Picture Perfect: Unleash the Power of Images in Your Blog Posts 3/3
Harnessing Platform Features to Make Your Images Shine
Images play an essential role in breathing life into any blog post, and knowing how to use them effectively can make a significant difference in how your content is received. In our previous discussions, we explored why integrating photos into your blog posts is crucial and gave tips to find the perfect image to resonate with your audience and how to make sure you are allowed to use them. In this installment, we will dive into utilizing the built-in tools of your blogging platform. These features are designed to optimize the quality and presentation of your images, ensuring they catch the eye and enhance readability. From setting a standout featured image to editing tools and accessibility features, mastering these built-in tools is key to elevating your blogging game.
Behold the Featured Image
Adding images to your blog post can greatly enhance its appeal. A blogging essential is learning how to set a featured image. While you can integrate images within the body of your post, much like you would in Word, the true star is the Featured Image. Setting a featured image means it will automatically appear at the top of the post and will be the visual representation when your link is shared or appears on your blog's landing page as part of the preview. Without doing this, your shared post could end up displaying the first image found on the page, often the logo of your website, which is both a missed opportunity and might detract from the focus of your content.
This process differs from inserting images into the body of the post. There is a place to do this separately from where you edit the body text. In WordPress, it’s in the right-hand column, below where you choose a category. This image serves as the front cover of your content: it’s the one seen with the title on the blog landing, usually large and at the top of the individual post.
It’s a Piece-of-Cake
Today's content management systems and blogging platforms are designed with user-friendliness in mind, providing built-in tools that aim to deliver high-quality visuals with minimal effort. It's valuable to familiarize yourself with these features. For example, the software will notify you if the size of the image you upload needs adjusting—too large, and it may offer to downsize; too small, and you’ll be prompted to replace it. Most platforms include basic editing capabilities like rotating, flipping, or cropping images. For consistency, using the same preset crop ratio on all your Featured Images is a practical approach. This way, you can pick one that works in social media posts and makes them look tidy on your blog landing page, where you’d see several together. If you use additional images in the body, the sizes of those can vary.
Hot Tip: Make it easier on yourself by choosing horizontal images (more common and work better in blog layouts) that are at least 2400 px wide to ensure they are high-resolution enough.
Don’t Overlook What The Robots Want
Incorporating alt-text and other metadata helps make your images accessible and improves their discoverability on search engines. This attention to detail ensures a wider audience can appreciate your work. When you upload an image, take the time to add alt-text where prompted. If a screen-reader (a tool used by visually challenged website visitors) rolls over the image, the voice will read out what is designated as alt-text. Therefore, you want to describe what it looks like. You can be literal (a red car on a coastal road) and add a few words to tie it to the post’s concept (a red car on a coastal road – freedom on the open road). If it acts as a link to another page, include that tidbit (Links to our contact page and will open in a new tab).
You can even add keywords or phrases here for search robots, but make it sensible for humans. You can add or alter alt-text in your image library or post at any time.
Hot Tip: Name the image something descriptive, connected to the theme and use keywords here too if you wish.
Check it Everywhere You Can
Finally, it's crucial to view how your blog post looks on both desktop and mobile devices. Sometimes, what looks perfect on a large screen might not translate well on a smaller one. Take a moment to visit your blog landing page and the full post page from different devices to ensure that your presentation is visually appealing and cohesive across all platforms. To do this before you publish, click preview. From a desktop or laptop, you can resize your browser window to see how images resize themselves down to tablet and mobile size. If your blog or website is not responsive this way, it’s time to update it.