Keyword Research for Portfolio Sites

Why Portfolio Sites need this

A gallery of forty beautiful images with no text under them gives Google almost nothing to index. The reason is simple: search engines understand words far better than pixels. If your project pages carry only a title like "Project 12" and a grid of photos, there is nothing that says what the job was, who it was for or where it happened. Alt text, filenames and captions are often blank or generic too, and heavy full-resolution files make everything load slowly.

Before fixing any of that, you need to know which words are worth writing. The Keyword Research tool takes one seed, such as "wedding photographer" or "brand designer", and returns scored phrase ideas from Google, Bing, DuckDuckGo and YouTube autocomplete. For a portfolio site owner it is a quick way to see how clients phrase a service and a city together, which questions they ask, and which phrases are specific enough to give one page a clear job.

Portfolio Sites specific guidance

Start with a service seed plus a city

Type a short seed such as "wedding photographer austin" or "brand identity designer" into the seed box, choose English, and set Country to the market you sell in. Country shapes Google autocomplete, but there is no city setting, so the city has to sit inside the seed itself. Run standard depth first; fast depth uses Google only. Ten minutes is enough for three seeds: your main service, your service with your city, and your service with a niche, such as "newborn photographer". Keep in mind that a result shows what people type into suggestion boxes. It does not prove anyone will hire you, and it says nothing about whether your current pages are indexed or ranking.

Reading Demand, Difficulty and Opportunity

Open Priority targets first, the top 20 phrases by opportunity. Demand Index is a relative 0-100 score, not monthly searches, and Difficulty is a heuristic built from phrase length, intent and demand; it never looks at who ranks. So a longer phrase with a city and modest demand often scores better than the bare service name, which suits a portfolio with only a handful of pages. Click a row through to the live search to check its intent label, because labels come from word lists and can be wrong. Then scan the Questions section: "how much does a headshot session cost" can become a short text block under a gallery. Neither score tells you what the results page looks like or how strong your competitors are.

Turning phrases into text, in order

Pick one phrase per page so two galleries do not compete for the same words. Put the main phrase in the page title and the H1, write two or three sentences about the brief, the process and the location under the images, and then describe each photo in alt text and a short filename such as austin-wedding-first-dance.jpg. Google's advice is to describe the image rather than stuff keywords into it. Use the copy button or Export JSON to keep a working sheet of the phrases you chose. The keyword list does not compress your hero images or rewrite your alt text, so those still need separate checks, and no phrase guarantees visits.

Example scenarios

Common mistakes

• Publishing galleries with no wording. A grid of images with only a project number gives search engines nothing to index. Add a short paragraph on the brief, the process and the location.
• Stuffing keywords into alt text. Alt text should describe the image in plain words, and Google advises against filling it with keywords. Keep the researched phrase in the visible page text instead.
• Reading Demand Index as search volume. The number is a relative 0-100 index from autocomplete signals, not a count of monthly searches. Use it to rank your own ideas against each other.
• Putting the city nowhere in the seed. The tool has no city setting, so a seed without a place name returns generic phrases. Add the city to the seed when you want local wording.
• Aiming several galleries at one phrase. Two pages written around the same term compete with each other. Give every gallery or case study its own phrase from the priority list.

Frequently asked questions

How do I find keywords for a photography portfolio?

Enter a short seed such as "family photographer" and add your city inside it, for example "family photographer denver", because the tool has no city field. Pick English and your Country, run standard depth, then read Priority targets and Questions. Choose one phrase per page and treat the Demand Index as a relative score rather than monthly searches. Those numbers come from autocomplete, so check a phrase by searching it yourself before you rewrite a title or heading around it.

Can I see monthly search volume for my photographer keywords?

No. The Demand Index runs from 0 to 100 and is built from autocomplete weights, suggestion position, agreement between engines and breadth, so it ranks your phrases against each other. It is not monthly volume, and the tool has no CPC or SERP data. If you need exact volumes you would need a different source. For a portfolio, relative order is often enough to choose which of five city phrases deserves its own page. Treat it as a sorting aid, not a forecast.

How do I do local SEO for photographers with this tool?

Put the city in the seed, for example "headshot photographer leeds", because Country only sets the market for Google autocomplete and there is no location field. Read the suggestions for neighbourhood names and service variants clients type, then give each real service its own page. The result cannot confirm your Google Business Profile, your address details or your map ranking; those need separate checks, and the tool only reports what autocomplete suggests. Use the list as a writing brief, not a verdict.

Will keywords fix my image-only gallery pages?

Keywords only help if there is text to place them in. Search engines understand text far better than images, so a page of photos with no wording gives them little to work with. Use the phrases you chose to write a short intro about the brief, the location and your process, then add descriptive alt text. Adding text improves what search engines can understand; it does not promise a ranking or a particular amount of traffic.

What should I put in image alt text and filenames?

Describe what is in the picture in plain words, such as "bride and groom first dance at Brooklyn warehouse venue", and keep filenames short and descriptive, like first-dance-brooklyn.jpg. Google's image guidance asks for descriptive alt text and warns against filling it with keywords. Phrases from your keyword list belong in the page text near the image, not repeated in every alt attribute. Google also recommends placing images near relevant text, which is where your chosen phrase naturally fits.

Reference: For alt text, descriptive filenames and placing images near relevant text, the Google Search Central image SEO best practices explain what search engines expect from an image-led site.