For years SEOs have been speculating that one day Google will have the ability to read text in images, and will eventually use it as an on-page ranking factor.

That day has finally arrived yet few seem to have realized it.

Google Keep, for those who don’t know, is a note taking service from Google that integrates closely with Google Drive. It accepts text notes, lists, to-dos, and image attachments.

Google Keep is actually one of the nicest note taking apps out there so if you have never tried it now may be the perfect opportunity.

Keep home screen

Image attachment

Text note

It also integrates seamlessly with the online version of the app which is stored in Google Drive.

On Friday, Google rolled out an update to the Keep app for Android. Included in the update is OCR technology that allows you to search for text in images.

It’s pretty darn good at it.

This may have massive implications for on-page SEO. For too long we have had to sacrifice design for SEO by warning clients to steer clear of text in images.

It looks like that may all be about to end.

Steven out.