I am a big promoter of blogs. I read them, I write one (this one) and I know first-hand how exhausting is can be finding the perfect image to accompany your post. In fact, I’ve had more than one client post their blogs without an image – which I do not suggest – out of frustration with sourcing an image. However, images are what make your content interesting before it’s read. It stimulates and can generate interest. It can also be meta-tagged with keywords and increase clicks and shares on social sites (they often pull the image through when you post). So, how do you find those images without spending a fortune on stock photos? You have a few options:
- Take your own photos. If you know how and are keen to try, then go for it. Be aware that bad photos can be as damaging as no photos (sometimes more so) so ask an impartial party to judge before you post it.
- Go to a free site. There are a large amount of sites that offer free photos now with no licenses or very relaxed ones. This means you can use the image for your blog post without fear. However, agreement change all the time so please read the licenses before you download.
Try not to be too figurative in what you select. For example, if you’re writing a post about life choices, a picture of a take-out menu wouldn’t connect to the reader. Be as specific as you can without being boring (interest in an image can come from an angle or colour palette – not necessarily the subject matter).
Quick fix tips: Photos should be the correct size in both pixels and dimensions for the space you want to fill. A blurred image means that the image is too small for the space and the image was stretched to fill it. Find a bigger size! If it takes too long to load it’s probably too large (file size) and should be smaller so it loads faster.
Here are a few free image sites for you to check out…
