Adding Images to Your Blog Posts

Did you know that there are right ways and wrong ways of adding images to your blog posts?  If you’ve read my post How to Write a Blog Post, you might.  I mentioned it a bit in there.

It was pretty brief but today I’m going to go into full detail of adding images to your blog posts and exactly what works best for both of my blogs.

When I started I would add images straight from my phone.  Gah!  That was a horrible idea!  Looking back later, I saw how unprofessional they looked!  For Christmas my husband upgraded me to this camera as a starter and it helped so much!

I also thought it looked cool to have text wrap around them, like a magazine or newspaper.

When I first started comparing my site to the top bloggers in my niche I realized how just unprofessional I looked.  And it was because I wasn’t using quality images and I wasn’t optimizing them for the post.

Second, it doesn’t matter how cool it may look to wrap text in a blog post.  Save it for your eBook that you will more than likely end up writing!

Share the love! Pin me for others!

The reason for that is that your ad company wants your post to be long.  And so do you!  The longer your post, the longer someone is there to view ads that come up.

Related Posts:

How to Write a Blog Post

How to Set Up a Pinterest Profile For Your Blog

Should You Delete Pins

Before I explain optimizing and adding images to your blog posts, I’ll tell you my FREE tools that I use!  Yep free!

• My favorite tool for optimizing my images is Canva!  They have a paid version, which I’m seriously considering but I’m on my second blog and still only using the free version.

I use Canva for just about everything media related for my blog.  Whether it’s the general, Pinterest or featured images, Social media sharing and meme’s, and even my eBooks and printables!

• My next tool is really more of a list of resources.  We don’t always have images for what we want to write about, but that doesn’t mean that we have to find a way to take them or go without.

There are plenty of websites offering free stock images to choose from.  Pixabay is a favorite of mine but there are so many more out there!

• My third tool is a media compression plugin.

Our images can really slow down our sites and you would be amazed at how much space this can save on your site!

You can find one by clicking the plugins tab in your dashboard and “Add New.”  There are plenty of free plugins for this.  You just need to find one that works best for you.

As far as image types in blog posts, I typically have three types.

I make Pinterest images (I can’t stress this enough! When I see that a post does not have one I won’t pin their post.)

Your descriptive images throughout the post.

And, my featured/Facebook image.

Canva has some great features that allow you to choose from pre-designed size or create your own size.

For Pinterest images they have a pre-designed size but I like using a custom size.  You can see in the upper right corner there is the option for this.

For the Featured Image and Facebook Image for my posts I use the Blog Title size.

And for my Descriptive Images I either use the Social Media or Twitter Image size.  (Clicking the “More” button at the top will give you so many more options and that’s where you find the Twitter size.

How to Design Your Images

Once you’ve chosen your design size, upload any images you want to use from your camera or a folder on your desktop.

The images will remain in your Uploads tab so you can go back and use them for other projects or posts.

Before you insert your images choose a grid, even if you’re only using one photo.  This ensures the photo is fit correctly into it.

Once you’ve chosen a grid, you can add your images to each box.

These tools will make sure that your images are optimized and look professional on your site.  When you’re adding your images you also have the option of editing it.  Whether you want to change the brightness, contrast, or even remove some of the blur!

Now that you have your images set, it’s up to you to add, or not to add, text or shapes!  There are plenty to choose from in the free version and you can upload your own text if you upgrade to the paid.

Adding Images to Blog Posts – How to Insert the Images

To insert your Pinterest image or Descriptive Images, you just place your cursor in the body of the post where you want the image to go.  Then click “Add Media” at the top to upload the image.

Always center them.  Do. Not. Wrap. Text.

Again, centering them throughout the post will make your ad company happier and it will make you happier because you will have more view time on your posts, meaning more revenue!

As to where you should place the Pinterest image, there’s debate between top or bottom of your post.  I like close to the top.  But you can play with it and see what brings you more Pins.

When it’s time to add your Featured and Facebook image (I use the same one) there are two places to put it.

First add it to the “Featured Image” space, found at the bottom right of your dashboard while you’re drafting your post.

The second place to add the featured image is if you have the YoastSEO plugin.  I’m in love with all the help this plugin gives!  I’ve spoken before about it in How to Set Up a Pinterest Profile For Your Blog and How to Write a Blog Post.

But the way it works here is to guarantee that when Facebook pulls an image for your post to be shared it will be the image you want.

Before I used YoastSEO I swear Facebook hated me and chose my worst images on purpose even though I’d assigned a featured image!

To insert here, scroll below the body of your post to the Yoast area and click on the social tab.  Then, click the Upload Image button in the Facebook section.

That’s how it’s done!  You are ready to start adding images to your blog posts!  All you need to do is grab your camera and get shooting!

What will most of your blog’s images be of? Tell me in the comments!