Web Developer Using Stock Photos
-
Hello,
The organization is selling a cms system in a niche market across the country. It has the normal SEO challenges, in addition he is using purchased stock images.
This seemed ok, while he was smaller but now we are growing rapidly and these images are VERY STOCK- and well used ( I have checked with Tiny Eye).
I remember a few years ago this was a flag to the search engines who went through manual review, is this still true?
It seems to me that the theme's that come with the images, are duplicated ( including navigation & footers), so having the duplicated images would be another negative.
Thank you for your suggestions!
-
You should be good to go. According to Rand the footers, menus, and sidebar content is ignored. What is seen as unique is only the body section of the page. Here is the link:
Hope this answers your question.
-
Unique, Innovative, Fresh Content is what search engines are looking for. Having stock or generic images isn't necessary bad, but not exactly good. Does that help?
-
I think if the stock image fits your brand then it's ok to use it. To the best of my knowledge the cover of Snow Leopard is actually a stock image, so even the best prefer to trust a professional to photograph a live snow leopard.
But back to your question I would certainly apply the names and alt tags to the business, so I wouldn't just use the most generic of naming conventions. Maybe a photo of happy customers would read "my_brand_testimonials" especially if it is on the testimonials page of your site. I would also make sure the stock is not commonly associated with your industry and that it's not too popular. If it is consider not making an image site map.
Another practice I would use would be if possible to alter the images for your use. Of course this is assuming you have the rights to make those modifications. But simple modifications can go a long way at explaining things. I myself have used skitch to draw attention to certain points.
Things I wouldn't do are to use a stock boardroom and claim it's the office. In this case theres really no stock solution and it looks deceiving.
I've never experienced this in a negative way but I find it hard to believe Google would penalize someone for using stock navigation buttons. I suppose if someone was crafting a directory using a popular directory software and provided little to no SEO value, but was the only player in a razor thin niche, then maybe being completely stock would hurt the site. But one could argue it never stood a chance regardless.
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
-
Multiple sites using same text - how to avoid Google duplicate content penalty?
Hi Mozers, my client located in Colorado is opening a similar (but not identical) clinic in California. Will Google penalize the new California site if we use text from our website that features his Colorado office? He runs the clinic in CO and will be a partner of the clinic in CA, so the CA clinic has his "permission" to use his original text. Eventually he hopes to go national, with multiple sites utilizing essentially the same text. Will Google penalize the new CA site for plagiarism and/or duplicate content? Or is there a way to tell Google, "hey Google, this new clinic is not ripping off my text"?
Web Design | | CalamityJane770 -
Out of stock products?
Hi. A client runs Woocommerce platform selling clothing. This clothing is seasonal and 95% of the stock, once it sells out is never restocked with the exception of a few core items that cross over season to season. What I want to know is, whats the best way to handle items that are out of stock and never coming back? I see a few options: delete it. Losing its rank and indexed link. 301 it back to the "brands" page or the "category" page. Eg. a Armani T-Shirt can go to either Armani page or T-Shirts page keeping it relevant. Just leave the old products there saying out of stock. All have benefits to the business. Delete it. Its gone. No more trouble, extra work involved, keeps out CMS clean. Obviously good for SEO? Also good for customer to go to a relevant page. But do we end up with loads of links to manage increasing costs if a developer needs to do the work? Easiest but defo not the right option. So what is it? Is 301'ing really worth the hassle? Is it possible bearing in mind we have 500 items every 6 months going out of stock? Who 301's it? Is it possible for staff to do it in Woocommerce or does a developer have to do them everytime you need to 301 a product? What is your advise on what to do and how to do it? Thanks
Web Design | | YNWA0 -
Any alternative techniques to display tabbed content without using Javascript / JSON and be SEO Friendly?
John Mueller's input in the EGWMH hangout suggests that Google MAY ignore expandable content served by Javascript. Are there any alternative techniques to display tabbed content without using Javascript / JSON and be SEO Friendly? I do however view these as good for website interactivity and UX - and see many examples of websites performing well and ranking highly whilst using these techniques - are there any Google friendly ways to serve content on a page so that search bots can recognise and choose to crawl / consume the content as legitimate fodder?
Web Design | | Fergclaw0 -
Is there a best practice for using a general iso code for the EAME region and APAC region or should you break it out by country?
I am creating a strategy for multiple regions and the US comes to market different than EAME (Europe, Africa, Middle East) and China. We were planning on using language and iso codes in subfolder's but the corporation only wants their content to be in German, English, and Queens English. Our current decision is to use /en-US/, /en/, /de/, /en-CN/, /zh-CN/. /en/ and /de/ will be what we use for EAME. This doesn't seem like the best idea as I think /en/ will get indexed as the US version and not the EAME version. Any suggestion or if clarification is needed is greatly appreciated.
Web Design | | GodfreyB2B0 -
Image Replacement Using Cufon (Javascript), SEO effects
Hello Friends, I am using Cufon for image replacement in my website. May I know, does Cufon have any negative seo effects? Will this affect the search engine ranking or loading time of my website? What are the advantages and disadvantages of using cufon in a website in seo perspective?
Web Design | | zco_seo0 -
Finding a good wordpress web developer for SEO fixes
I have gotten a good audit done of my site now it is time to get the fixes done. I have a developer I worked with for a long time that is good at coding and fixes on my site. However I am not confident in his abilities to execute some of the seo changes that need to be done. Their are some common stuff he can tackle but when it comes to GWT and proper handling of 404's and 301's and other seo tasks I am not sure if he is the right choice.Maybe due to a lack of experience of dealing with the issues I have or is just not his specialty or web devs just don't know seo...lol.... Is obvious a lot of SEO's don't make the changes themselves but leave it up to the devs to handle it their suggestions and fixes. But from my experience devs are not so well versed in seo and you have a hard time knowing if they are doing it correct or can even do it.(of course they will say they can they want your cash and i understand that ). In particular a good amount of wordpress devs claim to know seo but i find that far from the truth.Even when guided to issues some of them will often leave you disappointed. Sorry for my rant! Now to my question , obviously not many SEO's make the actual code changes themselves (how i wish i knew a one that did) are their ones out their that do? If not how do i find a good wordpress dev that can make proper seo changes and knows his stuff....example i need someone who can trouble shoot and track down some serious GWT I have and deal with some hardcore 404 & 301 issues . A lot claim to know but when push comes to shove I have been left disappointed. Thanks in advance for your help and suggestions or recommendations.
Web Design | | chrisyak0 -
Thoughts on using a CDN?
I'm trying to decide if I should use a CDN to speed up my site. I've never used one before, but I do know that there are a lot of images on my site and I think that could help a great deal. Are they hard to set up? Are there any down sides? And are the pricey? Also I'm not sure even sure if it would make a difference for me, but I want to work on getting my site faster. Thanks.
Web Design | | NoahsDad1 -
Web Design for Ecommerce like wanelo
Hi, I have a client that wants to design an ecommerce site like http://www.wanelo.com/ initially they want to set up a first release to test their market using just he basic functionality thereofre you see a picture click on it add toshopping cart an buy. Does anyone know of a theme that can be used on wordpress or any other ecommerce system that has a pre defined theme as http://www.wanelo.com/ Thanks
Web Design | | VivaArturo
Arthur0