Are Titles inside internal links very useful?

Could they improve SERPs positions?

[larryhatch]

My site has a lot of specialized maps that link to one another.

A typical internal link might look like:
<A HREF="http://www.mysite.net/USA52.html">1952 USA Map</A>

I'm starting to add title attributes something like this:
<A HREF="http://www.mysite.net/USA52.html" title="Widgets in the USA in 1952"> 1952 USA Map</A>

This should benefit users when they mouse-over the link; clarity, more information..

Question is: will there be any real benefit in the SERPs of the major search engines?
Any other benefits I didn't think of?

How about possible downsides? Might this be perceived as keyword stuffing?
I only use short titles for ease and clarity of browsing.

Its a lot of work, over 1000 links. I'd like to think there is some SERPs benefit as well. -Larry

[BeeDeeDubbleU]

The often ignored title attribute is designed as an accessibility tool for use in text to speech browsers but it is unlikely to be much help in SEO. I would assume that the SE's recognise that it would be too easy to manipulate to give it any weight.

Apparently Google has actually confirmed this ... [webmasterworld.com...]

But then again we know that alt text is used so why not title text?

[larryhatch]

Thanks BD, that makes sense.

I hope I can presume there's no downside, as long as the title attributes
are short, unique, to the point, and NOT KW stuffed. -Larry

[decaff]

Really, these have to be done very succinctly and very specific to the actual anchor text...being very careful not to keyword stuff...

Certainly, it would be a no brainer for the engines to simply trip a filter on the title="" attribute...so not sure if this adds any real value for SEO purposes...

Typically, not a good idea to take what is an accessibility standard and try to exploit it for SEO purposes....