As a creative person, you have always come up with an artsy part of any project. That’s common for all graphic designers out there. After spending all of their energy into creativity, they hardly have energy left for anything more.
Advertising, marketing, and promotions barely come into their mind. We feel you on that. But when you turn to sell your art or decide to launch your own graphic design site, getting familiar with a few basic SEO strategies is a must.
SEO or search engine optimization refers to the practice of optimization that helps a website rank higher in Google or other search engines. On the other hand, SEO strategies refer to the planning, outlining, and implementation of steps that have been designed to improve your search rankings. As a designer, you can learn these strategies to gain more exposure to your work for lead and sales generation.
So, if you’re ready to grow your brand or draw people’s attention to your work, here are some expert tips to follow
1. Name your images with suitable keywords
Creating high-quality images is a must for any graphic designer. Images not only improve the traffic of a website but also engage the audience and lure them to further scrolling. High-quality artworks that you’re selling on platforms like PrintShop or posting on social media also increase the likelihood that it gets shared. After all, who wouldn’t want to show their friends or family a stunning image or artwork!
In SEO, the use of keywords is fundamental. These are the main words, topics, or phrases that your artwork or content is based around. If you’re a logo designer, then your keyword may be “logo design” and more. You can leverage free tools such as Google keyword planner to provide you with data like monthly search volumes, competition, and difficulty for every keyword you search.
So, instead of picking random words to describe your artwork, look into Google keyword planner.
2. Compress your images for quick load speed
For any website, load speed a bigger problem. If visitors come to your site but cannot access the information quickly, they leave your site and never return. About 40% of customers abandon a website within 3 seconds of load time. In another scenario, load speed is also connected with SEO.
Google’s algorithm considers slow loading sites as the ones with poor user experience. Therefore, it lowers their ranking on the search result pages.
Often stunning and high-resolution graphics are considered the significant factor behind a site’s slow load speed. But that doesn’t mean you should remove your images. The best solution to this problem is to decrease its size and format. Only reducing the size will not do your job. You need to compress the images as well.
As a graphic designer, you can pitch your images to clients. You can ask them to replace their images with yours, which will significantly improve their site’s load speed. If it’s so, they are more likely to pick your images.
3. Don’t copy others design ideas
In SEO, plagiarism is a serious offense. Google considers duplicated or copied designs as a red flag. You may succeed in real life in some cases, but Google will downgrade or even penalize your site. If you really want your work to stand out, then the only mantra is to be original.
Suppose you’re selling your art. You created a design taking inspiration from somewhere but didn’t change much about the design. You upload it on a website. But later on, you find out that somebody else has already uploaded the same. This duplicacy will lead your design to be removed.
So, be unique and original.
4. Optimize your links both external and internal
Your links should be searchable. Google considers only the first few words of any link, so make sure you keep it simple. Steer clear of fancy words and use descriptive tags for your links.
Here, you can also include relevant keywords to improve SEO.
Anchor text optimization is also essential. It’s the visible part of your link that is shown in the browser. You can use anchor text for both on-page and off-page optimization.
5. Keep your home page design minimal and user-friendly
A home page is the most crucial section of a website. It’s where you land your potential buyers or clients. Be unique while designing a home page. Try to convey as much information as possible but make it concise and to-the-point. Also, make sure that the information you’re sharing is accurate and meaningful. Misleading or irrelevant information is often considered spam by Google.
6. Optimize web and page title tags
Web and page title tags are what appear in Google search. So, they are essential to be optimized. The title tags should have relevant keywords. Most importantly, they should be appealing to your target audience and convince them to click it. This small step will boost the SEO on your page.
7. Create relevant descriptions or content
Content is the king. It’s content that people search the entire Web for. The audience immediately rejects a website with irrelevant or untrue content. Also, it lowers page ranking in the Google search. So, you should use relevant keywords for subheading creation. Add a summary of the subheading in the form of a description.
8. Gain SEO friendliness by highlighting the keywords
You can use H1 and H6; you can highlight relevant content and keywords. Remember, keyword placement is delicate. Overstuffing might just ruin the whole SEO purpose. So, keep keyword placement natural and in a way that Google’s algorithm will not consider it as a violation of its algorithmic terms.
9. User-friendly UI and UX
Keep in mind that the designs that you create are for real people. So, you need to think just like them. Put yourself into their shoes and then make a design. Consider each point your client tells you. After all, your task is to deliver the exact thing a client wants. The user interface is responsible for bad or good user experience. If the UX is excellent, your ranking will also be high. Your user experience shouldn’t just be limited to the desktop, but it should also cater to mobile users.
10. Get backlinks or credit links
The number of backlinks you get on your site is essential for Google ranking. You can adapt to various strategies for this step. Google listing is one such step that includes a credit link back to the site. Those links, when included on the footer or header, add to the site’s credibility. Guest blogging is also another example of creating back links.
Rule of thumb for graphic designers – Create Mobile-friendly Visuals
In 2016, when mobile search exceeded desktop searches. Considering this, Google devised its ranking factor list and added a mobile-first design approach.
Here are three more reasons to adapt to mobile-first approach —
In 2018, the total number of mobile phone internet users crossed 390.9 million marks (as per Statista report)
Over 51% of customers use mobile phones to search for new products and brands.
Over 80% of mobile users tend to buy from companies with mobile apps or mobile-friendly sites.
Now, you may think what’s the relation between creating mobile-friendly graphics! But there is! According to research on graphic design, brands that are intensely focused on graphic design outshine those are that aren’t by 200%. Also, appealing graphics have long-lasting impressions on users, which render greater user experience. And, Google prefers it for ranking.
Consider these pointers to create visuals for your small screen users —
Use colors that evoke emotions.
Use geometric shapes
Include abstract patterns
Use color contrasts
Bring brightness at a minimal level.
Use hand-drawn designs or illustrations
Use real photographers
Conclusion
People involved with graphic design can design with ease. But when it comes to strategizing the ranking of their artwork or site, they start feeling out of context. So, it becomes essential to bring the right mixture of SEO strategy and creativity together for better search results.
So, don’t waste your time and start adapting to the basics of SEO discussed earlier for your ranking vision. If you have any other SEO tips for graphic designers, do share it with us.
