#tips on how to better my alt texts are welcome

[roselleasly]

guess whos back with some rosegold kisses!!

theres been some drama on twitter so for now ill post these two buddies here.

reminder that they are QUEERPLATONIC, NOT romantic

rbs are appreciated!

as before

⚠️THIS IS NOT A SHIP POST. GO AWAY IF YOU SHIP THEM⚠️

id be glad if you could use he/him for amity and she/they/xe for hunter in the tags, but ofc you dont have to ^^

[mibyledraws]

alt text 101 for artists

I’m not an accessibilty expert, but I gathered these tips here and there, and it has really been helping me writing better alt texts - and I hope they will help others too!

Alternative text is a description of an image that can be read by a screen reader. It also can help the understanding of an image for people who don't use screen readers.

What do you write?

It all goes down to including what is relevant to give the user an accurate idea of your artwork:

the medium you used to make the artwork (is it a digital illustration? a traditional oil painting? a graphite pencil sketchbook doodle?)

the subject of the artwork

anything that is relevant for understanding the meaning of the artwork. For instance, is the lighting important, or does it bring a particular meaning or mood?

Write sentences - don’t just throw away key words. EDIT: don't write full sentences, but phrases and fragments to keep your description concise

adding one more thing after getting feedback: keep it concise! Under 125 characters (even 100 is best)

Where/how do I add it?

The alt text feature is more or less obvious on the apps we usually post on. In doubt, please just search for it on a web browser, you’ll find how to add it in the blink of an eye :)

On Twitter

enable the alt text reminder! Everytime you post an image, it will remind you to add alt text if you forgot it. Go in your settings, then “accessibility, display and languages”. Then “accessibility”, and in the media section, check the “receive image description reminder” box.

on web browser: once you’ve uploaded your image, click on “add description” under it.

on the app: once you’ve uploaded your image, click on the “+alt” bubble in the right bottom corner that appeared on your image.

On Instagram

at the bottom of the posting page, go in “advanced settings”, then “accessibility”, then “write the alt text”.

On Tumblr

once you’ve uploaded your image, click on the three dots icon that appears when your mouse is on the image, then click on “update the description”.

On Mastodon

once you’ve uploaded your image, click on the “description missing” message that appears on it.

On your website (portfolio, shops, etc)

Where and how you can add it depends on the platforms but there’s always a way! My tip for this would be to schedule yourself an alt text audit of your website to take a moment when you would search how to do it and when you would add all the necessary alt texts! I’d also encourage you to pay attention to some other accessibility features - for instance contrast between background and text. There are lots of ressources out there and I admit it can sound overwhelming: digital accessibility is an expertise, a job field in itself after all. In my opinion, taking it a few steps at a time is a good way to go! For instance I like to do little accessibility audits of my portfolio every once in a while and check a new area that I might have missed before.

I forgot to add it, what should I do?

On some platforms, you can add it after posting if needed - it’s the case on the Instagram app for instance. Always try to see if you can add it afterwards. If you can’t, add it in the replies (if it’s on twitter for instance) or edit the body/caption of your post if you can change this but can’t change the alt text.

Adding it as a “simple description” instead of an alt text that will be read by a screen reader in lieu of the image isn’t perfect, but having it somewhere very close to the image in plain text that will get to be read by screen readers is way better than nothing to my knowledge :)

It's Disability Pride Month (July, when I'm writing this)

I wanted to take some time to encourage you to take some time and energy this month, and at anytime of the year, when you can, to learn about Disability Justice. I’m not the best at explaining what it is, and how much there is at stake. I’m better at this, making small guides about what fellow artists can do to make their work more welcoming to disabled people. But it doesn’t mean Disability Justice isn’t close to my heart and that I shouldn’t even mention it.

There’s a documentary about the Disability Rights movement that I can only highly recommend - it’s Crip Camp. It’s on netflix, and even watchable in full on Youtube.

Pay attention to us, disabled people, to what we have to say. ”Nothing about us without us”: our perspectives and opinions are those you must focus on when it comes to disability and to our lives.

[butchdarling]

Hi, thanks for all your IDs! I'm new to Tumblr and want to write IDs. Are there etiquettes that I should take note of, like which posts to write IDs for and which not to? Any tags I should look out for? I came from Reddit and I'm aware that not all users want to have IDs on their posts, there's probably something similar here.

Hi, first of all you're very welcome for the descriptions! It's always nice to hear that my efforts are appreciated :)

Ideally, any post with images should also have a description for those images. Any post that doesn't already have an ID in the original post is one that's appropriate to add a description to. Even if someone else already wrote a description in a reblog, you're allowed to write your own if you want to. I personally haven't encountered anyone who has been upset when I've written a description? I think that's more an individual thing than something specific to a certain type of post.

There's not a consensus on what format works best for image descriptions, but alt text or plain text (not colored and normal size) directly below the image in the body of the post are generally considered the most accessible. Alt text tends to work better for screen readers, and plain text works better for some people who need descriptions but don't use screen readers. I personally use alt text for posts with a lot of images and plain text for posts with only a few. I've also seen people put a short description in alt text and a more detailed one in body text.

Other etiquette includes indicating when a description starts and ends. I use brackets and start and end with [ID / End ID] but some other formats I’ve seen include “Start ID / End ID” of “Image description / End image description” and being objective in your descriptions. If you're describing a picture of a dog as a "cute puppy," you're telling the reader what to think instead of letting them come to their own conclusion.

As for tags I know some people like to sort their posts as “described” for posts with IDs and “undescribed” or “no ID” for posts without. I find most of my descriptions either from people I follow or from looking in the notes of specific posts as opposed to searching tags so I'm not much help there, but here is a link to a post listing a whole bunch of accounts that make image descriptions.

There isn't really one way to write image descriptions because people have different accessibility needs, but even a simple description is better than no description. The basic format I usually go with is this:

[ID: A (type of image, painting, photo, etc) of (subject; if it's fan art I like to include the source) doing (action, this can really be as detailed or as simple as you want.) End ID]

In general, I go with more simple descriptions for comedic posts and more detailed ones for art. My number one tip is to follow people who write and reblog descriptions and to read them! I've picked up a lot of formats and phrases I use a lot in descriptions from people I follow.

If you're looking for more resources, I’m going to point you towards my mutual Kay @pathos-logical ‘s accessibility tag that has a bunch of good posts on how to write descriptions. You're also welcome to send me another ask or DM me if you'd like ^^

[pathos-logical]

Do you know of any resources or posts specifically about captioning comics? I am very new to this, but I love comics and I make comics so I want to learn how to caption them properly. Thank you for your blog and all you do!

Delighted you asked this, since it gives me the excuse to share one of my top favorite posts about exactly that!!! I used @/TheQueerWithoutFear's addition in this post as a personal bible when starting out with art IDs! I think this post also has advice which is generally applicable to lots of comic IDs, since people can get bogged down writing every single detail of a piece when the broad strokes would do and thus detract from the overall comprehensibility of an ID. I also really appreciate this site as a great resource for examples on how to write concisely and with an audience in mind, and this post also lays out a lot of good tips! I'll round out this post with some general advice/guidelines:

Neither alt text nor caption IDs are better or even necessarily more accessible than the other; what matters is good formatting (so please don't put IDs below a readmore or use anything but plain text, use sentence case and primarily formal language, use brackets and "ID/End ID" formatting for caption IDs but omit them from alt, etc!)

For comics, especially long ones, I personally favor conciseness over strict fidelity to art, though this is highly subjective and depends on the piece and sometimes my mood. What I would boil this down to is that you don't need to include every detail in a piece to write a good ID, and using narration/prose is often more understandable than transcribing visual techniques (Ex: "She notices something to the side" is clearer and more succinct than "Action lines next to her face indicate she saw something to the side")

Organizing an ID's information in a top-down format is best for comprehensibility: start with who/what is featured (and where they're from, if applicable) and what they're doing, and then move on to background, style, and details

Last, you're welcome, and thank YOU so much for reaching out!! Artists like you make the world go round!! Please feel free to reach out if you ever have more questions, and have a wonderful day!!!

[seoness]

Writing Guide of ASOIAF/GoT

|| Part 1 of 2

Welcome to the first part of my writing guide, we'll begin with looking at writing fanfiction in the world of A Song of Ice and Fire and general tips on writing. A second part will be made regarding the character of Sandor Clegane. I did this because to write a believable Hound you need a believable world.

I am by no means an authority. Take what tips you wish and ignore the rest or ignore it all. I've spruced in some gifs to break up the text a bit. 💃

Helpful links 🚀

Interactive Map of Westeros

The most detailed timeline of the books (fan-made)

The ASOIAF wiki

Study the books

"But I want to write fanfiction set in the show?" Doesn't matter. Think of it like this: the show is a rendition of the books (at least the earlier seasons), so if you write fanfiction about the show you, in turn, write a rendition of a rendition. The further in the rendition line we go, the more we run the risk of losing accuracy in portrayal. You don't need to read the whole book series but reading the chapters where, for example, the Hound is present will give you so much more meat on your bones. There are excellent collections of excerpts floating around on the internet so no need to cough up coin (my only advice is not only reading excerpts from Sansa Stark but Arya Stark as well if your goal is to gain a better understanding of the Hound).

Smaller details/answers to questions can often be found in the ASOIAF wiki so - as I said - there is no reason to read the whole series.

Remember the times

Traveling takes time and effort. Avoid giving your character jetpacks like they had in the last seasons of GoT.

Use garment types that fit into the world. Breeches, doublets, cloaks, boots, underdress, hairnets, etc.

If you are doing battle scenes get some general knowledge of fighting. Two YouTube channels I've found informative:

Jill Bearup

Schola Gladiatoria

Hopefully, these two aren't problematic. Use caution when browsing "historical" YouTube. Some channels quickly divert into... well, someone trying to make you believe that wokeness is the greatest threat to humanity... I'll just leave it at that 🫠

Know the names of some armor pieces.

Dialogue - Class Difference

One way GRRM differentiates speech between smallfolk and nobles is if the person shortens their speech. For example:

Nobility: "I did not see them passing the bridge, my lord."

Smallfolk: "Ain't seen 'em passing the bridge, m'lord."

Servants that are expected to be in close relation with nobility mimic their way of speech.

Be careful with the usage of certain words

Some vocabulary we use isn't used in the show or the books, and using them in your text will make the story feel too modern.

Avoid personal titles of miss, mister, and sir (not to be confused with the knight title of Ser).

In describing scenes consider avoiding modern comparisons unless your OC has been transported from our world to Westeros. For example:

"Things moved in slow-motion."

"He pictured himself as King of the Seven Kingdoms."

Be careful not to overwhelm your reader with descriptions

This, admittedly, is something I struggle with as well. It doesn't matter how beautiful your prose is, how vivid you paint the world of Westeros if it becomes too heavy to take in. If you're writing longer scenes, remember that it needs to be a balance of describing and moving the story along. Having a good pace is crucial to keep people reading.

But here are some concrete things to keep in mind.

Don't overstuff your sentence with unnecessary wording. For example:

Stranger stomped angrily at the ground as Sandor quickly pulled at the reigns.

Remove unnecessary descriptions.

Stranger stomped at the ground as Sandor pulled (alt: yanked) at the reigns.

Don't be afraid of simple dialogue tags like said, replied, and answered, and to some extent, using none. There is nothing wrong with adding an alternative here and there, but dialogue and action are usually enough to indicate tone, infliction, etc.

Keep your sentence-length varied. I like to imagine writing as listening to music. You want the text to flow, and to feel alive and the length of your sentence is as valuable as the wording itself. Keep it short. Perhaps ask a question here and there to engage your reader? It keeps your text from becoming rigid and monotone, but be conscious about its use. Shorter sentences will make time move quicker. Longer sentences will make time move slower and display a more calm and calculating environment.

A quick observation on the depiction of canon fem-characters

As an example, I will use the typical OC build of having your character be a part of the Stark family. Usually, in OC x Sandor Clegane, it is a female and either true- or bastardborn. Here, other females in the family can become very unflattering in their depiction. There is nothing wrong with having your OC be at odds with the female characters, but try to keep the canonical traits of the females in mind. Especially Sansa Stark and her mother, Lady Catelyn Stark. Study them for a bit, look into what their reactions would be, and you'll have a more believable depiction and potential conflict.

For example, if your OC is bastardborn, Catelyn Stark would probably show your character the same treatment as Jon Snow. Never saying your name, never speaking to you, treating you as nothing more than air. Lady Catelyn Stark is usually written as the epitome of a true lady, keeping true to the Tully words of Family, Duty, Honor.

It goes into my next pointer of believable consequence and reaction, but this area, in particular, can make your OC feel like a "pick-me". A "not like other girls"-type.

There is nothing wrong with writing a female character that goes against the grain, but unless it's a part of character growth for her to realize that it shouldn't be done while bashing other women, try to be cautious in that area.

And if you recognize that you've done something like this, then please do not see this pointer as me "calling you out", "throwing shade", or "hating". I've made this mistake too. And writing a pick-me doesn't even have to be a mistake. A writer could certainly do something interesting with that character and their growth.

At the end of the day, writers are humans, and our biases and prejudice bleed through to the page. All anyone can do is try to be conscious of them.

Believeable Reactions

Westeros is not a kind place and it takes quick note of those that stand out. Your characters shouldn't be exempt from facing consequences for their actions/behavior, and in that place? Hells, they are more often severe than not. The older your character gets, the more the pressure will grow to conform to society. If your character is bold, the easiest way to circumvent consequences is having them be in a position of power that makes them untouchable. Think Daemon Targaryen from HOTD.

Your character shouldn't be all-knowing

There should be gods, customs, and places that are new to them. We may have watched the show and know who's good or bad, but that shouldn't be extended to an OC. Perhaps you write a jack-of-all-trades, but they shouldn't be an expert in all those areas. Basically, prevent your character from being a Mary Sue/Gary Sue.

Editing is a bitch and your best friend

There is something you can do to up your editing game if you got the coin.

Spellchecking software: I use Grammarly. It's expensive and far from perfect. It gives quick feedback, but it can sometimes miss errors and give faulty advice.

My biggest editing tip is to use text-to-speech software. While reading aloud to yourself is free, the issue is that you "know" how it's supposed to sound. The software doesn't. It reads what's there. I use Natural Readers, but that's just one of many available for personal use. It takes more time, but I find that the result is far better than using spellchecking software on its own.

Let text rest. This is completely free, but returning with fresh eyes can be a game changer.

Have Fun! 🎉

Above all else, have fun. Fanfiction is just the love of stories, so don't be too harsh on yourself. This a courtesy that should be extended to writers as well, some are really young and are brave enough to share their work early on in their writing journey.

[cheese-water]

Hello hello bootwt and any other twitter runways, welcome to tumblr! I’ve seen many a useful tumblr etiquette posts on my feed and I honestly had nothing to add. However as someone who’s been lurking/active on booblr since the very beginning, here are some less so guidelines, more so tips and tricks to make your first experience on tumblr more enjoyable :D

By selecting already written text, you can do all all sorts of cool things with it, such as bullet points, colors, smaller text size, so have fun.

Alt text/image IDs and video transcripts are very useful for everyone on tumblr, especially for the disabled community. Here’s a great post on why image ids are so important and how to write them with links about video ids/transcript near the end.

Tumblr users follow the “block and move on” mantra hard. The ranboo tag used to be really bad, and I get wanting weirdos of the internet. But trying to hold them accountable will only give them more attention and put you through more anguish. Your better off to block them, their mutuals, and their tags to save you the mental turmoil.

Reblogs > Likes is a general correct assumption for artists so their works can spread to other people. However some people may still want likes on their posts, like if they view likes as special private bookmarks or enjoy the little number going up (it’s me I’m some people I love em both). Blogs will be very apparent to which they prefer and you should too.

Tags like “cheese don’t look” on Twitter work the same way here.

If you want create separate accounts for things like posting art or other fandoms, create a side blog(s)! Or don’t! It’s your blog.

You’re able to turn off comments and reblogs on specific posts (like for wips or stuff you don’t want to spread) and can turn off anons or disable your ask box.

Scheduling posts are here as well plus you can automatically schedule reblogs through the queue feature! It’s described better in the queue tab under your account

Reposting stuff without credit/permission is still weird. Just reblog it.

Nobody can see the amount of followers you have. 🎉 If you want to celebrate hitting a certain amount of followers, that’s also chill too.

Terms like “moot and oomf” aren’t really used here like they were on Twitter but honestly you do you.

Lots of these are optional (except the accessibility stuff don’t be a jackass :)) so just have fun and try to enjoy the internet again! :D

[kaushal555]

seo league city texas

Conquering the Digital Frontier: A Guide to SEO in League City, Texas

Welcome, fellow League City residents, to your one-stop shop for mastering the art of SEO! Do you ever wonder how some businesses seem to magically appear at the top of Google searches, while others struggle to be seen? The answer lies in a powerful tool called Search Engine Optimization, or SEO for short. This guide will unveil the secrets of SEO in League City, Texas, and empower you to climb the search engine ladder, reaching new customers and skyrocketing your online presence.

Demystifying SEO: What is it and Why Does it Matter?

Think of SEO as the key to unlocking the treasure chest of online visibility. By optimizing your website and online content, you make it easier for search engines like Google to understand what your business offers and who you want to reach. The better search engines understand you, the higher they'll rank your website in search results, making you more discoverable by potential customers in League City and beyond.

Here's why SEO is crucial for businesses in League City:

Increased Website Traffic: A well-optimized website attracts more visitors, translating into more potential customers.

Enhanced Brand Awareness: Higher search engine rankings put your brand in front of a wider audience, building stronger brand recognition.

Targeted Leads: SEO allows you to focus your website content on keywords relevant to your industry and local area, attracting customers actively searching for your products or services.

Cost-Effective Marketing: SEO offers a long-term, cost-effective marketing strategy compared to traditional advertising methods.

Conquer Local SEO: Optimizing for League City

League City boasts a thriving business scene, and local SEO helps you stand out from the crowd. Here's how to tailor your SEO strategy for League City:

Keyword Research: Identify keywords your target audience uses to search for products or services like yours in League City. Tools like Google Keyword Planner can be a valuable resource. Think about specific phrases like "League City plumber" or "best bakery in League City."

Location Optimization: Claim and verify your Google My Business listing. This ensures accurate information about your business, including address, phone number, and opening hours, appears in Google Maps and local search results.

Content is King: Create high-quality, informative content relevant to your industry and League City. Consider blog posts about local events, tips related to your services, or community partnerships. Include relevant keywords naturally throughout your content.

Embrace Local Citations: Encourage customers to leave reviews on platforms like Google My Business, Yelp, and Facebook. Backlinks from reputable local websites can also boost your local SEO presence.

SEO for Beginners: Simple Steps to Success

SEO might seem complex, but here are some beginner-friendly steps you can take to improve your League City-based website's ranking:

Optimize Page Titles & Meta Descriptions: These are the snippets users see in search results. Craft clear, concise titles and descriptions containing relevant keywords that accurately reflect your page content.

Mobile-Friendly Design: With more people searching on smartphones, ensure your website is mobile-friendly. Responsive design allows your website to adapt to any screen size, providing a seamless user experience for all League City residents searching on the go.

Image Optimization: Include relevant keywords in your image file names and alt text descriptions. Not only does this improve SEO, but it also helps visually impaired users understand your content.

Internal Linking: Connect your website's pages with internal links. This helps search engines crawl and understand your website's structure, ultimately improving ranking.

Beyond the Basics: Advanced SEO Techniques

As you progress on your SEO journey, consider these advanced techniques to further refine your strategy:

Technical SEO: This involves optimizing your website's speed, code structure, and overall user experience for search engines. While technical SEO might require technical expertise, several resources and plugins can simplify the process.

Link Building: Secure backlinks from high-authority websites related to your industry. Backlinks act like votes of trust for search engines, signifying the valuable content on your website.

Content Marketing: Develop a consistent content marketing strategy that provides informative and engaging content for your target audience. This can take the form of blog posts, infographics, or even video content related to your industry and League City.

Conclusion: Embrace SEO and Watch Your League City Business Thrive

The world of SEO is vast and ever-evolving, but don't let that intimidate you. Start by implementing the basic strategies outlined above, and gradually build your knowledge with free online resources, workshops, or even consulting with a local SEO specialist in League City. Remember, SEO is a marathon, not a sprint. With dedication and a consistent approach, you can transform your online presence

Conquering the Digital Frontier: A Guide to SEO in League City, Texas

Welcome, fellow League City residents, to your one-stop shop for mastering the art of SEO! Do you ever wonder how some businesses seem to magically appear at the top of Google searches, while others struggle to be seen? The answer lies in a powerful tool called Search Engine Optimization, or SEO for short. This guide will unveil the secrets of SEO in League City, Texas, and empower you to climb the search engine ladder, reaching new customers and skyrocketing your online presence.

Demystifying SEO: What is it and Why Does it Matter?

Think of SEO as the key to unlocking the treasure chest of online visibility. By optimizing your website and online content, you make it easier for search engines like Google to understand what your business offers and who you want to reach. The better search engines understand you, the higher they'll rank your website in search results, making you more discoverable by potential customers in League City and beyond.

Here's why SEO is crucial for businesses in League City:

Increased Website Traffic: A well-optimized website attracts more visitors, translating into more potential customers.

Enhanced Brand Awareness: Higher search engine rankings put your brand in front of a wider audience, building stronger brand recognition.

Targeted Leads: SEO allows you to focus your website content on keywords relevant to your industry and local area, attracting customers actively searching for your products or services.

Cost-Effective Marketing: SEO offers a long-term, cost-effective marketing strategy compared to traditional advertising methods.

Conquer Local SEO: Optimizing for League City

League City boasts a thriving business scene, and local SEO helps you stand out from the crowd. Here's how to tailor your SEO strategy for League City:

Keyword Research: Identify keywords your target audience uses to search for products or services like yours in League City. Tools like Google Keyword Planner can be a valuable resource. Think about specific phrases like "League City plumber" or "best bakery in League City."

Location Optimization: Claim and verify your Google My Business listing. This ensures accurate information about your business, including address, phone number, and opening hours, appears in Google Maps and local search results.

Content is King: Create high-quality, informative content relevant to your industry and League City. Consider blog posts about local events, tips related to your services, or community partnerships. Include relevant keywords naturally throughout your content.

Embrace Local Citations: Encourage customers to leave reviews on platforms like Google My Business, Yelp, and Facebook. Backlinks from reputable local websites can also boost your local SEO presence.

SEO for Beginners: Simple Steps to Success

SEO might seem complex, but here are some beginner-friendly steps you can take to improve your League City-based website's ranking:

Optimize Page Titles & Meta Descriptions: These are the snippets users see in search results. Craft clear, concise titles and descriptions containing relevant keywords that accurately reflect your page content.

Mobile-Friendly Design: With more people searching on smartphones, ensure your website is mobile-friendly. Responsive design allows your website to adapt to any screen size, providing a seamless user experience for all League City residents searching on the go.

Image Optimization: Include relevant keywords in your image file names and alt text descriptions. Not only does this improve SEO, but it also helps visually impaired users understand your content.

Internal Linking: Connect your website's pages with internal links. This helps search engines crawl and understand your website's structure, ultimately improving ranking.

Beyond the Basics: Advanced SEO Techniques

As you progress on your SEO journey, consider these advanced techniques to further refine your strategy:

Technical SEO: This involves optimizing your website's speed, code structure, and overall user experience for search engines. While technical SEO might require technical expertise, several resources and plugins can simplify the process.

Link Building: Secure backlinks from high-authority websites related to your industry. Backlinks act like votes of trust for search engines, signifying the valuable content on your website.

Content Marketing: Develop a consistent content marketing strategy that provides informative and engaging content for your target audience. This can take the form of blog posts, infographics, or even video content related to your industry and League City.

Conclusion: Embrace SEO and Watch Your League City Business Thrive

The world of SEO is vast and ever-evolving, but don't let that intimidate you. Start by implementing the basic strategies outlined above, and gradually build your knowledge with free online resources, workshops, or even consulting with a local SEO specialist in League City. Remember, SEO is a marathon, not a sprint. With dedication and a consistent approach, you can transform your online presence

[delcat177]

Text in captions, if that won’t read on text to voice please let me know <3

This is a half-year old, but I only paid Blobs Magician to help me out once and I’m fresh out of delicately painted acorns and he gave me commission rights so I’ll be tipping him a ziploc bag of goldfish later

I feel awkward writing about all of this--there was a bit of jealousy when I got my hyst (not projecting, I was told flat by a trans friend), and I worry that I may be making other people feel alone, anxious, or less-than in their gender by talking about it.  If you feel that at all, please, stop right now.  Don’t look in the mirror, because mirrors are scary. Like, really scary, they have ghosts or stuff probably, but also in the genders sense, so instead, look in your head.   Look at your self.  It’s in there, because it is you.  What is happening to me now is a shell upgrade, a hermit crab moving domiciles.  I was a boy once, then a young man, then a oldman, and now I’m a oldman with a society man shell.  Never mistake the shell for the crab, go “hey crab, I like your shell, I hope you find the perfect shell, because you are the perfect inhabitant” and celebrate that crab.  Because we are all crabs, and we are all beautiful, and we all deserve the shells that reflect us as individuals, and anyone who says otherwise can fuck off into a spiny urchin bush and not have a shell.  Or.  Something.  Did I say I felt awkward?  I AM awkward.  But anyway, drive-in movie totals and such after cut, potential TMI, and protect yourself love yourself, you lovely crabs <333

 (with cut ‘cause longtext is looong)

(ORIGINAL POST)

Alt-text: I'm always the last one to know

so uh

I'm a blithe idiot and somehow never processed or dared to dream that this was possible

which makes the timeline look SPECTACULARLY dumb but I was going through SO MANY LIFESTYLE CHANGES

HYST DATE: SEPTEMBER 28, 2016

2017: Me: Man, living in the townhouse has really amped up my leg game, all that up and down stairs.

Me: I'm down ten pounds since the hyst! Megan: That's probably your natural weight. Me: That or getting there.  Not surprising, I'm not feeding the beast constantly.

Me: *punches Megan playfully in the arm* Megan: OW goddammit Del that hurt like SHIT! Me: oh my God I'm sorry I didn't mean to! Megan: It's okay, just be careful! Me: That's so weird I'm sorry D8

Me: man is it just me or am I good in bed lately? oh right I'm the only one here...I guess it's because I'm more confident?

Me: ghghjh my hair's thinning out at the temples, well been expecting that one for awhile, at least it waited for 30

2018:

Me: Holy shit, the stairs plus the shopping is paying off!  My thighs are HUGE!  I wonder if cracking a watermelon with these bad boys is hyperbole.  I bet I could though.  I BET.

Me: Down to 162 and holding, fuck you past doctors!  I just needed ENERGY goddammit!

Me: Wow, I've lost a lot of weight from my face especially.  That makes me super happy.  Anyway better pluck these stray hairs.  ...have I been yanking these more lately?  Getting old is weird.

Me: (struggling with shorts) Megan: Do you need a belt? Me: I'M WEARING A BELT (lifts shirt to reveal belt double wrapped around hips) Megan: Well then Me: I just need to buy new shorts, my ass is just GONE Megan: In the meantime maybe pay attention to what underwear you have on Me: yeah thank God for boxers

Me: My acne scars are heck of acting up.  I wish I hadn't picked at my face so much as a kid, I guess the pores are just kinda fucked, I've read about that happening.

2019:

Megan: New shorts look good Me: I am so bad at shopping Megan: At least you have them now Me: I'm an assless chap is all Megan: Go to bed Del Me: It's four in the afternoon

Me: My throat feels so *thick* lately.  I haven't been hitting the vape that often, why does it feel weird?  And why am I noticing my own voice more?  I NEVER notice my own voice, I make a point of it.  Am I subconsciously pitching it lower like I used to do talking on Skype because I'm more socially active?  What is my brain I'm so AWKWARD Me: UGH I'm falling back into derma habits, I haven't picked in my face in years, I think I need to change cleansers.  But...my face looks...good?  I guess I had this hiding under that baby fat all these years.  ...I guess? Me: Am I getting a hump from my bad computer posture?  Shit. Me: Oh no, it's not a hump, my shoulders are starting to put on muscle!  That's a relief.  That must be from the...laundry?  Carrying...laundry?

AUGUST 5, 2019: Me: (lying in bed) 2 + 2

Me: wait why am I putting on shoulder muscle now?  I've been doing laundry for years, and it's never done that.  And my legs didn't get this buff with a routine job where I was walking three hours a d--

Me:

AUGUST 14, 2019:

New Endocrinologist: We'll test your levels to make sure it isn't a pituitary gland issue or (some syndrome I've already forgotten the name of), and it could be because there's some small element of testosterone in the estrogen replacement, but the brain does produce androgens.  We can definitely look into switching you to T if you want, but if it's facial hair you're worried about...well, once the follicle is there, it's there.  These are irreversible changes.

Me: No on that then but irreversible,, like,, what I have now,, is forever,,,,,,,?

New Endocrinologist: Forever, and I would expect to continue to see muscle gains if you work out.

Me:

welcome to my second puberty please be aware it apparently involves as many mood swings as the first one but i'm tryin'

Since then, it’s been continuing confirm, confirm, confirm. 

My acne turned out to be little follicles growing in odd places--not fullblown hair, just enough to irritate the skin while it was developing. Tiny tufts of 1-3 entirely white, downy hairs have popped up in a few places on my breasts.  The real fuzz proliferation has been in the southern quarters--with all delicacy, there is no itch like the itch of hair beginning to grow anywhere sweat can proliferate, and I now understand why cis men scratch privates in public.  Having NOT gone through a unified social experience with a peer group accepting of such measures, I am sure there is footage on grocery store cams of someone with an agonized expression walking like he has a weasel down his pants and worrying that 30 is early for hemorrhoids.  Both have settled in for the most part, leaving me with a very fluffy, barely-there peach fuzz mustache that’s only noticeable in the right light, some spare hairs across my chin and neck that I keep in order, and a profound relief that I prefer boy shorts and swim trunks.

I went through a few weeks of being especially rank despite all the showering and was worried that was my new normal, but apparently T sweats be like that, and I’m back to smelling like...whatever I smell like, probably lavender with our fabric softener.  I experienced what I believed was a relapse a month later that turned out to be a false positive--specifically, our thermostat was slowly dying and frog-boiling us until it got hot enough that my sister also went “dear God it is a sauna in here”, leading to replacement of the faulty element and another notch in the “my life is dumb” bedpost.

My face bonebs, which I frankly expected the least out of (when I wasn’t expecting at all), have slowly but surely been rearranging, a visual effect doubled by the much faster redistribution of fat.  I honestly have no idea how this one works.  I know more about dead bonebs than live ones.  I would doubt it if I didn’t have pictures to back it up.  I would say it’s easier to look in the mirror now, but I already stated my opinion on mirrors, do it too much and a skeleton will pop out.  It WILL.  My brain tells me this and it is never wrong about fears and or phobias.  Don’t do it kids.

If there’s been a single most beautiful moment so far, it’s been getting back into Steven Universe after a long hiatus, opening my mouth to sing the opening like I did years ago, and realizing all at once that I was singing falsetto.  I ran it back, dropped a register, and the first names I sang became those who would believe in me most.  There were tears, and later, showing it off, there were fierce hugs.  (Yes, the first ep I watched once I realized was Stevonnie, and YES GARNET GOING “GO HAVE FUN” wah)

I can’t begin to express the validation--I am no gender essentialist’s data point, this is MY experience and no one else’s, but I keep going “my aunt had a hyst and didn’t transition and I had one and I am because my brain makes androgens my brain makes androgens MY BRAIN MAKES ANDROGENS IT HAS BEEN MAKING ANDROGENS ALL THIS TIME IT HAS BEEN TRYING” and living in that, living in “not even SCIENCE is against me”, which is a tremendous thing as a scientist.  (As a scientist, I would be a blithering dullard to claim this is the only thing that affects or proves my gender, and I do not.  Again, TERFs fuck off.  This is simply a very validating thing to me, personally, in my experience.  I’m not thrilled that I have to underline that this hard dammit internet.)

What lies ahead is...I don’t know!  I thought I was done changing, but the post I saw that nudged me to finally do this on here went “you may stop being able to cry for awhile” and this is Important because I have been trying to figure out if I have Sjogren’s but apparently I have androgens which is slightly easier to pronounce.  I’m not sure how I feel about that, because transitioning is a lot of “I’m not sure how I feel about this” and then things being okay.  I would definitely say that the more I learn, the easier it is to feel steady and normal, which is important because the mood swings have been REAL.  This is more than I asked for or bargained for, but I still only have one regret, and that’s that my hyst scars are just slightly asymmetrical and it Bothers Me, but even that is growing on me.

I don’t know how to end this post.  I love you all to death, and I hope if you’re seeking transition, you find it and twenty dollars, and if you’re not seeking transition, you still find twenty dollars.  Thank you so much for you and all you do and are.  Remember--you are great!

Unless you’re truscum.  Then this post isn’t for you (dammit Internet) and you can fall off a boardwalk onto a dead fish.  Have fun with that!

hekk

[minimonojoon]

drabble 01 | pjm

g e n r e: angsty. p a i r i n g: idol!jimin x reader. w o r d s: 1482. p r o m p t: “goodbye kiss” taken from this list. w a r n i n g s: none. a / n: I wrote this last night and rushly edited this morning, so sorry for whatever mistake you’ll find. I wanted to post something as I’m currently writing a bigger fic, which is turning into a personal challenge for me👀. Anyway, I hope you enjoy this little drabble! xx

Airports give you goosebumps.

Usually, it’s the good kind of goosebumps. Your blood runs faster with adrenaline whenever you enter airports, baggage in hand and smile on your face. The sound of trolleys’ wheels on the ground, the chatting of people speaking languages you never heard of – it excites you to the point you can’t stop jumping around here and there, rushing to go on the line for your plane and the protocol controls they made.

To most of the people out there, taking a plane is a stressful experience and sometimes, even awful. You can’t say you hadn’t your fair share of those uncomfortable situations, where you risked arriving late and missing your flight, or simply having to wake up to ungodly hours to take a damn plane. But it was never something you perceived negatively.

Today, however, it is marked as an exception.

There isn’t any goosebumps on your skin, nor the marvelous expression you make whenever you realize the airport is somewhere people just pass by and you watch them in awe, picturing where they go and why. Today, the airport is just a place where people’s bustling and running from and for everywhere, too scared of not arriving in time for their flight, annoys you in a way you could never imagine. You watch passengers fighting on the phone because they baggage were lost and families who part for god knows how long. The sight of a mother adjusting her son’s jacket with shaky hands and lips pressured together to contain her tears and sobs, has your breath itched. The frightening sensation of tears coming to wet your eyes hunts you and you do everything in your willpower to suppress it, desperately fluttering your eyelashes.

It’s only the tugging on your hand that distracts you and you feel the warm fingers intertwined with yours squeezing your tiny hand in a comforted grip.

You lift your gaze to watch your boyfriend, his blond hair completely covered by a black cap. The sole thing you can see right now are his dark eyes, which reflect your same sentiment of falling apart – but you picture a smile under the black fabric of his mask, the way it crinkles around his mouth. This is one of the reason why you love and hate Jimin; being able to be strong whenever it is needed and acting as everything is okay, even when it’s clearly not it’s both a bless and curse for you. It shows you how much strong he is, but at the same time he makes himself unreachable for you, prohibiting you to comfort him as well.

You smile back, following him to the gates where passengers are lining up, waiting to pass the usual controlling operations. “Did you take everything? I know you tend to forget your toothbrush, dummy,” you start, stopping beside a closed shop, in a more secluded spot. The thundering of your heart is now strong enough that you can hear it, as your voice quivers a little. You’re not even able to look at him in the eyes.

“I did, yeah. But I’ll take another one to add it to my collection when I come back,” he tries to lighten the mood, chuckling mildly. You hum a laugh, uncapable to really enjoying how he jokes about your personal collection of toothbrush, always bought in some stores across the world or taken away from hotels he stays in during concert or promotion period. You move closer to him, until your cheek touches his shoulder. This is not the first time he goes away, yet this one in particular has put you under an emotional rollercoaster.

Maybe because you will not see each other for probably more than six months.

“Call me or text me when you arrive. And don’t forget to eat. I recommended Tae to watch over you.” You blurt the words with a dreading scowl, interrupting the silence established between the two of you, looking at him in the eyes to show how serious you are. The way your brows are furrowed and your lips form that adorable pout make Jimin watching you with adoration and longing, simply nodding to your words. He isn’t able to form a cocky reply as he’d have usually done, not this time.

“You better study and work hard, okay? I want you to finally have that degree. You deserve that.” He affirms determinedly, suddenly cupping your cheeks. You watch him with wide eyes, biting your bottom lip to contain your tears. You feel an enormous lump on your throat and you try to gulp multiples times, uselessly.

You take a deep, shaky breath, gripping his coat with your small hands. You want this moment to never end, prolonging it as much as possible. “I’ll miss you so much, Jimin,” you stutter, as you realize he soon needs to go. He might be arriving late to the gate and you can’t let that happen, not when he purposely asked his manager to let him go a day after the rest of boys have gone to their first big city of their worldwide tour, just to stay with you. You choke a sob that threatens to leave your lips.

“I’ll miss you, too,___.”

He places his mask below his chin, so you can now see his face. His eyes are watery as yours, you notice. It’s almost comically the way you two try to smile to each other but failing miserably. You try to joke on that, when Jimin’s eyes closes briefly and his face draws near yours, until his lips are gently brushing yours. Your breath falters at the delicate touch, as this is your very first kiss and not the last in the next long months.

It’s just a matter of seconds though, before you decide to press firmly yet gently your lips on his, sealing them in a proper kiss.

Your heart suddenly burst in a thundering storm, pulsing violently as the thought that you will not be able to touch him like this for longer than you ever imagined hits you. It has your arms sliding across his shoulders and your feet to lift so that you can mold your body to his. You feel his stronger arms clasping your middle as his hands alt in the expanse of your back, as he also desires to never separate from you and to embed you forever.

In that moment, everything is casted away. The noises of the outside are a faint sound in the background, as you focus on the sensation the kiss you’re sharing with Jimin crash you like a wave of the ocean. It’s like you are in your own little bubble, excluding the rest of the world from it. Your chest blooms with love and affection for the boy in your arms, as your part your lips to let him search your tongue to deepen the kiss. Your hands caress the strands on the back of his neck, tugging slightly on them. You don’t want to let go, now nor never. It’s childish and egoistic, but you don’t want leave him.

That’s why, after what felt like interminable minutes passed too fast, you whine when Jimin detaches from you, chuckling before pressing his nose to yours and then in the crook of your neck, inhaling your delicate and flowery scent. The words “don’t go” are on the tip of your tongue, but you don’t voice them. Yet you seem to not let your grip on his coat loosen and that’s why Jimin has to calmly place his hands above yours.

“I need to go, love,” Jimin whispers, as these words wounded him the moment he let them out. He lovingly brushes his thumbs on the back of your hands in a soothing way before you finally let go, sighing dejectedly.

“See you in six months, then,” you snivel, wiping a tear from your cheek. He simply nods, before he goes in for another kiss. This time, Jimin just press his lips over yours in a sweet, innocent way, like he’s going out for practice or to the groceries store near your apartment. Not far away from you.

“I love you.”

“I love you too, hon.”

You wave your hand, eyes puffy and red as you carefully watch him lining up with other people, sniffing. It’s only when Jimin is nearly at the corner of the line that he turns to you one last time. He settles his mask below his chin again, smiling reassuringly. He sends you a flying kiss this time and you can’t help but chuckle as your cheeks burn red returning the gesture. You bless this century for technology, devices and apps for once. As you watch your boyfriend vanish, following the line, you start walking back to the main entrance.

You can’t wait to go back here to welcome him again.

[un-chat-sauvage-blog]

On-Page SEO for 2019 - Whiteboard Friday

Posted by BritneyMuller

Whew! We made it through another year, and it seems like we're past due for taking a close look at the health of our on-page SEO practices. What better way to hit the ground running than with a checklist? In today's Whiteboard Friday, the fabulous Britney Muller shares her best tips for doing effective on-page SEO in 2019.

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Hey, Moz fans. Welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Today we're going over all things on-page SEO, and I've divided it into three different sections:

How are crawlers and Googlebot crawling through your site and your web pages?

What is the UX of your on-page content?

What is the value in the content of your on-page content?

So let's just jump right in, shall we?

Crawler/bot-accessible

☑ Meta robots tag allows crawling

Making sure your meta robots tag allows crawling is essential. If that's blocking Googlebot from crawling, your page will never be in search. You want to make sure that's all panned out.

☑ Robots.txt doesn't disallow crawling

You want to make sure that let's say this page that you're trying to get to rank in search engines, that you're not disallowing this URL from your robots.txt.

☑ URL is included in sitemap

Similarly you want to make sure that the URL is in your site map.

☑ Schema markup

You also want to add any schema markup, any relevant schema markup that you can. This is essentially spoon-feeding search engines what your page is about and what your content is about.

☑ Internal links pointing to your page with natural anchor text

So let's say I am trying to rank for chakra stones. Maybe I'm on a yoga website and I want to make sure that I have other internal pages linking to chakra stones with the anchor text "chakra crystals" or "chakra stones" and making sure that I'm showing Google that this is indeed an internally linked page and it's important and we want to give it some weight.

☑ HTTPS - SSL

You want to make sure that that is secure and that Google is taking that into consideration as well.

User experience

☑ Meets Web Content Accessibility Guidelines

Does it meet Web Content Accessibility Guidelines? Definitely look into that and make sure you check all the boxes.

☑ Responsive mobile design with same content and links

Is it responsive for mobile? Super important with the mobile-first indexing.

☑ Clear CTA

Is there one clear call to action? A lot of pages miss this. So, for this page, maybe I would have a big "Buy Chakra Crystals Here" button or link. That would be a clear CTA. It's important to have.

☑ Multimedia: Evaluate SERP and add desired media

Are you providing other desired media types? Are there images and video and different forms of content on your page?

☑ Page speed: utilize CDNs, compress images, use reliable hosting

Are you checking the page speed? Are you using CDNs? Are you compressing your images? You want to check all of that.

☑ Integrate social sharing buttons

It's the easiest thing. Make sure that people can easily share your content.

Content and value

This is where it gets really fun and strategic too.

☑ Unique, high-quality content

Are you providing high-quality content? So if you go to Google and you search "chakra stones" and you take a look at all of those results, are you including all of that good content into your page? Then are you making it even better? Because that should be the goal.

☑ Optimize for intent: Evaluate SERP and PPC, note which SERP features show up

You want to also optimize for intent. So you want to evaluate that SERP. If that search result page is showing tons of images or maybe videos, you should be incorporating that into your page as well, because clearly that's what people are looking for.

You also want to evaluate the PPC. They have done so much testing on what converts and what doesn't. So it's silly not to take that into consideration when optimizing your page.

☑ Title tags and meta descriptions

What are those titles? What are those descriptions? What's working? Title tags and meta description are still so important. This is the first impression to many of your visitors in Google. Are you enticing a click? Are you making that an enticing call to action to your site?

☑ Header tags

H1, H2, and H3 header tags are still super important. You want to make sure that the title of your page is the H1 and so forth. But just to check on all of that would be good.

☑ Optimize images: compress, title file names, add alt text

Images are the biggest source of bloat of on-page site speed. So you want to make sure that your images are compressed and optimized and keeping your page fast and easily accessible to your users.

☑ Review for freshness

You want to review for freshness. We want to make sure that this is up-to-date content. Maybe take a look at popular content the last year or two of your site and update that stuff. This should be a continual wash and repeat. You want to continue to update the content on your site.

☑ Include commonly asked questions

It's such an easy thing to do, but it's commonly overlooked. AnswerThePublic does a great job of surfacing questions. Moz Keyword Explorer has a really great filter that provides some of the most commonly asked questions for a keyword term. I highly suggest you check that out and start to incorporate some of that.

Find common questions now

These help to target featured snippets. So if you're incorporating some of that, not only do you get the extra traffic, but you find these opportunities of getting featured snippets, which is great. You're expanding your real estate in search. Awesome. PAA boxes are also a great way to find commonly asked questions for a particular keyword.

☑ Add summaries

Summaries are also hidden gems. We see Google seeking out summaries for content all of the time. They are providing summaries in featured snippets and in different SERP features to help sort of distill information for users. So if you can do that, not only will you make your content more easily scannable, but you're also making it more accessible for search, which is great.

☑ TF-IDF (term frequency-inverse document frequency)

TF-IDF stands for "term frequency-inverse document frequency." It sounds a little intimidating. It's actually pretty simple. What's the number of times that "chakra stones" is mentioned in this particular page divided by the number of times it's mentioned anywhere? This is basically just a calculation to determine relevance for the term "chakra stones." Really cool and commonly used by Google. So if you can do this on your on-page, it will just help you in the long term.

☑ LSI (latent semantic indexing) for relevance

Similarly LSI or LSA, it sometimes referred to, is latent semantic indexing, and it's also for relevance. This helps determine, okay, if I'm talking about chakra stones, it may also incorporate those other topics that are commonly related to this topic. Relevant.

☑ Flesch-Kincaid Readability Test

What is the readability of this page? The easier it is to read the better, but you just want to keep an eye on that in general.

Bonus tip!

One final tip that Kameron Jenkins put on Twitter, that I love so much, and Kameron is a world-class writer -she's one of the best I've ever had the privilege of working with - mentioned this on-page SEO trick. Find the top three ranking URLs for your target keyword.

KW research tip 1. Search your target kw & pull the top 3 ranking URLs 2. Compare URLs in @Moz KWE 3. Click on the areas of most overlap 4. See KWs that top-ranking URLs for target KW also rank for 5. Use ideas to optimize your own page! pic.twitter.com/FxJjOxn7DJ - Kameron Jenkins (@Kammie_Jenkins) November 7, 2018

So if I were to put in "chakra stones" in Google and pull the top three URLs, put them into Moz Keyword Explorer and I see what they're ranking for, I see what those three URLs are specifically ranking for, and I look at what they're commonly ranking for in the middle here. Then I use those keywords to optimize my page even better. It's genius. It's very similar to some of the relevant stuff we were talking about over here.

Discover new keyword ideas

So definitely try some of this stuff out. I hope this helps. I really look forward to any of your comments or questions down below in the comments section.

Thank you so much for joining me on this edition of Whiteboard Friday. I look forward to seeing you all again soon, so thanks. Have a good one.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

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[makingnewenemies]

Hi Hi Hi. Here is a little blurb I wrote off the top of my head about all my friends on this year’s Group Picture Vol. 8. I love them all. I love their songs. And I love that we still keep up this stupid tradition; and somehow the comp keeps getting better and better. Thanks everyone! Merry Christmas / Happy Holidays :) - walt

Sour Guy - All Those Plans Were Wrong

Last summer Kris Schobert (Sour Guy, Walter Etc. / Mitty core member, Ernie…) was admitted to the hospital… and then again… and then again…. I think he spent like a month total in the hospital. It was not chill. But when he got out, the whole experience gave him a bit of clarity and new perspective on his life and the decisions he has made thus far. I won’t speak any further for him, but Kris… hey, nice song! And your quality home recording production and continuation of the WMAHMO slop sound doesn’t not go unnoticed! This song made me tear up in a coffee shop the first time I heard it. 

Slaughter Beach, Dog - Big Band

Slaughter Beach, Dog are randomly GP staples by now but also one of my favorite bands and greatest friends. This song is a bit of a sound change for them, swapping mid tempo soft rock John K Sampson vibes for a theatrical late 60’s / 70’s sound that is a bit more light hearted than normal and I LOVE IT. It’s catchy, it makes me laugh, yet its so true. Glad to have these boys back this year.

Teal & Jer - Alphabet

Portland’s dreamiest duo Teal & Jer (Chain, Riled, Loose, lots of projects) bring a quirky alt edge to our otherwise bland and boring comp. Without them, we’d just be us. I personally would like to hear more Teal solo work??? Teal???

Milk Flud - Rodeo

If you don’t fuck with Milk Flud then you can get out.

Chase Hoyt - Health

Chase Hoyt (Ubu Roi, Feed, Chaz and the Minions of Chaz, The Rodeo…) is a GP fixture by now, and important asset to MNE because it’s his classic rock sensibilities that balance out the overload of folk / indie rock that we swim in. This song not only has a comically true message (health is the most important, i agree Chase) but the vibe, especially the chorus, has my head bobbing and me feeling like I’m on a grassy hillside at an outdoor concert in the 70’s, but also one glass of wine deep making homemade pizzas at an Air BNB with a girl I love, and that is a nice combo of feelings. “Let’s wrap it up / I’ve embarrassed us all enough”

Dry Goods - Learnt Nothing

You hear that flawless acoustic finger picking? That masculine story telling voice that sounds somewhere between a suburban Bob Dylan and a cowboy singing to the emptiness of the high desert? Yup, its Russell Park AKA Dry Goods and FKA Weston Bookhouse coming at us with another folk masterpiece, but this year adding in some new elements we aren’t quite used to- namely some cruisey guitar solos! Rumor has it Dry Goods is in the studio recording a new album right now and I would not be bummed out if this song were on it.

Byronius Punk - Beautiful Things

I just spent 3 weeks with Byronius Punk (Ian Farmer of Slaugher Beach, Dog / Modern Baseball) at his studio The Metal Shop in Philadelphia making a record with his beautiful mind and his new drum machine- so this song really hits home for me. I could write an essay on why this is the perfect Group Picture song- my three main points being - 1. It is a song about the act of creating. (“in everything that exists there lies a certain beauty / I want the world to know how much it all means to me”) which is exactly what Group Picture aims to celebrate. 2. It’s a song written and performed by someone who is usually more in the background of his bands (bassist / backup vox / recording engineer) but here has a platform to express his own individual style and skills, which is exactly what Group Picture wants to promote. 3. It has a Milk Flud name drop, which is a classic and classy GP / MNE move. Thank you Ian. You rule.

Dante Elephante - It Bothers Me

Dante Elephante are Santa Barbara legends and their new album “Rare Attractions” shows them evolving their sound into more loungey and ethereal territory. I am so glad they have joined GP this year, because I see singer / songwriter Ruben almost every weekend when he DJ’s at The Tavern in Ventura and I drunkenly annoy him / vaguely fan boy out on him. Dante being on Group Picture is a sign that our friendship extends beyond Saturday nights at the Tavern. Also their album vibes hard. Check out Rare Attractions on Spotify.

Peanut Butter Cups - Highest Quality

Petition for Aaron Kovacs (Peanut Butter cups, Lauren Records CEO, Winter Break and Summer Vacation drummer) to finally put out a full album? This catchy lo-fi pop rock is undeniably infectious. Fun fact: I’ve been hanging with this boy for almost 10 years and I’ve never heard him sing, but then he sends me these recordings and I’m like wtf your voice is so cool! If he makes a full album, MNE will put out the LP and still give him 100% of the digital income. That is how much I like Aaron’s style. 

Anika Pyle - Young Love

I once wrote a song with the lyric “I’ll probably see her on tour but she won’t be on Group Picture this year.” I’m so glad I was wrong. Welcome to GP Anika Pyle! Anika (Katie Ellen, Chumped) plays raw emotional pop rock songs and this gem “Young Love” is just the tip of the iceberg. When her vocals max out at the end of the tune and you get a little bit of musical goosebumps, that is the feeling you get for a full 30 minutes of watching her play live. Anika, please come in and stay for a while! 

Walter Etc. - This Would Only Happen to Me

Ok ok enough of the soft emotional bullshit. Here’s a song about someone coming to kill me! It’s 100% true. If you’re reading this, help!!!

Jake Lee - Good Run

Jake Lee (Bleeding Gums Murphy) strikes again with a lo-fi indie gem in which we hear Jake Lee reflect on his gaime from last year. Sounds like he made some interesting choices and is coming to terms with them? Or did I miss the mark, Jake? He is and always will be one of my favorite songwriters and his voice in this fuzz effect is not a bad look, I have to admit. The only way my life would be better is if Jake made a full album. Cheers homie.

Babytooth - State Quarters, OR

Technically, this is Babytooth’s official debut on Group Picture, but Portland, OR singer / songwriter Isabel Zacharias had a song on the comp last year that blew me away. It was her vocals and lyrics that hooked me then, and are still yanking me now. Now backed by a full band that gives dynamic range to her songs, it was still that first line “now you know you want a girl without a phone” that had me nodding “yup i love this”. Fingers crossed for Babytooth to become a GP staple.

Trashbike - Weasel

Trashbike is Bread (Blowout, Walter etc., Donkey Lips) and his homie Ru playing the pedals. He told me he wrote this song while stumbling home from the Bye and Bye. Bread is like a sexy emo prince, can’t you hear it? This song rules and I really hope Trashbike is more than just a one and done GP band. I would listen to a few albums of soft songs like this, wouldn’t you?

Banned From Japan - Vegan X

Welcome back to the Socal Valley punk rockers Banned From Japan! If you know that singer / songwriter Matthew Earle has been sober for a few years, this song is hilarious, simultaneously poking fun at vegan straight-edge and himself. The music rips and his vocals are catchy af. Fat Wrecks Chords come and sign Banned From Japan asap!

Walter X - Winter Shy

Ok. This is a bit meta. Walter X (Michael Mahaffie and his WMAHMO / Walter Etc. hardcore chip tune cover project) covers an old Walter GP song as his own GP song. Pretty niche MNE content! This song, in this Lifetime-esque style, his vocals so clear but so gruff, those guitar harmonies, the creative intro and chip-tuney bridge…. this literally gives me chills and is so much better than the original. I encourage anyone reading this to go check out his own original music under the name Jump Cut. It sounds just like this but with Michael’s own songs, shedding the limitations of the musical simpleton Walter songs.  Also, check out the full Walter X album on Spotify! What a talented dude…

Curling - Genkai Trip

Curling released their MNE album “Definitely Band” this year and the musical arrangements / song structures absolutely floored me. Genkai Trip is a song that got left off the album, but lives on through GP! Singer / guitarist Bernie Gelman noted “There's some pretty wacky guitar overdubs where Jojo and I each doubled some guitar parts while the other person was playing with the trem on the guitar, so you get this really weird detuning effect.” and yup that is Curling in a nutshell for you. Always excited to play around with gear and recording techniques that are way beyond my level.  I think this is an extremely underrated band and highly encourage the world to check out Definitely Band on spotify!

Ali Muhareb - DIY Hell

Ali? What the hell did you even make this song? It’s intriguing in the verses and then when the chorus busts out it sounds like if Dough Martsch were an up and coming artist in Portland in 2018. I actually had to text Ali to ask what these guitar sounds were and, if anyone is interested, he responded, “I compressed two guitars together through a virtual amp. And they’re both running through this sick pedal I got called the Data Corrupter.” For sure Ali! Thanks for a bad ass tune.

Dakota Loesch - Don’t Solve My Mysteries

I’ve been listening to a lot of Dakota’s music (solo, Animal City, Lemp Lungs) recently. I keep coming back to it, and its not a mystery. After hundreds of songs in his pocket, songs like “Don’t Solve My Mysteries” still sound musically and lyrically fresh, like Dakota has never had writer’s block in his life. When I listen to his music, I feel like it vicariously breaks down my own creative barriers. For instance when I first heard this song and he dropped the hook “just don’t solve all mysterious” I had that knee-jerk urge to ditch what I was doing and go write a poem or something. His will to create is just that contagious. Combine that with the Casio-keyboard bedroom drum machine vibe that I love so much about his songs like “The Basmati Rice” and you have a 10/10 GP banger. 

Jerbear - Nowhere Girl

Jerbear is Jeremy Murphy (Teal & Jer, Riled, so many) and he is the king of a few things: weird bad guitar tones, asymmetrical organic song structures, rad lyrics that I never understand, and a voice that is universally loved. He stole my heart with Cranberries in the Cosmos on a previous GP, but I think Nowhere Girl takes the cake. Jer- when do we get the full solo album? Please don’t fall into the category of GP lost wonders. You’re not too shabby at this music thing! 

Hemingway - Catch My Cool

Catch My Cool is a B-side from Hemingway’s You Will Never Be Happy.

I played drums in Hemingway at this time and I always vibed that Benny didn’t really like the way this song came out int he studio. I don’t get why? That vocal melody, soft sad and surfy guitar leads… it makes me wanna hold hands with a girl on Christmas Eve while walking down some bougie street looking at Christmas Lights. It sounds like a Starflyer 59 worship track and I love it for that. Benny, you made a mistake. This song should have made the album. 

Alex Maddox - The Hypocrit’s Dilemma

I’ve heard Alex play this song when we get together to jam, and he always laughs it off as a Walter Mitty rip off song. But honestly, this is what I wish WMAHMO would write about if we made a folk punk record today. If you listen to this song knowing that Alex Maddox was a guy who quit his high paying job to travel Europe in his van, surfing and skating and working on farms, the lyrics to this song are way more wanna-be Walter Mitty. The song depicts a transformation in his paradigm and is completely raw, authentic, and sincere. Alex inspires me to chase a wholesome life that is designed for and by myself, rather than the obvious and sterile template that is provided for us, and this song exemplifies that 1000%. 

Uncle Uncle - Nira (I’m Alive)

We played with Uncle Uncle last year in Santa Barbara and I honestly think we should have opened for them. They are actually a good band, both live and recorded. Stylish, friendly, and comically laid back- they might be the quintessential Santa Barbara band. A semi-new band, Uncle Uncle is gaining momentum quickly, and I won’t be surprised when the day comes that Kevin and Dom big time me on State st. Til then, I’m just glad I get to claim that they were on a Group Picture. 

Humphrey Orlando - Set U Free

Ah, Humphrey. No, Humphrey accompanied by Toast. Two legends as old as MNE itself. What is there to say? I could listen to their wandering ballads til I fall into the Big Sleep, and still the melodies linger on…

[lakelandseo]

Image Link Building — Best of Whiteboard Friday

Posted by BritneyMuller

Last week, we took you into the future with SEO expert Britney Muller to explore link prospecting in 2021. This week, we're going back in time — all the way to 2017 — for her concrete advice on an important part of building links: image link building.

Image link building is a delicate art. There are some distinct considerations from traditional link building, and doing it successfully requires a balance of creativity, curiosity, and having the right tools on hand. Let's dive in! 

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Hey, Moz fans, welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Today we're going to go over all things image link building, which is sort of an art. I'm so excited to dig into this with you.

Know your link targets

So first and foremost, you need to know your link targets:

I. Popular industry platforms - top pages

What are those top platforms or websites that you would really like to acquire a link from? Then, from there, you can start to understand who might be influencers on those platforms, who's writing the content, who might you contact, and also what are the top pages currently for those sites. There are a number of tools that give you a glimpse into that information. Moz's OSE, Open Site Explorer, will show you top pages. SEMrush has a top page report. SimilarWeb has a popular page report. You can dig into all that information there, really interesting stuff.

II. Old popular images - update!

You can also start to dig into old, popular images and then update them. So what are old popular images within your space that you could have an opportunity to revamp and update? A really neat way to sort of dig into some of that is BuzzSumo's infographics filter, and then you would insert the topic. You enter the industry or the topic you're trying to address and then search by the infographics to see if you can come across anything.

III. Transform popular content into images

You can also just transform popular content into images, and I think there is so much opportunity in doing that for new statistics reports, new data that comes out. There are tons of great opportunities to transform those into multiple images and leverage that across different platforms for link building.

IV. Influencers

Again, just understanding who those influencers are.

Do your keyword research

So, from here, we're going to dive into the keyword research part of this whole puzzle, and this is really understanding the intent behind people searching about the topic or the product or whatever it might be. Something you can do is evaluate keywords with link intent. This is a brilliant concept I heard about a couple weeks back from Dan Shure's podcast. Thank you, Dan. Essentially it's the idea that keywords with statistics or facts after the keyword have link intent baked into the search query. It's brilliant. Those individuals are searching for something to reference, to maybe link to, to include in a presentation or an article or whatever that might be. It has this basic link intent.

Another thing you want to evaluate is just anything around images. Do any of your keywords and pictures or photos, etc. have good search volume with some opportunities? What does that search result currently look like? You have to evaluate what's currently ranking to understand what's working and what's not. I used to say at my old agency I didn't want anyone writing any piece of content until they had read all of the 10 search results for that keyword or that phrase we were targeting. Why would you do that until you have a full understanding of how that looks currently and how we can make something way better?

Rand had also mentioned this really cool tip on if you find some keywords, it's good to evaluate whether or not the image carousel shows up for those searches, because if it does, that's a little glimpse into the searcher intent that leads to images. That's a good sign that you're on the right track to really optimize for a certain image. It's something to keep in mind.

Provide value

So, from here, we're going to move up to providing value. Now we're in the brainstorming stage. Hopefully, you've gotten some ideas, you know where you want to link from, and you need to provide value in some way. It could be a...

I. Reference/bookmark Maybe something that people would bookmark, that always works.

II. Perspective is a really interesting one. So some of the most beautiful data visualizations do this extremely well, where they can simplify a confusing concept or a lot of data. It's a great way to leverage images and graphics.

III. Printouts still work really well. Moz has the SEO Dev Cheat Sheet that I have seen printed all over at different agencies, and that's really neat to see it adding value directly.

IV. Curate images. We see this a lot with different articles. Maybe the top 25 to 50 images from this tradeshow or this event or whatever it might be, that's a great way to leverage link building and kind of getting people fired up about a curated piece of content.

Gregory Ciotti — I don't know if I'm saying that right — has an incredible article I suggest you all read called "Why a Visual Really Is Worth a Thousand Words," and he mentions don't be afraid to get obvious. I love that, because I think all too often we tend to overthink images and executing things in general. Why not just state the obvious and see how it goes? He's got great examples.

Optimize

So, from here, we are going to move into optimization. If any of you need a brush-up on image optimization, I highly suggest you check out Rand's Whiteboard Friday on image SEO. It covers everything. But some of the basics are your...

Title

You want to make sure that the title of the image has your keyword and explains what it is that you're trying to convey.

Alt text

This was first and foremost designed for the visually impaired, so you need to be mindful of visually impaired screen readers that will read this to people to explain what the image actually is. So first and foremost, you just need to be helpful and provide information in a descriptive way to describe that image.

Compression

Compression is huge. Page speed is so big right now. I hear about it all the time. I know you guys do too. But one of the easiest ways to help page speed is to compress those huge images. There's a ton of great free tools out there, like Optimizilla, where you can bulk upload a bunch of large images and then bulk download. It makes it super easy. There are also some desktop programs, if you're doing this kind of stuff all the time, that will automatically compress images you download or save. That might be worth looking into if you do this a lot. You want to host the image. You want it to live on your domain. You want to house that. You can leverage it on other platforms, but you want sort of that original to be on your site.

SRCSET

Source set attribute is getting a little technical. It's super interesting, and it's basically this really incredible image attribute that allows you to set the minimum browser size and the image you would prefer to show up for different sizes. So you can not only have different images show up for different devices in different sizes, but you can also revamp them. You can revamp the same image and serve it better for a mobile user versus a tablet, etc. Jon Henshaw has some of the greatest stuff on source set. Highly suggest you look at some of his articles. He's doing really cool things with it. Check that out.

Promotion

So, from here, you want to promote your images. You obviously want to share it on popular platforms. You want to reach back out to some of these things that you might have into earlier. If you updated a piece of content, make them aware of that. Or if you transformed a really popular piece of content into some visuals, you might want to share that with the person who is sharing that piece of content. You want to start to tap into that previous research with your promotion.

Inform the influencers

Ask people to share it. There is nothing wrong with just asking your network of people to share something you've worked really hard on, and hopefully, vice versa, that can work in return and you're not afraid to share something a connection of yours has that they worked really hard on.

Monitor the image SERPs

From here, you need to monitor. One of the best ways to do this is Google reverse image search. So if you go to Google and you click the images tab, there's that little camera icon that you can click on and upload images to see where else they live on the web. This is a great way to figure out who is using your image, where it's being held, are you getting a backlink or are you not. You want to keep an eye on all of that stuff.

Two other tools to do this, that I've heard about, are Image Raider and TinEye. But I have not had great experience with either of these. I would love to hear your comments below if maybe you have.

Reverse image search with Google works the best for me. This is also an awesome opportunity for someone to get on the market and create a Google alert for images. I don't think anyone is actually doing that right now. If you know someone that is, please let me know down below in the comments. But it could be a cool business opportunity, right? I don't know.

So for monitoring, let's say you find your image is being used on different websites. Now you need to do some basic outreach to get that link. You want to request that link for using your image.

This is just a super basic template that I came up with. You can use it. You can change it, do whatever you want. But it's just:

Hi, [first name]. Thank you so much for including our image in your article. Great piece. Just wondering if you could link to us.com as the source. Thanks, Britney

Something like that. Something short, to the point. If you can make it more personalized, please do so. I can't stress that enough. People will take you way more seriously if you have some nugget of personal information or connection that you can make.

From there, you just sort of stay in this loop. After you go through this process, you need to continue to promote your content and continue to monitor and do outreach and push that to maximize your link building efforts. So I hope you enjoyed this. I look forward to hearing all of your comments and thoughts down below in the comments. I look forward to seeing you all later. Thanks for joining us on this edition of Whiteboard Friday. Thanks.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[epackingvietnam]

Image Link Building — Best of Whiteboard Friday

Posted by BritneyMuller

Last week, we took you into the future with SEO expert Britney Muller to explore link prospecting in 2021. This week, we're going back in time — all the way to 2017 — for her concrete advice on an important part of building links: image link building.

Image link building is a delicate art. There are some distinct considerations from traditional link building, and doing it successfully requires a balance of creativity, curiosity, and having the right tools on hand. Let's dive in! 

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Hey, Moz fans, welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Today we're going to go over all things image link building, which is sort of an art. I'm so excited to dig into this with you.

Know your link targets

So first and foremost, you need to know your link targets:

I. Popular industry platforms - top pages

What are those top platforms or websites that you would really like to acquire a link from? Then, from there, you can start to understand who might be influencers on those platforms, who's writing the content, who might you contact, and also what are the top pages currently for those sites. There are a number of tools that give you a glimpse into that information. Moz's OSE, Open Site Explorer, will show you top pages. SEMrush has a top page report. SimilarWeb has a popular page report. You can dig into all that information there, really interesting stuff.

II. Old popular images - update!

You can also start to dig into old, popular images and then update them. So what are old popular images within your space that you could have an opportunity to revamp and update? A really neat way to sort of dig into some of that is BuzzSumo's infographics filter, and then you would insert the topic. You enter the industry or the topic you're trying to address and then search by the infographics to see if you can come across anything.

III. Transform popular content into images

You can also just transform popular content into images, and I think there is so much opportunity in doing that for new statistics reports, new data that comes out. There are tons of great opportunities to transform those into multiple images and leverage that across different platforms for link building.

IV. Influencers

Again, just understanding who those influencers are.

Do your keyword research

So, from here, we're going to dive into the keyword research part of this whole puzzle, and this is really understanding the intent behind people searching about the topic or the product or whatever it might be. Something you can do is evaluate keywords with link intent. This is a brilliant concept I heard about a couple weeks back from Dan Shure's podcast. Thank you, Dan. Essentially it's the idea that keywords with statistics or facts after the keyword have link intent baked into the search query. It's brilliant. Those individuals are searching for something to reference, to maybe link to, to include in a presentation or an article or whatever that might be. It has this basic link intent.

Another thing you want to evaluate is just anything around images. Do any of your keywords and pictures or photos, etc. have good search volume with some opportunities? What does that search result currently look like? You have to evaluate what's currently ranking to understand what's working and what's not. I used to say at my old agency I didn't want anyone writing any piece of content until they had read all of the 10 search results for that keyword or that phrase we were targeting. Why would you do that until you have a full understanding of how that looks currently and how we can make something way better?

Rand had also mentioned this really cool tip on if you find some keywords, it's good to evaluate whether or not the image carousel shows up for those searches, because if it does, that's a little glimpse into the searcher intent that leads to images. That's a good sign that you're on the right track to really optimize for a certain image. It's something to keep in mind.

Provide value

So, from here, we're going to move up to providing value. Now we're in the brainstorming stage. Hopefully, you've gotten some ideas, you know where you want to link from, and you need to provide value in some way. It could be a...

I. Reference/bookmark Maybe something that people would bookmark, that always works.

II. Perspective is a really interesting one. So some of the most beautiful data visualizations do this extremely well, where they can simplify a confusing concept or a lot of data. It's a great way to leverage images and graphics.

III. Printouts still work really well. Moz has the SEO Dev Cheat Sheet that I have seen printed all over at different agencies, and that's really neat to see it adding value directly.

IV. Curate images. We see this a lot with different articles. Maybe the top 25 to 50 images from this tradeshow or this event or whatever it might be, that's a great way to leverage link building and kind of getting people fired up about a curated piece of content.

Gregory Ciotti — I don't know if I'm saying that right — has an incredible article I suggest you all read called "Why a Visual Really Is Worth a Thousand Words," and he mentions don't be afraid to get obvious. I love that, because I think all too often we tend to overthink images and executing things in general. Why not just state the obvious and see how it goes? He's got great examples.

Optimize

So, from here, we are going to move into optimization. If any of you need a brush-up on image optimization, I highly suggest you check out Rand's Whiteboard Friday on image SEO. It covers everything. But some of the basics are your...

Title

You want to make sure that the title of the image has your keyword and explains what it is that you're trying to convey.

Alt text

This was first and foremost designed for the visually impaired, so you need to be mindful of visually impaired screen readers that will read this to people to explain what the image actually is. So first and foremost, you just need to be helpful and provide information in a descriptive way to describe that image.

Compression

Compression is huge. Page speed is so big right now. I hear about it all the time. I know you guys do too. But one of the easiest ways to help page speed is to compress those huge images. There's a ton of great free tools out there, like Optimizilla, where you can bulk upload a bunch of large images and then bulk download. It makes it super easy. There are also some desktop programs, if you're doing this kind of stuff all the time, that will automatically compress images you download or save. That might be worth looking into if you do this a lot. You want to host the image. You want it to live on your domain. You want to house that. You can leverage it on other platforms, but you want sort of that original to be on your site.

SRCSET

Source set attribute is getting a little technical. It's super interesting, and it's basically this really incredible image attribute that allows you to set the minimum browser size and the image you would prefer to show up for different sizes. So you can not only have different images show up for different devices in different sizes, but you can also revamp them. You can revamp the same image and serve it better for a mobile user versus a tablet, etc. Jon Henshaw has some of the greatest stuff on source set. Highly suggest you look at some of his articles. He's doing really cool things with it. Check that out.

Promotion

So, from here, you want to promote your images. You obviously want to share it on popular platforms. You want to reach back out to some of these things that you might have into earlier. If you updated a piece of content, make them aware of that. Or if you transformed a really popular piece of content into some visuals, you might want to share that with the person who is sharing that piece of content. You want to start to tap into that previous research with your promotion.

Inform the influencers

Ask people to share it. There is nothing wrong with just asking your network of people to share something you've worked really hard on, and hopefully, vice versa, that can work in return and you're not afraid to share something a connection of yours has that they worked really hard on.

Monitor the image SERPs

From here, you need to monitor. One of the best ways to do this is Google reverse image search. So if you go to Google and you click the images tab, there's that little camera icon that you can click on and upload images to see where else they live on the web. This is a great way to figure out who is using your image, where it's being held, are you getting a backlink or are you not. You want to keep an eye on all of that stuff.

Two other tools to do this, that I've heard about, are Image Raider and TinEye. But I have not had great experience with either of these. I would love to hear your comments below if maybe you have.

Reverse image search with Google works the best for me. This is also an awesome opportunity for someone to get on the market and create a Google alert for images. I don't think anyone is actually doing that right now. If you know someone that is, please let me know down below in the comments. But it could be a cool business opportunity, right? I don't know.

So for monitoring, let's say you find your image is being used on different websites. Now you need to do some basic outreach to get that link. You want to request that link for using your image.

This is just a super basic template that I came up with. You can use it. You can change it, do whatever you want. But it's just:

Hi, [first name]. Thank you so much for including our image in your article. Great piece. Just wondering if you could link to us.com as the source. Thanks, Britney

Something like that. Something short, to the point. If you can make it more personalized, please do so. I can't stress that enough. People will take you way more seriously if you have some nugget of personal information or connection that you can make.

From there, you just sort of stay in this loop. After you go through this process, you need to continue to promote your content and continue to monitor and do outreach and push that to maximize your link building efforts. So I hope you enjoyed this. I look forward to hearing all of your comments and thoughts down below in the comments. I look forward to seeing you all later. Thanks for joining us on this edition of Whiteboard Friday. Thanks.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

#túi_giấy_epacking_việt_nam #túi_giấy_epacking #in_túi_giấy_giá_rẻ #in_túi_giấy #epackingvietnam #tuigiayepacking

[bfxenon]

Image Link Building — Best of Whiteboard Friday

Posted by BritneyMuller

Last week, we took you into the future with SEO expert Britney Muller to explore link prospecting in 2021. This week, we're going back in time — all the way to 2017 — for her concrete advice on an important part of building links: image link building.

Image link building is a delicate art. There are some distinct considerations from traditional link building, and doing it successfully requires a balance of creativity, curiosity, and having the right tools on hand. Let's dive in! 

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Hey, Moz fans, welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Today we're going to go over all things image link building, which is sort of an art. I'm so excited to dig into this with you.

Know your link targets

So first and foremost, you need to know your link targets:

I. Popular industry platforms - top pages

What are those top platforms or websites that you would really like to acquire a link from? Then, from there, you can start to understand who might be influencers on those platforms, who's writing the content, who might you contact, and also what are the top pages currently for those sites. There are a number of tools that give you a glimpse into that information. Moz's OSE, Open Site Explorer, will show you top pages. SEMrush has a top page report. SimilarWeb has a popular page report. You can dig into all that information there, really interesting stuff.

II. Old popular images - update!

You can also start to dig into old, popular images and then update them. So what are old popular images within your space that you could have an opportunity to revamp and update? A really neat way to sort of dig into some of that is BuzzSumo's infographics filter, and then you would insert the topic. You enter the industry or the topic you're trying to address and then search by the infographics to see if you can come across anything.

III. Transform popular content into images

You can also just transform popular content into images, and I think there is so much opportunity in doing that for new statistics reports, new data that comes out. There are tons of great opportunities to transform those into multiple images and leverage that across different platforms for link building.

IV. Influencers

Again, just understanding who those influencers are.

Do your keyword research

So, from here, we're going to dive into the keyword research part of this whole puzzle, and this is really understanding the intent behind people searching about the topic or the product or whatever it might be. Something you can do is evaluate keywords with link intent. This is a brilliant concept I heard about a couple weeks back from Dan Shure's podcast. Thank you, Dan. Essentially it's the idea that keywords with statistics or facts after the keyword have link intent baked into the search query. It's brilliant. Those individuals are searching for something to reference, to maybe link to, to include in a presentation or an article or whatever that might be. It has this basic link intent.

Another thing you want to evaluate is just anything around images. Do any of your keywords and pictures or photos, etc. have good search volume with some opportunities? What does that search result currently look like? You have to evaluate what's currently ranking to understand what's working and what's not. I used to say at my old agency I didn't want anyone writing any piece of content until they had read all of the 10 search results for that keyword or that phrase we were targeting. Why would you do that until you have a full understanding of how that looks currently and how we can make something way better?

Rand had also mentioned this really cool tip on if you find some keywords, it's good to evaluate whether or not the image carousel shows up for those searches, because if it does, that's a little glimpse into the searcher intent that leads to images. That's a good sign that you're on the right track to really optimize for a certain image. It's something to keep in mind.

Provide value

So, from here, we're going to move up to providing value. Now we're in the brainstorming stage. Hopefully, you've gotten some ideas, you know where you want to link from, and you need to provide value in some way. It could be a...

I. Reference/bookmark Maybe something that people would bookmark, that always works.

II. Perspective is a really interesting one. So some of the most beautiful data visualizations do this extremely well, where they can simplify a confusing concept or a lot of data. It's a great way to leverage images and graphics.

III. Printouts still work really well. Moz has the SEO Dev Cheat Sheet that I have seen printed all over at different agencies, and that's really neat to see it adding value directly.

IV. Curate images. We see this a lot with different articles. Maybe the top 25 to 50 images from this tradeshow or this event or whatever it might be, that's a great way to leverage link building and kind of getting people fired up about a curated piece of content.

Gregory Ciotti — I don't know if I'm saying that right — has an incredible article I suggest you all read called "Why a Visual Really Is Worth a Thousand Words," and he mentions don't be afraid to get obvious. I love that, because I think all too often we tend to overthink images and executing things in general. Why not just state the obvious and see how it goes? He's got great examples.

Optimize

So, from here, we are going to move into optimization. If any of you need a brush-up on image optimization, I highly suggest you check out Rand's Whiteboard Friday on image SEO. It covers everything. But some of the basics are your...

Title

You want to make sure that the title of the image has your keyword and explains what it is that you're trying to convey.

Alt text

This was first and foremost designed for the visually impaired, so you need to be mindful of visually impaired screen readers that will read this to people to explain what the image actually is. So first and foremost, you just need to be helpful and provide information in a descriptive way to describe that image.

Compression

Compression is huge. Page speed is so big right now. I hear about it all the time. I know you guys do too. But one of the easiest ways to help page speed is to compress those huge images. There's a ton of great free tools out there, like Optimizilla, where you can bulk upload a bunch of large images and then bulk download. It makes it super easy. There are also some desktop programs, if you're doing this kind of stuff all the time, that will automatically compress images you download or save. That might be worth looking into if you do this a lot. You want to host the image. You want it to live on your domain. You want to house that. You can leverage it on other platforms, but you want sort of that original to be on your site.

SRCSET

Source set attribute is getting a little technical. It's super interesting, and it's basically this really incredible image attribute that allows you to set the minimum browser size and the image you would prefer to show up for different sizes. So you can not only have different images show up for different devices in different sizes, but you can also revamp them. You can revamp the same image and serve it better for a mobile user versus a tablet, etc. Jon Henshaw has some of the greatest stuff on source set. Highly suggest you look at some of his articles. He's doing really cool things with it. Check that out.

Promotion

So, from here, you want to promote your images. You obviously want to share it on popular platforms. You want to reach back out to some of these things that you might have into earlier. If you updated a piece of content, make them aware of that. Or if you transformed a really popular piece of content into some visuals, you might want to share that with the person who is sharing that piece of content. You want to start to tap into that previous research with your promotion.

Inform the influencers

Ask people to share it. There is nothing wrong with just asking your network of people to share something you've worked really hard on, and hopefully, vice versa, that can work in return and you're not afraid to share something a connection of yours has that they worked really hard on.

Monitor the image SERPs

From here, you need to monitor. One of the best ways to do this is Google reverse image search. So if you go to Google and you click the images tab, there's that little camera icon that you can click on and upload images to see where else they live on the web. This is a great way to figure out who is using your image, where it's being held, are you getting a backlink or are you not. You want to keep an eye on all of that stuff.

Two other tools to do this, that I've heard about, are Image Raider and TinEye. But I have not had great experience with either of these. I would love to hear your comments below if maybe you have.

Reverse image search with Google works the best for me. This is also an awesome opportunity for someone to get on the market and create a Google alert for images. I don't think anyone is actually doing that right now. If you know someone that is, please let me know down below in the comments. But it could be a cool business opportunity, right? I don't know.

So for monitoring, let's say you find your image is being used on different websites. Now you need to do some basic outreach to get that link. You want to request that link for using your image.

This is just a super basic template that I came up with. You can use it. You can change it, do whatever you want. But it's just:

Hi, [first name]. Thank you so much for including our image in your article. Great piece. Just wondering if you could link to us.com as the source. Thanks, Britney

Something like that. Something short, to the point. If you can make it more personalized, please do so. I can't stress that enough. People will take you way more seriously if you have some nugget of personal information or connection that you can make.

From there, you just sort of stay in this loop. After you go through this process, you need to continue to promote your content and continue to monitor and do outreach and push that to maximize your link building efforts. So I hope you enjoyed this. I look forward to hearing all of your comments and thoughts down below in the comments. I look forward to seeing you all later. Thanks for joining us on this edition of Whiteboard Friday. Thanks.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[nutrifami]

Image Link Building — Best of Whiteboard Friday

Posted by BritneyMuller

Last week, we took you into the future with SEO expert Britney Muller to explore link prospecting in 2021. This week, we're going back in time — all the way to 2017 — for her concrete advice on an important part of building links: image link building.

Image link building is a delicate art. There are some distinct considerations from traditional link building, and doing it successfully requires a balance of creativity, curiosity, and having the right tools on hand. Let's dive in! 

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Hey, Moz fans, welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Today we're going to go over all things image link building, which is sort of an art. I'm so excited to dig into this with you.

Know your link targets

So first and foremost, you need to know your link targets:

I. Popular industry platforms - top pages

What are those top platforms or websites that you would really like to acquire a link from? Then, from there, you can start to understand who might be influencers on those platforms, who's writing the content, who might you contact, and also what are the top pages currently for those sites. There are a number of tools that give you a glimpse into that information. Moz's OSE, Open Site Explorer, will show you top pages. SEMrush has a top page report. SimilarWeb has a popular page report. You can dig into all that information there, really interesting stuff.

II. Old popular images - update!

You can also start to dig into old, popular images and then update them. So what are old popular images within your space that you could have an opportunity to revamp and update? A really neat way to sort of dig into some of that is BuzzSumo's infographics filter, and then you would insert the topic. You enter the industry or the topic you're trying to address and then search by the infographics to see if you can come across anything.

III. Transform popular content into images

You can also just transform popular content into images, and I think there is so much opportunity in doing that for new statistics reports, new data that comes out. There are tons of great opportunities to transform those into multiple images and leverage that across different platforms for link building.

IV. Influencers

Again, just understanding who those influencers are.

Do your keyword research

So, from here, we're going to dive into the keyword research part of this whole puzzle, and this is really understanding the intent behind people searching about the topic or the product or whatever it might be. Something you can do is evaluate keywords with link intent. This is a brilliant concept I heard about a couple weeks back from Dan Shure's podcast. Thank you, Dan. Essentially it's the idea that keywords with statistics or facts after the keyword have link intent baked into the search query. It's brilliant. Those individuals are searching for something to reference, to maybe link to, to include in a presentation or an article or whatever that might be. It has this basic link intent.

Another thing you want to evaluate is just anything around images. Do any of your keywords and pictures or photos, etc. have good search volume with some opportunities? What does that search result currently look like? You have to evaluate what's currently ranking to understand what's working and what's not. I used to say at my old agency I didn't want anyone writing any piece of content until they had read all of the 10 search results for that keyword or that phrase we were targeting. Why would you do that until you have a full understanding of how that looks currently and how we can make something way better?

Rand had also mentioned this really cool tip on if you find some keywords, it's good to evaluate whether or not the image carousel shows up for those searches, because if it does, that's a little glimpse into the searcher intent that leads to images. That's a good sign that you're on the right track to really optimize for a certain image. It's something to keep in mind.

Provide value

So, from here, we're going to move up to providing value. Now we're in the brainstorming stage. Hopefully, you've gotten some ideas, you know where you want to link from, and you need to provide value in some way. It could be a...

I. Reference/bookmark Maybe something that people would bookmark, that always works.

II. Perspective is a really interesting one. So some of the most beautiful data visualizations do this extremely well, where they can simplify a confusing concept or a lot of data. It's a great way to leverage images and graphics.

III. Printouts still work really well. Moz has the SEO Dev Cheat Sheet that I have seen printed all over at different agencies, and that's really neat to see it adding value directly.

IV. Curate images. We see this a lot with different articles. Maybe the top 25 to 50 images from this tradeshow or this event or whatever it might be, that's a great way to leverage link building and kind of getting people fired up about a curated piece of content.

Gregory Ciotti — I don't know if I'm saying that right — has an incredible article I suggest you all read called "Why a Visual Really Is Worth a Thousand Words," and he mentions don't be afraid to get obvious. I love that, because I think all too often we tend to overthink images and executing things in general. Why not just state the obvious and see how it goes? He's got great examples.

Optimize

So, from here, we are going to move into optimization. If any of you need a brush-up on image optimization, I highly suggest you check out Rand's Whiteboard Friday on image SEO. It covers everything. But some of the basics are your...

Title

You want to make sure that the title of the image has your keyword and explains what it is that you're trying to convey.

Alt text

This was first and foremost designed for the visually impaired, so you need to be mindful of visually impaired screen readers that will read this to people to explain what the image actually is. So first and foremost, you just need to be helpful and provide information in a descriptive way to describe that image.

Compression

Compression is huge. Page speed is so big right now. I hear about it all the time. I know you guys do too. But one of the easiest ways to help page speed is to compress those huge images. There's a ton of great free tools out there, like Optimizilla, where you can bulk upload a bunch of large images and then bulk download. It makes it super easy. There are also some desktop programs, if you're doing this kind of stuff all the time, that will automatically compress images you download or save. That might be worth looking into if you do this a lot. You want to host the image. You want it to live on your domain. You want to house that. You can leverage it on other platforms, but you want sort of that original to be on your site.

SRCSET

Source set attribute is getting a little technical. It's super interesting, and it's basically this really incredible image attribute that allows you to set the minimum browser size and the image you would prefer to show up for different sizes. So you can not only have different images show up for different devices in different sizes, but you can also revamp them. You can revamp the same image and serve it better for a mobile user versus a tablet, etc. Jon Henshaw has some of the greatest stuff on source set. Highly suggest you look at some of his articles. He's doing really cool things with it. Check that out.

Promotion

So, from here, you want to promote your images. You obviously want to share it on popular platforms. You want to reach back out to some of these things that you might have into earlier. If you updated a piece of content, make them aware of that. Or if you transformed a really popular piece of content into some visuals, you might want to share that with the person who is sharing that piece of content. You want to start to tap into that previous research with your promotion.

Inform the influencers

Ask people to share it. There is nothing wrong with just asking your network of people to share something you've worked really hard on, and hopefully, vice versa, that can work in return and you're not afraid to share something a connection of yours has that they worked really hard on.

Monitor the image SERPs

From here, you need to monitor. One of the best ways to do this is Google reverse image search. So if you go to Google and you click the images tab, there's that little camera icon that you can click on and upload images to see where else they live on the web. This is a great way to figure out who is using your image, where it's being held, are you getting a backlink or are you not. You want to keep an eye on all of that stuff.

Two other tools to do this, that I've heard about, are Image Raider and TinEye. But I have not had great experience with either of these. I would love to hear your comments below if maybe you have.

Reverse image search with Google works the best for me. This is also an awesome opportunity for someone to get on the market and create a Google alert for images. I don't think anyone is actually doing that right now. If you know someone that is, please let me know down below in the comments. But it could be a cool business opportunity, right? I don't know.

So for monitoring, let's say you find your image is being used on different websites. Now you need to do some basic outreach to get that link. You want to request that link for using your image.

This is just a super basic template that I came up with. You can use it. You can change it, do whatever you want. But it's just:

Hi, [first name]. Thank you so much for including our image in your article. Great piece. Just wondering if you could link to us.com as the source. Thanks, Britney

Something like that. Something short, to the point. If you can make it more personalized, please do so. I can't stress that enough. People will take you way more seriously if you have some nugget of personal information or connection that you can make.

From there, you just sort of stay in this loop. After you go through this process, you need to continue to promote your content and continue to monitor and do outreach and push that to maximize your link building efforts. So I hope you enjoyed this. I look forward to hearing all of your comments and thoughts down below in the comments. I look forward to seeing you all later. Thanks for joining us on this edition of Whiteboard Friday. Thanks.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!

[xaydungtruonggia]

Image Link Building — Best of Whiteboard Friday

Posted by BritneyMuller

Last week, we took you into the future with SEO expert Britney Muller to explore link prospecting in 2021. This week, we're going back in time — all the way to 2017 — for her concrete advice on an important part of building links: image link building.

Image link building is a delicate art. There are some distinct considerations from traditional link building, and doing it successfully requires a balance of creativity, curiosity, and having the right tools on hand. Let's dive in! 

Click on the whiteboard image above to open a high-resolution version in a new tab!

Video Transcription

Hey, Moz fans, welcome to another edition of Whiteboard Friday. Today we're going to go over all things image link building, which is sort of an art. I'm so excited to dig into this with you.

Know your link targets

So first and foremost, you need to know your link targets:

I. Popular industry platforms - top pages

What are those top platforms or websites that you would really like to acquire a link from? Then, from there, you can start to understand who might be influencers on those platforms, who's writing the content, who might you contact, and also what are the top pages currently for those sites. There are a number of tools that give you a glimpse into that information. Moz's OSE, Open Site Explorer, will show you top pages. SEMrush has a top page report. SimilarWeb has a popular page report. You can dig into all that information there, really interesting stuff.

II. Old popular images - update!

You can also start to dig into old, popular images and then update them. So what are old popular images within your space that you could have an opportunity to revamp and update? A really neat way to sort of dig into some of that is BuzzSumo's infographics filter, and then you would insert the topic. You enter the industry or the topic you're trying to address and then search by the infographics to see if you can come across anything.

III. Transform popular content into images

You can also just transform popular content into images, and I think there is so much opportunity in doing that for new statistics reports, new data that comes out. There are tons of great opportunities to transform those into multiple images and leverage that across different platforms for link building.

IV. Influencers

Again, just understanding who those influencers are.

Do your keyword research

So, from here, we're going to dive into the keyword research part of this whole puzzle, and this is really understanding the intent behind people searching about the topic or the product or whatever it might be. Something you can do is evaluate keywords with link intent. This is a brilliant concept I heard about a couple weeks back from Dan Shure's podcast. Thank you, Dan. Essentially it's the idea that keywords with statistics or facts after the keyword have link intent baked into the search query. It's brilliant. Those individuals are searching for something to reference, to maybe link to, to include in a presentation or an article or whatever that might be. It has this basic link intent.

Another thing you want to evaluate is just anything around images. Do any of your keywords and pictures or photos, etc. have good search volume with some opportunities? What does that search result currently look like? You have to evaluate what's currently ranking to understand what's working and what's not. I used to say at my old agency I didn't want anyone writing any piece of content until they had read all of the 10 search results for that keyword or that phrase we were targeting. Why would you do that until you have a full understanding of how that looks currently and how we can make something way better?

Rand had also mentioned this really cool tip on if you find some keywords, it's good to evaluate whether or not the image carousel shows up for those searches, because if it does, that's a little glimpse into the searcher intent that leads to images. That's a good sign that you're on the right track to really optimize for a certain image. It's something to keep in mind.

Provide value

So, from here, we're going to move up to providing value. Now we're in the brainstorming stage. Hopefully, you've gotten some ideas, you know where you want to link from, and you need to provide value in some way. It could be a...

I. Reference/bookmark Maybe something that people would bookmark, that always works.

II. Perspective is a really interesting one. So some of the most beautiful data visualizations do this extremely well, where they can simplify a confusing concept or a lot of data. It's a great way to leverage images and graphics.

III. Printouts still work really well. Moz has the SEO Dev Cheat Sheet that I have seen printed all over at different agencies, and that's really neat to see it adding value directly.

IV. Curate images. We see this a lot with different articles. Maybe the top 25 to 50 images from this tradeshow or this event or whatever it might be, that's a great way to leverage link building and kind of getting people fired up about a curated piece of content.

Gregory Ciotti — I don't know if I'm saying that right — has an incredible article I suggest you all read called "Why a Visual Really Is Worth a Thousand Words," and he mentions don't be afraid to get obvious. I love that, because I think all too often we tend to overthink images and executing things in general. Why not just state the obvious and see how it goes? He's got great examples.

Optimize

So, from here, we are going to move into optimization. If any of you need a brush-up on image optimization, I highly suggest you check out Rand's Whiteboard Friday on image SEO. It covers everything. But some of the basics are your...

Title

You want to make sure that the title of the image has your keyword and explains what it is that you're trying to convey.

Alt text

This was first and foremost designed for the visually impaired, so you need to be mindful of visually impaired screen readers that will read this to people to explain what the image actually is. So first and foremost, you just need to be helpful and provide information in a descriptive way to describe that image.

Compression

Compression is huge. Page speed is so big right now. I hear about it all the time. I know you guys do too. But one of the easiest ways to help page speed is to compress those huge images. There's a ton of great free tools out there, like Optimizilla, where you can bulk upload a bunch of large images and then bulk download. It makes it super easy. There are also some desktop programs, if you're doing this kind of stuff all the time, that will automatically compress images you download or save. That might be worth looking into if you do this a lot. You want to host the image. You want it to live on your domain. You want to house that. You can leverage it on other platforms, but you want sort of that original to be on your site.

SRCSET

Source set attribute is getting a little technical. It's super interesting, and it's basically this really incredible image attribute that allows you to set the minimum browser size and the image you would prefer to show up for different sizes. So you can not only have different images show up for different devices in different sizes, but you can also revamp them. You can revamp the same image and serve it better for a mobile user versus a tablet, etc. Jon Henshaw has some of the greatest stuff on source set. Highly suggest you look at some of his articles. He's doing really cool things with it. Check that out.

Promotion

So, from here, you want to promote your images. You obviously want to share it on popular platforms. You want to reach back out to some of these things that you might have into earlier. If you updated a piece of content, make them aware of that. Or if you transformed a really popular piece of content into some visuals, you might want to share that with the person who is sharing that piece of content. You want to start to tap into that previous research with your promotion.

Inform the influencers

Ask people to share it. There is nothing wrong with just asking your network of people to share something you've worked really hard on, and hopefully, vice versa, that can work in return and you're not afraid to share something a connection of yours has that they worked really hard on.

Monitor the image SERPs

From here, you need to monitor. One of the best ways to do this is Google reverse image search. So if you go to Google and you click the images tab, there's that little camera icon that you can click on and upload images to see where else they live on the web. This is a great way to figure out who is using your image, where it's being held, are you getting a backlink or are you not. You want to keep an eye on all of that stuff.

Two other tools to do this, that I've heard about, are Image Raider and TinEye. But I have not had great experience with either of these. I would love to hear your comments below if maybe you have.

Reverse image search with Google works the best for me. This is also an awesome opportunity for someone to get on the market and create a Google alert for images. I don't think anyone is actually doing that right now. If you know someone that is, please let me know down below in the comments. But it could be a cool business opportunity, right? I don't know.

So for monitoring, let's say you find your image is being used on different websites. Now you need to do some basic outreach to get that link. You want to request that link for using your image.

This is just a super basic template that I came up with. You can use it. You can change it, do whatever you want. But it's just:

Hi, [first name]. Thank you so much for including our image in your article. Great piece. Just wondering if you could link to us.com as the source. Thanks, Britney

Something like that. Something short, to the point. If you can make it more personalized, please do so. I can't stress that enough. People will take you way more seriously if you have some nugget of personal information or connection that you can make.

From there, you just sort of stay in this loop. After you go through this process, you need to continue to promote your content and continue to monitor and do outreach and push that to maximize your link building efforts. So I hope you enjoyed this. I look forward to hearing all of your comments and thoughts down below in the comments. I look forward to seeing you all later. Thanks for joining us on this edition of Whiteboard Friday. Thanks.

Video transcription by Speechpad.com

Sign up for The Moz Top 10, a semimonthly mailer updating you on the top ten hottest pieces of SEO news, tips, and rad links uncovered by the Moz team. Think of it as your exclusive digest of stuff you don't have time to hunt down but want to read!