How to Geotag Photos for SEO

What are geotagged photos?

Geotagged photos are photos that have information about their location embedded in the metadata. This can include the exact location the photo was taken or the general area. This information is usually added by a GPS-enabled camera or smartphone. Geolocation data is usually stored as longitude and latitude coordinates. For some people, this can be a great way to keep track of places they’ve been to or see where their friends or others have visited.

In fact, some people use image geotagging as a virtual scrapbook of the places you’ve been!

How do geotagged images affect SEO?

Geotagging your images can help your website show up higher in search results. Geotagging your images can have a positive impact on Search Engine Optimization (SEO) by helping search engines like Google understand the location context of an image as well as categorize it to a given location.

Geotagged images play an important role in local searches. When someone searches for a specific location, geotagged images of that location can show up in the results. This can help your website or Google Business Profile’s visibility and bring in more web traffic leading to more conversions.

Geotagged images give search engines a better idea of what your website or web page is about and how it relates to a specific location. This can help your website rank higher for relevant local search terms. This can be very useful when listing places to visit in a specific area.

An example would be geotagging images on a list of different restaurants in the same city.

Think about it like this: when you search for something online, search engines like Google want to show you the most relevant results. They use all sorts of ranking metrics to determine which websites are the most relevant. It turns out that one of those ranking metrics is location.

By geotagging your images, you’re giving search engines more information about where the images were taken and what they’re about, which can make your website or Google Business Profile show up higher in search results when someone searches for things related to that location.

Related: Local SEO Checklist - The Ultimate Guide

What If Your Images Are Not Pre-Geotagged?

Some cameras require specific settings to be in place to geotag images automatically. If your images are not automatically geotagged you can geotag them at any time.

How To Geotag Photos?

There are many different ways to add geotags to your photos. You can use photo editing software like Adobe Photoshop or a dedicated geotagging tool. For this tutorial let’s use the GeoImgr geotagging tool.

How To Use GeoImgr

Once you’ve opened this geotagging tool upload the image you want to geotag. If you choose to pay for the pro version of the tool, you can type in the name or address of the location and it will automatically pull up the longitude and latitude coordinates. However, if you don’t purchase the Pro version of this tool you will have to add the coordinates manually.

How To Find The Right Coordinates When Geotagging Your Photos

The easiest and fastest way to find the location coordinates of your image is to open another tab in your browser and search for the location on Google Maps. This allows you to use business names that are registered with Google My Business or street addresses.

Once you’ve entered the location you want to find the longitude and latitude of, right-click on the map pin.

Here you can see the coordinates in the dropdown menu along with several other options. By clicking on the longitude and latitude coordinates you will copy them to your clipboard.

Geotagging Your Photo

The next step is to paste the coordinates back into GeoImgr and click “Write EXIF Tags.”

The final step is to click the download button and you’re all set! Your image has been Geotagged.

Want To Learn More Ways To Increase Traffic To Your Website and Google Business Profile?

Geotagging images is a great way to improve traffic to your website and climb local search rankings. To learn more about geotagging your photos or other actionable SEO tactics check out the rest of our blog.