Every image you place on your blog could help drive traffic and visitors to that blog. In fact adding descriptions to the images you upload is one of the first things most SEO’S will tell you to help with Search Engine Optimization. In this post you will see why adding descriptions help your blog rank higher in search results and how it can also bring direct traffic. Of course we will also see how the descriptions are added, a process that has become a little harder with the new Blogger post editor. And we have a video from Google Employee Matt Cutts on the Importance of Descriptions.
Alternative Text
So far i have been referring to ‘Image Discriptions’ but the actual term used is ‘Alternative Text’ or ‘Alt Tags’.Alt tags have a number of purposes, they help search engines like Google know what the image is about and what the image contains. This is why having alt tags for all your images help your blogs search rank. By explaining the content of an image you are helping Google index the post the image is in. Lets say for example you upload a picture of U2 singer Bono to a post. If you have the alt tag of ‘Bono from U2’ Google will know the post is related to Bono. If you went further and added the alt tag ‘Bono from U2 at the Superbowl half time show’ now Google know your post is related to u2, Bono, The Superbowl and the half time show. The more information you can give search engines to index your blog posts the better.
Image Search
So how can using alt tags on your images help get direct traffic to your blog ? Once again it’s through search results but this time it’s from Image searches.Both Google and Yahoo image searches are very popular and by letting these search engines know what your image is about you will soon get your blog displayed in image search results.So if someone does an image search for Bono, U2, Superbowl or Halftime show your blog and the image will be returned in the results.
The reason we call these descriptions Alternative Text is because of their other purpose. If someone views you blog with a screen reader or for any reason they can not view the image then the Alternative Text will be displayed in place of the image.
How To Add Alt Tags To Images
Adding an alt tag to an image is actually very easy.On the old blogger post editor the alt tag was already in the image code and you just needed to add the text.The new editor however does not add the tag (They say it’s in the pipeline) but you can add the tag and text in a few seconds.
This is an image i just uploaded to Blogger of, you guessed it Bono at the half time show.
This is the Html code for that image, it has no alt tag
<a href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_rKG-ziTSNUQ/TDN84iHSlGI/AAAAAAAABdE/O4dqhpBVUDk/s1600/bono.jpg” imageanchor=”1″ style=”margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;”><img border=”0″ src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_rKG-ziTSNUQ/TDN84iHSlGI/AAAAAAAABdE/O4dqhpBVUDk/s320/bono.jpg” /></a>
Here you can see were to add the alt tag
<div class=”separator” style=”clear: both; text-align: center;”>
<a href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_rKG-ziTSNUQ/TDN84iHSlGI/AAAAAAAABdE/O4dqhpBVUDk/s1600/bono.jpg” imageanchor=”1″ style=”margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;”><img border=”0″ src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_rKG-ziTSNUQ/TDN84iHSlGI/AAAAAAAABdE/O4dqhpBVUDk/s320/bono.jpg” alt=”ADD YOUR DESCRIPTION HERE”/></a></div>
This is the image Html with the alt tag and discription
<div class=”separator” style=”clear: both; text-align: center;”>
<a href=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_rKG-ziTSNUQ/TDN84iHSlGI/AAAAAAAABdE/O4dqhpBVUDk/s1600/bono.jpg” imageanchor=”1″ style=”margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;”><img border=”0″ src=”http://2.bp.blogspot.com/_rKG-ziTSNUQ/TDN84iHSlGI/AAAAAAAABdE/O4dqhpBVUDk/s320/bono.jpg” alt=”Bono With American Flag Jacket U2 Superbowl Half Time Show” /></a></div>
As you can see i have added an in dept description but all the information is relative to the image. So when you next upload an image just add alt=”” and give the picture a description. Below i have a video from Google employee Matt Cutts with more information on the importance of alt tags.
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Video -Matt Cutts On Image Alt Tags
“..Matt Cutts works for the Search Quality group in Google, specializing in search engine optimization issues...”
Do you use alt tags on your images ? Will you start using alt tags now ? Let Us Know…
