Image SEO - including image URL's in Google sitemap

[redhillccwebmas]

Hi there,

I am managing a product catalogue site which has around 350 items with relevant image for each; Google has deep crawled the site, but only index around 50 images. Getting traffic through image searches is quite important for us; I have been reading up in image SEO, and amongst other things is to include keywords within the image name.

I have also been reading up on including image URL's within Google; by what I'm reading on other forums, this looks to be an advantage- is this true?

And if it is, does anyone have any examples of how to include image URL's within a sitemap?

James

[stymiee]

It would be no different then including a page I would think. Just put the URL as the location of the image.

Not sure if this really helps but I don't see why you shouldn't at least try.

[DaveWoods]

Yeah, don't see a reason why that wouldn't work although I'd be interested to see the results from this as I presume most uses for Google Image search is generally by people looking to use an image for their own purpose.

I know I've used it to grab an image for a mock-up numerous times before the final images were available and don't think I've ever actually been inclined to visit a site for information or to purchase anything after carrying out an image search so I'd be interested to see if you have any success from this other than people stealing your images?

[bluedreamer]

I can't see the real value of doing this, surely with a direct image link the user will just see the image and not a html page which you need if you want them to get them looking at your site?