<a> attributes

eg. <a title="more info">

[zaneta]

In an <img> element it is well known that the alt attribute helps SE categorize the picture. Do you think that the "title" atrribute helps SE to know more about where the anchor text links to? Also is it a good idea to have the value of the title attribute be the same as the anchor text?
eg.

<a title="london travel">London Travel</a>

or

<a title="more info">London Travel</a>

is better?

And by saying better, i mean getting higher ranking!

[londrum]

accessibility gurus always say a title attribute on an anchor tag is a good thing, because it tells people more about where the link will take them. that way they can choose whether to follow the link or not (...so the theory goes, anyway)
but if you put exactly the same words in the title as are already in the link words, then you are taking away all of that benefit. it just becomes an SEO thing, which the engines might regard as an obvious attempt to rank higher.

so if you're going to do it, then i would make the titles as descriptive as possible (whilst still keeping it relatively short)

but i doubt it carries much weight these days, anyway. maybe a little tiny weeny bit. but if you do it properly then it can't hurt, and it will help the usability of your page

[tedster]

At the New Orleans PubCon, I finally got confirmation from a Google engineer that they did not use the title attribute. He told me that it was not common enough to provide them with a valid relevance signal. I had been testing it for years and never saw any sign that it helped.

I still don't think this has changed -- but the title attribute is a good thing for visitors in some applications, so I still use it - especially in the anchor tag, as you mentioned.

[zaneta]

Thank u for your helpful replies.

So it is a completely different thing than the alt attribute we assign to an image.

eg.

<img alt="athens parthenon"/>

is still acceptable and helpful for SE indexing and ranking, right?

[londrum]

yeah, definately different - you should always put in the alt attributes. if only for that fact that your page won't validate without it.
don't stuff it with loads and loads of keywords though, that's an old trick. you can put in a couple though. best to keep it natural sounding and meaningful. people do actually read those things - especially if the images take ages to download.
if the image is actually a link to somewhere, and your alt attribute is good, then people will be free to click the link before they even see the image. that is good for usability.