Images in articles - copying the authority in my industry
-
Hello,
For my site, BobWeikel.com, I have an article about the type of coaching I do. It's called "What is NLP?" Here's the link.
The two authorities in my industry which I respect the most have no (or sometimes one) images or anything in their best articles - it's all just text.
Some examples of these authoritative articles are here and here. Note the second article has one image in it. That's common for that author, and he's the top person in the field. Note that that first link has no images at all.
I'd like to refine my article until I can compete. Should I leave out all images since that's what the big guys are doing?
Thanks!
-
Awesome advice from both of you. Thanks!
-
Bob,
I don't think that mimicking your competitors is a good strategy for winning. Instead you should be doing something that is superior. Keep that in mind.
The value of images on a webpage varies depending upon the subject. If I am talking about how to install crown molding then images of how it is done are extremely valuable to my article. They might even be more important than text. So, if these guys are writing about topics for which images can play a critical role then they should have their heads examined if they are not using lots of images.
Lots of other topics might not lend themselves to an article with a lot of images. However, images can be used for other things. They can be used to reinforce points, pretty up a page (which is important in my opinion - landing on an article with no images is horrible for engagement in my opinon).
We take a lot of our own photos, we license a lot of photos, and we use websites like istockphoto to obtain access to a library of photos that can be licensed for minimal cost.
So, I would use photos and art and tables and graphs no matter what I am writing about. I think that it makes for a classy website and those photos can be used as primary, secondary or "did you know?" content.
In short, I pay very little attention to my competitors, other than to take a quick look at their content and decide if I can beat it. For me images are a major way for me to beat my competitors in richness of content and aesthetic appeal
-
Hey Bob,
Although it is good to keep an eye on Authorities in your field, I would suggest you be your own person and not worry too much about them not using images.
At the end of the day. research shows images are a great way of keeping people engaged on your page. I would always use images to illustrate a point if I can.
Hope this helps
Dave
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Images & Duplicate Content Issues
Here's a scenario for you: The site is running WordPress and the images are uploaded to the media section. You can set image attributes there such as the Description & Alt Tag. Let's say you'd like to reuse the same image in two different blog posts. The image keeps the same Description & Alt Tag associated with it in the media section. Would this be considered duplicate content? What would be the best practice in this case to reuse the same image in multiple posts?
Content Development | | VicMarcusNWI0 -
High qualitty images and mobile
We know that google likes high quality unique images. On the other side google likes fast load times (in particular on mobile). What about showing two different dimensions images on desktop and mobile? Is it good? If yes than any wordpress plugins for that?
Content Development | | kitoks2 -
How many articles are ok to publish a day on my website blog?
I have a blog on my website which is a part of the website. Currently I publish one article a day. Is it ok if I increase it to 2 a day? Is there any limitation in order not look negative to Google
Content Development | | AlirezaHamidian0 -
Can a rel author tag point to a Google+ business page
I’m trying to get my blog posts to show with rich snippets but they are a collaborative effort from our staff and as such are posted under our business name. We do have some guest bloggers who write under their own name and we use the author tags to show this. Is there a similar way to do this with a business?
Content Development | | mark_baird0 -
Google adsense image - text and alternatives
Hi, there has been a lot of talk on the internet about google adsense and which is better, image or text as well as what are the best alternatives to google adsense, so i thought i would throw out the topic on here and see what real website experts think about the topic. I have experienced google adsense image as better than text and would like to know what other people think and beside affliate ads what alternatives to google adsense do people like
Content Development | | ClaireH-1848860 -
Is the Page Authority/Rank of my corporate site affected by my blog's PA/PR and vice versa?
If I host my blog on my corporate site (it is a wordpress blog) will the page authority and page rank of my site translate to the blog? And does this also go the other way around? My gut says this would make sense, and I think I have seen it in action with other corporate sites that host their wordpress blogs, but I want to be completely sure. Even better, if someone can explain to me how this works, that would be super helpful!
Content Development | | Kendi0 -
Google : Bad positioning of my new articles for 2 months
For one or two months my new questions / Answers have a bad positioning and competitors who have a contents of inferior quality are classified in front of dismoicomment.fr. Recently I had + of 1000 errors of exploitation in webmasters tools because there was an url in the code of every page which was untraceable. Do you think that it can come from there? Nevertheless since the passage of Google panda, I have more traffic. I don't Understand... Furthermore my old posts have same positioning. My website : www.dismoicomment.fr Thank you. Sorry for my bad level in english.
Content Development | | elitepronostic0 -
Long versus short copy
Does the search engines have a preference for pages with long or short copy? (Assuming our short copy fulfill the basic keyword requirements) While a long copy, enable us to include more long tail keywords, i find that most people prefer to read a short copy. We currently try to keep each page short and give the reader an option to explorer further with links to more detailed pages.
Content Development | | petersen0