Google Local and Panaramio - Upload Is Broken | Alternatives? | Local SEO

[mjtaylor]

Not too long ago, I ran across a Local Optimization tip that suggested that adding photos to Panaramio and then adding them to your Google Places page was a good idea. It made sense to me, so I loaded some photos for a real estate client. But when I tried to upload them in his Google Account, I get an error message that says: 'unable to store image at this time' (see screenshot).

local-seo-panaramio.jpg

I dug around and found a message or two on other boards and found a reference to it that suggested it is a bug that Google is working on ... however, that was last December and it's still not fixed.

Other things I have read suggest it would work if the photo has been accepted into Google Earth ... and another local SEO consultant I talked to said Picasa -- or was it flickr? -- also allows the same sort of GEO targeting of a photo that panaramio allows.

Any ideas on this?

[Linda Buquet]

mj I think I mentioned I'm a Top Contributor over at the Places forum so help users with issues like this all the time. Vanessa told me about a month ago that image upload was fixed, but users are still reporting problems. The last advice I saw from her, she said just upload from your computer instead.

I don't think the other image services work now either because I think what's broken is uploading from ANY URL.

You can GEO tag on your computer too using a program that modifies the exifer file or something. I don't bother to do any of that and am not sure it buys you much if anything. I just fully keyword optimize the images on my PC before uploading.

There are a lot more important things that work for Places ranking than geo-tagging images. I have carpal probs so don't waste time doing extra stuff unless I know it works and I have lots of other techniques that I know are worth the time and carpal energy. so that's where I put my focus.

[mjtaylor]

Thanks! I will try geo-tagging online ... I have (or at least I think I have) done a lot of the other things that can be done to optimize this one client's site for Places, and they have more Reviews than the competition, but the site languishes ... but I don't want to get off into another area ... thanks for your time on this.

This is complicated way to do it:

http://digital-photography-school.co...-geotag-images .. you have to have a GPS.

Here's a software solution that doesn't require a GPS alongside your computer: http://geotag.sourceforge.net/.

It is also possible to geo-tag within Picasa: http://support.google.com/picasa/bin...n&answer=43896 ... though that doesn't matter if files can't be uploaded from Picasa any better than from Panoramio.

[PhilipDunn]

Can I ask how you optimize an image for keywords? Just in the file name?

[PhilipDunn]

And that is to optimize an image Before uploading...

[weegillis]

And that is to optimize an image Before uploading...

As MJ mentions, you can create a JPEG comment in Picasa, as well as most image editing software, but on the local machine, yes. There are two different fields in the EXIF data, ImageDescription, and UserComment. I haven't tried working with the description, so don't know yet how to edit it. It isn't as straight forward as the comment, but I am going to research it and see if one cannot use it to create ALT text in the generated image tag. Picasa is free, as we know, and so is GIMP 2.

It's not clear yet, either, what the maximum length of the comment is, though one would 'guess' it to be quite large, as in thousands of characters, not hundreds. One would need to push the limit on a test photo to see where it fails. It's also not clear, and will need more research, whether SE's go to the effort to extract EXIF or just depend on the markup in the document. Your page generating script will extract the comment and mark it up in a P element to accompany the photo. The mechanics are discussed in another thread.

As for geo-tagging, (the topic of this thread) the mechanics to editing this information are still unknown to me, but if and when I learn how to do it, it will get posted back in here. One expects it will take a more serious tool to create this data if it does not exist in the image header. Lastly, EXIF is only supported in JPEG and TIFF, not PNG.

[Linda Buquet]

Can I ask how you optimize an image for keywords? Just in the file name?

In the file name, yes, but you can also go a step further and optimize the image properties. I think it depends on operating system, but for me with Vista I right click on image >> properties >> details >> then can add Title, subject, tags, comments and author.

RE GEO TAGGING - Just skipped a recent blog post about a free program called GeoSetter that may be worth checking out. And I also saw it recommended on WhiteSpark's blog post about how to pimp out your Place page.

[PhilipDunn]

great information Linda. Thanks..