Add Images to Your Sitemaps

Screenshot of sitemap file with images included

Yesterday (April 7th) Google announced on their Webmaster Central Blog that you can now use a Sitemaps extension to provide Google with information about important images on your site. For each URL you list in your Sitemap, you can add additional information about important images that exist on that page. You don’t need to create a new Sitemap, you can just add information on images to the Sitemap you already use.

This is not necessarily game-changing news, but it is definitely a beneficial feature being added to the sitemaps protocol with Google. For pharma marketers, one area that has largely been left untouched is image search optimization (at least from my perspective). Through research, we know that users are looking for images, pictures, infographics and more. Treat valuable, important images just like you treat the other content on your site.

Note that an image is included in the top result. Click to see for yourself.

You have likely noticed for some time that when you use Google (or Bing or Yahoo), often times you will find a variety of different types of results. Search marketers refer to this as “universal search”, primarily because ALL types and forms of content are being included in search results for your query. In the example to the left, I did a quick search for plaque psoriasis and one of the first results I found was an image. Through keyword research I have done previously I know that people are extremely interested in and search for content about what plaque psoriasis looks like. For a condition like plaque psoriasis, I would argue that visual content may be more compelling to a user (even if it is not necessarily more compelling for a search engine).

The point to make here is that images are and will be key pieces of content within your global bucket of “optimizable” content. If your consumers are searching for pictures, images and anything else that is visual, it makes sense that these should be optimized for search engine visibility.

Disclaimer: The postings on this site are my own and do not necessarily represent the opinions or positions of Intouch Solutions.