Image alt tags

[darqSHADOW]

I am wondering about the use of image alt tags. My site is built using a very nice design we came up with, and many of the images are borders, and placeholders, yet they have no alt attribute. WebPosition Gold and other tools complain that too many images do not have alt tags, and that it is hurting my results.

Would placing keywords on these images help?

How about placing random sets of keywords from a list via dynamic php? Do you think Google would penalize me for this?

DS

[le_gber]

Hi darqSHADOW,

If it's just because WPG told you to do so I wouldn't worry.

As long as your 'important' images use the alt attribute to tell people what the image is about it should be enough.

For more info on alt attribute you can read: [w3.org...]

Hope this helps,

Leo

[Powdork]

Google only indexes the alt tag content if it is within an <a>tag</a>. Also keep in mind the intent of the alt tag is to help with access for those with disabilities. For instance, browsers made for visually impaired will read aloud the alt tag content.
And, oh yeah, hiding keywords is considered spam.

[scatcat]

It is a good idea to have an alt tag for every image.

All websites should now be fully accessible to people with disabilities.

According to the 508 standards committee

'All IMG elements are required to contain either the alt or the longdesc attribute.'

This is part of the priority 1 standards ie. it's a must do!

You can check all your pages for accessability, by using the webdeveloper plugin for the Firefox browser.

Have fun.

[g1smd]

Alt is not a tag. I have never seen <alt>some text</alt> tags in the HTML spec.

You think that's pedantic? Wait until the the discussion moves on to <title> tags and title="" attributes.

You need a minimum of alt="" for the attribute in an <img> tag, for the HTML document to be considered a valid document.

[brixton]

here is what you can use as alt and that can have your KW as well in all SE's not only Google
<a href="http://www.mysite.com/"><img border="0" src="A.jpg" alt="buy widgets at widget.com" width="100" height="83"></a>

[Marcia]

Take a look at the alt attributes for some sites in Google's text-only cache, with and without being linked. ;)

They started showing them a few months ago, so it looks like they do index them even if the image isn't linked, but we don't know if they count in scoring, or if they do, how much.

[WebWalla]

And they definitely count for the G Image Search, so apart from the usability argument which should suffice on its own, it's always a good idea to use them.

[billygg]

be careful with alt tags guys, as of recently, i seen an article on how one guy. had fairly good placement in google. then added alt tags and lost about 5 pages in the results. then he removed the tags, and got his placement back. Many people now days are stuffing the alt tags with keywords. i think google is responding with a closer look at indexing these tags.

[Marcia]

I've got some low-volume but consistent traffic from Google's image search for an image that isn't even on my site, it's hot-linked as an affiliate link from the merchant's site. Of course, it may be the merchant doing the searching for their own images to make sure they're being used properly. I have no way of knowing who it is. It does have an alt attribute, but goes to show that it does pay to use alt text.

Thanks for the tip about the image search without links, it's good to know.