Google Image Search traffic is not to under-estimated. In some of the relatively busy sites I run traffic from Google Image Search accounts for almost 10% of the incoming traffic. The Image Search folks usually do not stick around very long, but there are a few quick tips you can implement to make the most of that traffic.

With a perfect post on “17/19 Ways to Get More Traffic to Your Site Using Google Images“, Dosh Dosh has done a great job of listing the ways you can increase traffic from the Image Search sites (which he can actually implement on his lovely Anime images on every post). Obvious tips include using the ALT and image-name wisely with relevant text & keywords as well as setting the image preferences in Google Webmaster Tools, but there were a few less-known tips that are worth mentioning.

The first is “Use Javascript to prevent framing of your webpages” which is a feature in Google Images I’ve always disliked a little. It’s like coming in from Google Search with an annoying header showing a text highlight the search words (a bit like with Google Cache). Basically, you can use a piece of Javascript code that I use on most of my sites which will disable that frame:

<script language="JavaScript" type="text/javascript">
if (top.location != self.location) top.location = self.location;
</script>

It is recommended to add this higher up your theme so the change would take place sooner and be more unnoticeable.

For those who are using Wordpress and are not comfortable adding code to their theme, there’s even a Break-Out-Of-Frames Wordpress plugin.

The second is about making the most out of users who are using the images on your site. You can implement something that would replace right-clicking and copying with a suggestion on how to copy the image with a link back to your site.  This way you’ll atleast get some link-love and a small SEO boost.

Blogstorm wrote the basic script, and has even released a simple Use Google Images to build links Wordpress plugin. Visitors coming in through Google or Yahoo image search would see the link suggestion when right clicking. Not sure what it would look like? Blogstorm even did a demo video.  It’s not perfect, as it puts the link suggestion on top of the post no matter where the image actually is, but it’s still a neat idea. He’s also been pretty clever about using his “Close” button image used in the plugin for some incoming links to his domain :).

Try it out.

- Added on June 09, 2008 :Maurizio Petrone has a sweet tip with “Link Building Secrets“.

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2. Custom Google Search Provider with an Open-Search Auto Discovery for a Wordpress Site
3. Website Google Search results within your Drupal site
4. Search Engine Optimization for a Flash+HTML site
5. Optimizing a Dream-Weaver photography site : Basic webdesign SEO tips