New URLs = Better SEO
We love making you famous. We started out giving you NiceNames, then we gave you tons of other great tips on how to get found on search engines like Google.
We’ve rearranged your direct image URLs so that your filenames get tacked on to the end of every direct image link. (These!) This means your images will be more user- and SEO-friendly, but no less secure than before. As long as you remember to give your files descriptive names, you won’t need to do anything to get a little extra Google Juice.
Take a look at the address bar in the example below:
What does it mean?
Here’s what the old image links looked like:
http://schmoo.smugmug.com/Hikes/Cascades/mist-forest/964725586_ddnfJ-XL-5.jpg
And here’s what they look like now:
http://schmoo.smugmug.com/Hikes/Cascades/i-3sVwdJM/5/XL/mist-forest-XL.jpg
As you can see, your domain, Category and Subcategory are unchanged. Now we throw in the Image Key, version number (incremented when you make changes using various our photo tools), then size and the filename.
Your gallery URLs will remain the same (for now!) and any images you’ve ever embedded in forums or blog posts will still work. You’ll only see these minor changes in any new images that you upload and share from here on out.
Find Your Files Fast
We also did this to simplify photo downloads, because now they’ll keep their original filenames. Previously, files were saved under their Image IDs and Keys… which made them difficult to locate if you had a lot of files on your computer.
But now, instead of searching for 964725586_ddnfJ-O.jpg you can scan your desktop for mist-forest.jpg .
How do I know my images are secure?
Look at your URLs and you’ll see the Image Keys. They’re the jumble of random letters and numbers you see in the middle of that link (like “i-3sVwdJM”). Chances of anyone guessing that combo and coming up with a link to your secret, private photos are rare.
Remember that if you don’t want anyone to find your site via your image link, set your gallery settings to “Hide Owner”. This feature removes any identifying information like your nickname and the filename from that URL. More about using Hide Owner.
Making your galleries unlisted or passworded will, by default, foil Google from finding those images in search results. More about privacy options.
Can I still make custom sizes for my blog?
Of course! You’ve always been able to type in your own dimensions and get a custom image size to fit wherever you’re posting the pic. Now, just be sure to change it before and after your filename, like this:
http://schmoo.smugmug.com/Hikes/Cascades/i-3sVwdJM/5/400×200/mist-forest-400×200.jpg
As always, we won’t smoosh your pic even if you didn’t get the exact dimensions. We’ll make it fit on the longest side and adjust the other as needed. More info here.
Remember that if you have any feedback or questions about these changes, speak up! We love listening.
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I LOVE that the downloaded files is now what was originally uploaded! Excellent. Thanks!
Had no idea about custom sizes. Very useful.
ditto, now I know!
I used this feature today. Thank you.
Is there an opt-out of the fancy name thing?
My images are usually named something like 20110417-IMG0203-5-hdr-Edit.jpg with suffixes getting added (sometimes in mixed languages) by different part of my post-processing workflow. I’d rather not have that showing up.
If there is no choice I guess I’ll have to adapt and start renaming files on upload. Is there an automatic way to do so?
Hi Javier, you can set your gallery to be unlisted or even choose Hide Owner to hide your filename. Aside from that, your image editing program should allow you to change the filename before you upload to your gallery. Hope this helps!
Thanks, I don’t want to go unlisted or hide my name, is just that I normally don’t bother changing the file names, and since they get changed with every edit if there is some particularly tricky one I can get a name like (date and image number)-Edit-Edit-Edit.jpg which doesn’t look very professional
Anyway, I figured out how to make Lightroom change the name upon upload, so I should be alright
I have that same question.
Unless you need to compare the SM files to your catalog files and the naming is different…
Is there any roadmap for being able to edit filenames after they are uploaded? Will this ever be a feature?
http://feedback.smugmug.com/forums/17723-smugmug/suggestions/369134-change-file-names-?ref=title
Is my previously linked images on other site still accessible? If not then there will be a lot of dead images I have previously linked to SmugMug!
Hello – great post. I’m just starting to go back and add SEO keywords and such to my photos, which is a laborious process. I’ll have to consider my filenames as well.
NOTE: I want to subscribe via RSS, but I just get a bunch of compressed text within a browser window when I click on the “RSS” button at the top.
doesn’t solve my problem. my file names look like “110428-01-298″.
here’s my problem… client looks at images on smugmug at large size. downloads 20 images. asks me on the phone about some of the downloaded images. i ask for the file name, so I’ll have a reference. they say something like ” the file name is i-TQx6Dnx-X2.jpg” which is the file name that Smugmug told them it was. That download file name means nothing to me.
for me, Smugmug still mangles my file names.
Nice to see you implemented changes based upon my suggestion… Thank you…
I’ve built a lot of customizations to my own site, including my random photo widget that clicks through to the source gallery, using the old format. When will this old format be completely abandoned and the old link stop working? I hope never because I’ll lose a lot of SEO when linked images are no longer found.