does it count for keyword density

alt tags!

[soapystar]

ok..if i have the same icon for a bunch of lines..and if the alt tag is used then it takes my keyword density to high.....does google count the alt tag in its calculations for keyword density?....and for that matter..what elements of the meta-tags does it count in working out total keyword density?

[Brett_Tabke]

Interestingly enough, I was just in a major "discussion" (ok, argument) on whether Google was even using density in it's calculations.

Alt tags don't count for much, but it's pretty clear they are going into the mix somehow.

Can anyone find a case where a alt tag has a unique kw and you can search on that kw and find the page? I can under special circumstances but I do think alt tags get indexed or count somehow.

There are those rare pages that are 100% graphic where you can search on alt text, but it is unclear (untested) whether that is come from the meta description or from the alt tag.

[glengara]

Interesting, as I'm convinced it was too high density on my major 4 word keyphrase that caused a fall this time around.
For the minor 2 word keyphrase the page/site stayed where it was.

[Randex]

"Can anyone find a case where a alt tag has a unique kw and you can search on that kw and find the page?"

Yes. I accidently misspelled a word in one of my alt tags and the page
shows up as #2 when searchers do the same misspelling.
The Alt tag is the only place on my page where the misspelled word is located.
I thought about correcting the word but since it draws traffic I decided to leave it alone. May misspell more words.

[tristan]

I got some picture gallery pages deeper in a site that show up for
searches on words which only appear in the alt tags
Interestingly enough all these pages went waay down in this index,
although their PR went from 2 to 3

[Marcia]

I've got an alt tag showing in the Google snippet, and yes, there's text on the page, it's picking up part alt text and part promo text. Couldn't be better if ad copy had been written for it.

[bether2]

Like Marcia, I've also seen my alt tags in google snippits. And there was text on the page. Don't know whether or not the alt tags count toward keyword density, though.

Beth

[Powdork]

Interesting, as I'm convinced it was too high density on my major 4 word keyphrase that caused a fall this time around.
For the minor 2 word keyphrase the page/site stayed where it was.

I too fell for my four word phrase and it wasn't just that I fell but this is where the results were shuffled. Try your four word phrase with quotes. Also, if the four word phrase is your two word plus an additional two words, do those two words put you into a more competitive search.

On topic- I do have alt text, an artist's name when only the music genre appears on the page, that shows up in snippets. I have never given keyword density much thought, though, and I don't know why any self respecting search engine would either. Too easy to manipulate, and manipulation leads to poor content. Rewarding for kw density would give seo's the upper hand and we all have our ideas about that. Google would want (I hope) for our pages to be optomised for Joe Surfer, not for Googlebot's algo. A good search engine will have an algo that thinks like Joe Surfer too. Google does that pretty darn well.

[soapystar]

my point about if alt tags count for density is that you can accidentally look like spamming if you have a lot of images using your keyword on one page and this is calculated into the density ratio.