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3.6.6 "Search Engines don't read images." So what?

Exactly as it says above, if something′ s written on an image, Search Engines can′ t read this text. But you can save yourself trouble and write nice ALT texts for all your images.

In fact, every image needs an ALT text. It′ s a brief description of the image, that′ s put in the image tag. ALT text is absolutely required by HTML standards. And, if you run your page through w3c validator like you did earlier, you′ ll see that it just won′ t let you go without ALT texts.

Image displayed in a browser Image′ s alt text displayed in a browser

If you disable images in your browser and load a new web page, you′ ll be able to see the ALT texts of the images.

On the right, you see the ALT text "Mens ASICS GEL–Kayano 19 Running Shoe" instead of the image showing the shoe itself.

Here′ s the thing: if there weren′ t any text, Search Engines wouldn′ t notice the image. They only see the ALT text saying "ASICS Running Shoe".

As Search Engines pay attention to ALT texts, they can be used for SEO. For instance, quite a lot of businesses get very good traffic from Image Search. And, if there were no ALT texts, image search just wouldn′ t work.

So, to get some more traffic, you should use keywords in your ALT texts.

And, one more thing to remember. People can also see these texts. Some of your visitors may use special browsers for people with visual, hearing, or other impairments. Others will view your site without downloading any images. The ALT text will tell everyone what′ s on the image, no matter how people view your site.

So make these texts meaningful and to the point and... never write "My asshole Boss" in the ALT tag of your CEO′ s picture ;)

DO IT NOW! Write good ALT texts for your images. Where possible, use your keywords in them. Make all changes available online.

Make your pages link to each other

Remember I told you, pages on your site must link one to another? That was, for the robot to have many ways to go. These links coming from pages of the same site are called internal links, and they can also help your SEO efforts as the robots also looks at the links′ texts. Time to say,

Links to your page must contain your keywords!

Check the links to your landing page, the one you′ re making right at the moment. Now, add keywords to the links′ texts. Just to let you know... This text you see on the link and click on is called anchor text.

And the HTML code to produce this link looks like this:

<a href="http://www.some–website.com">this is what we call "anchor text"</a>

The anchor should contain keywords specific for the page to which the link leads (not for the one where the link′ s put). If you link from a page about dogs to a page about cats, the anchor text should say "cats".

Now make good keyword–rich and logical anchor texts.

For instance, if your page′ s about vacation at the Caribbean and one of your keywords is tours to the Caribbean and the link to this page looked like this:

To learn more about tours to the Caribbean, click here,

then you′ d better replace it with

Learn more about tours to the Caribbean.

And, if you don′ t have links to this page yet, put links immediately, and use keywords. Your links must tell what they really link to.

But, again, never forget that people are going to read these texts. Sometimes webmasters use words just because they are good keywords — and never care what users will think.

For instance, when I was looking to buy a turtle for my son, I clicked a link with an anchor "exotic pets" on some website. But all I found was all kinds of cats. Imagine my disappointment. In this case, the webmaster could write all cat breeds or cats for sale, or cats and kittens. Then, if users clicked the link, they′ d find what they expect.

Yes, you can "cheat" Search Engines, but it′ s important not to cheat real users.

DO IT NOW! Make internal links with descriptive keyword–rich anchor texts.

Done with links? Here′ s a reminder for you: if you made a new page to optimize, the page is not yet in the sitemap, so don′ t forget to add it! (You don′ t have to submit the sitemap to Search Engines again; the robot will see the changes next time it comes.)

DO IT NOW! Add your new page to the Sitemap.

Now, publish your page to the web server, and the first cycle of on–page optimization is over.

DO IT NOW! Make your page available online.

25 comments

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#5571 2024-07-24 08:23:08 signature logos

While images are essential for visual appeal, search engines primarily interpret text-based content such as metadata, alt text, and surrounding context to understand and index web pages. Optimizing these elements ensures your website is effectively crawled and ranked, enhancing its visibility and accessibility in search engine results.

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#5190 2021-10-22 04:52:02 Raj Shah

Now most of search engines are powerful and use artificial intelligence to read images. So, ALT Tag is important to tell search engine about image but now search engines can read images with AI.

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#4840 2019-05-11 19:41:28 Seo Services in islamabad

alt attribute is good to connect our page image with focus keywords of sites

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#4785 2018-12-27 07:12:40 Opula Software

Good information.

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#4566 2016-12-07 08:05:00 Mebel Jepara

good job information

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#4368 2016-01-15 00:45:42 Anton Shutenko

+ u can use meta data for all images

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#3729 2013-08-15 11:29:51 jepara online

What would you suggest about the use of multiple anchor texts towards the same thing: the same keywords/keyphrases in anchor texts or different keywords that mean the same thing?

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#3731 2013-08-21 06:55:41 Dan Richmond

Hello Jepara.

Taking to account the latest Google updates I would recommend you to use your site URL as an anchor text for at least half of your links. I would also advice you to avoid using the brand names as an anchor text, instead try using such common anchor text as "Click Here", "Follow this link", "Go to our site" and ect.

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#2413 2011-09-13 03:00:01 M G

Hi Dan,

When i use internal links on my homepage, my site drops in Google. I tried this a couple of days ago and my site dropped like 5 ranks down. How come your telling me this is good for SEO while my site drops after putting internal links on it?


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#3064 2012-06-01 04:49:00 Dan Richmond

Actually the fact that you have put some internal links on the homepage of your website can not become the reason for the drop in rankings. Most probably something else influenced the position downfall. If you still experience this issue, please contact Link-Assistant.Com support (http://www.link-assistant.com/support/) describing the situation. These guys will help you investigate the problem and find the solution.

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#2040 2011-06-02 16:50:50 Benny J

Hi Dan,
Is there any recommended number of internal links per page to improve rankings??
Thank you

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#1939 2011-04-09 23:48:09 chanel Tan

Anchor text is one of the really important part of SEO.
It tells the robot what we are.

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