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Further, one of my marketplaces requires title tags, as many of our visitors use screen readers. Once again - all the sites I see well ranked in several categories don't have these, either (in fact, none at all..).
Has the Google algo shifted to the point where these are "bad news"..?
I think that you may also be seeing some sites that thought that florida/austin brought about some over optimization penalties.
There is no such thing as an <alt> tag, but there is an alt attribute used with the <img> tag.
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>> Further, one of my marketplaces requires title tags, as many of our visitors use screen readers.
Every site should have a <title> tag. It is the main title that search engines show in the SERPs, as well as that shown along the top of the browser window.
And every image should have a alt tag
It is true that every image should have an alt attribute. But, every image should not have a text alternative. If the image used is a bullet, then alt="*" is suggested or alt="".
Many have over optimized their alt attributes to the point where it probably won't be long before the SEs start ignoring them too, just like other elements that have been abused.
I was reviewing a site this morning that had alt text assigned to every image, including about 20 spacer gifs. The alt text was abusive in most areas (exceeded 80 characters) and made no sense whatsoever.
a_chameleon, are you referring to the title attribute? If so, I believe there have been more than sufficient user experiences to say that this particular attribute is not counted towards relevancy.
Also, if the link text is sufficient enough for the user to understand the destination target, then the title attribute is not required.
Suggestion, look at the site through lynx which is a text-mode WWW browser for linux. This will give you a very good idea of how your pages look in text mode. If they make sense on that browser, they will make sense anywhere...
just my 2 cents worth
Most users won't see the ALT text or they can easily ignore it because it is only shown when the mouse pointer hovers over the image for some time.
Actually that is an incorrect behavior on IE's part. The alternative text should only be visible when a user has their images turned off.
The alt attribute is one of the 100+ factors that Google takes into consideration when determining the relevancy of a page. Too much alternative text and I think you can raise a flag or possibly get caught up in a filter of some sort.
It is not that having the exact keyword in Title and ALT is bad. It is just that Google not only looks at which exact keyword you have typed in but also synonims. Refer an interesting discussion on LSI [webmasterworld.com]
May be you could run a tild (~) test on your targetted keywords and find how well are the top ranked sites on content with synonims.
Best wishes
Mc
I meant attribute, but shortened it to "tag" referncing the HTML 'name' of the attribute's application to browsers.
OK: Thanks for the replies, all of them. Here's the dilemna I'm facing..
In my category(s) all the >#10 sites do not provide alt text for images at all, period. G's "Info for Webmasters", as old as it is (hasn't been modified in about a year, it seems) still recommends alt txt.
Additionally, most sites have anchor text like "blue widgets"; many of our visitors using screen readers can't rteally navigate well w/ shortened/abbreviated link text like
[.} Gigmagator Widgets {.](Often an image)
[> "blue widgets"
[> "green widgets"
[> "yellow widgets"[.} Doomagator Widgets {.](Often an image)
[> "blue widgets"
[> "green widgets"
[> "yellow widgets"
as many screen reader users can't plow through the hyperbole above these shortened text links comfortably, to know that if they're looking for "Green Widgets that only work with Doomagator Widgets" they need to go to the bottom section of the above example.
Ergo, title attributes become crucial - advanced screen reader users will skip-skip-skip until they hear "Click here for Green Widgets that only work with Doomagators".
Again - a common denominator of the >#10 sites in my categories is no title attributes, at all... Zip. Nada. The Big 0.
Seeing these two common denominators, warns me they may now be detrimental to good Google ranking, regardless of what Inf. for Wbmstrs. still says...
Is anyone else experiencing this in their catgory(s) ...?
0? 0
~
On another forum was told this was a mistake and overly long Alt's could get us penalized and I was advised to switch to title attributes instead for the descriptions. Our site has been ranking fairly well for most keywords and I'm waiting to see if this is going to affect search results.
So is there a general consensus here? Alt & title attributes make no difference SEO wise so use or not at my discretion? Don't use Alt, use title? Don't use either?
On another forum was told this was a mistake and overly long Alt's could get us penalized and I was advised to switch to title attributes instead for the descriptions.
Its a shame that there is so much misinformation floating about out there. I doubt very seriously that overly long alt attributes will get you penalized. There may be some sort of filter that kicks in once you exceed a certain character count.
Based on your description of how you were using them adheres to the specifications set forth by the W3C on the proper use of the alt attribute.
Now, if those images are linked, you'll want to have a descriptive alt attribute (relative to the image) and then use the title attribute in the link to describe the destination of the link to the user if required. Usually the image is descriptive enough.
The maximum recommended character count for the alt attribute is 80. Anything over that and you should be using the longdesc attribute.
Based on various member input here at the board, the title attribute is not included when determining the relevancy of the page.
Alt & title attributes make no difference SEO wise so use or not at my discretion?
in my research i am finding that most of the basic SEO practices that worked prior to austin no longer work with the new algorithm.
the number 1 site for a fairly competitive keyword phrase i follow does not have the phrase or components of the phrase in the:
title
headings
alt
body text
the only occurrence of the keyword phrase is in the anchor text on outbound links in 6 places.
I doubt if Google gives much if any weight to alt text, since it's so easily abused.
Check their incoming link anchor text and also do a check of the cached page on google. My guess is that both of those will show that there are incoming links with the KW/KWs you are looking for in them as anchor text.
My theory, therefore: SEO-savvy webmasters in your industry abused alt and title attributes to the hilt, whereas SEO-unsavvy webmasters were not even aware of their existence and so did not. If it's a competitive field, there is no middle ground-- either you know and you try to squeeze every last advantage out of it, or you don't and live in peaceful oblivion.
Google altered its algorithm/filters to reduce the impact of alt and title attributes, or perhaps penalized those sites. Since there is no halfway, the bottom bubbles to the top.
Again - a common denominator of the >#10 sites in my categories is no title attributes, at all... Zip. Nada. The Big 0.Seeing these two common denominators, warns me they may now be detrimental to good Google ranking, regardless of what Inf. for Wbmstrs. still says...
Hi,
What shows up in SERPs where the title should be then?
Best wishes
Sid
The title in the Google SERPs comes from the <title> tag in the <head> section.
What is being discussed here is the title attribute used on images and links:
<a href="somefile.html" title="this is the title attribute">this is the link text</a>
<img src="someimage.png" title="this is the title attribute" alt="this is the alt attribute" height="40" width="40" border="0">
This is why it is important to know the difference between a tag and an attribute.
