006-19,GGLG:en

How do you get to the image without first viewing the page?

BingoBalls · 07-03-2006, 12:55 PM

I personally use Google images a lot so I know I am giving someone else traffic to their site.

I too see visitors coming from Google images onto my site - dont have the % infront of me now.

John do you link the images and use ALT tags to get better performance from Google images?

vangogh · 07-03-2006, 01:04 PM

I think they will use alt attributes and file names alot for the image search (probably title attirubute too). Linking the image might help also. There's only so much Google could go on to know about the image itself. I'd still write both alt and title attributes appropriately, meaning for those who can not see your images. Keyword stuffing isn't the idea, but mention your keywords.

I would think to a lesser degree Google will look over everything on the page itself as well so for example John's image of a Suzuki Katana will most likely do better on a page about Suziki Katana's than it would on a page where the majority of content is a cake mix recipe.

spyderscripts · 07-03-2006, 07:49 PM

To get better listed with Google Image Search:

Name the image something descriptive: RedDoghouse.jpg, Red Dog House.jpg (eww, but would work)

Add a descrptive but NOT spammy ALT tag.

Place the image in a table and add a table caption for it.

You may also have to check your meta tags or htaccess files are limiting the web bots from parsing your images.