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Image SEO: How to Write Powerful Alt Image Tags

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Google Images hold over 20% of the search engine market share. That’s more than all of the other search engines competing with Google put together.

US Search Market Share Alt Image share 21.03%

Source: Sparktoro Google CTR in 2018: Paid, Organic, & No-Click Searches by Rand Fishkin

As you can see above, the potential for image SEO is huge. If you have images on your site that are worth the user’s attention, you should seize the opportunity.

How to Succeed with Google Images?

You can begin by optimizing a bunch of image SEO-ranking factors such as:

  • Alt image text of an image
  • Off-page ranking factors
  • Title of the page
  • Surrounding text of an image
  • The uniqueness of an image
  • Title HTML attribute
  • Filename
  • Image dimensions

In this article, I will show you how to optimize the image alt attribute.

5 Benefits of Using Alt Image Text

Alt image text has benefits not only in SEO but also for web accessibility and usability.

1) Alt Image Text is an Important Ranking Factor

Search engines can’t read images, but they can read the alt text, which helps them understand the meaning of the image. Get more traffic to your site by having your images appear in searches.

2) Improve Image Click-through Rate (CTR)

Keywords in the alt attribute can help to improve user’s CTR from search results. It’s visible in a description of the image result, as in this search result:

alt image search results

3) Alt Text as Anchor Text

If an image contains a hyperlink, the alt text represents the anchor text.

4) Web Accessibility

Properly chosen image alt tags are very important in web accessibility. They are used by visually impaired people to understand the context of images.

5) Alt Text Displayed When Images Aren’t Loaded

Not all internet users allow images to be displayed. This is typically due to having internet access with limited data bandwidth. When no image is loaded, the alt image text is visible as seen in the screen capture below:

alt image tag

How to Write SEO-Friendly Alt Text for Your Images: the Basics

Every image should have defined an alt text. Don’t forget about it.

In some cases though, you can leave it empty (alt=””). For example, this works if you use the image to create bullets in a list or as some decoration.

You should also avoid generic alt texts like “picture,” “image,” 123.jpg, etc.

So, what words should you use? Try to imagine that you’re calling your friend. You have to describe him in your image in up to 10 words. What would you say? The answer will be your alt text. Try to be descriptive, but not too much.

To create a new alt text is not so difficult, right? But have you added alt texts to every image on your site in the past? Let’s look at how to find out.

How to Check Your Existing Images for Alt Text

A Fast Check of One Particular Image

Visit one of your web pages in a browser (I used Chrome), open the right-click menu and click on “Inspect.” Then, you will see source code, including alt text:

Use inspect source code to view alt image text

Inspect All Images on One Web Page

You can quickly check every alt with the Spotibo analyzer. Enter the inspected URL. It will automatically highlight empty and poorly used alt image tags containing filenames or generic tags such as “picture.”

inspect all images to see alt image text

Inspect All Images on a Website

If you want to be really efficient with the image SEO, you should optimize every image on your site. In the previous crawl, using Spotibo, you can see not only one page but an entire website.

This way, you can check alt tags of all images on your website and filter them. For example, if you need to optimize images with “.jpg” filenames, the tool will display it to you like this:

Check alt image tags using Spotibo

For further reading, I recommend this step-by-step guide on how to audit images of a web site.

Now, you know the basics about alt text, and you also know how to audit it. Let’s move on to the more advanced practices required to overtake your competitors in search engines.

Use Advanced Alt Text Techniques Like a Pro

Different pictures can have different purposes. And sometimes, depending on the context of a web page, the same image can have more than one purpose.

There are three main types of images:

  • Informative images: These images are the most important for SEO. They graphically represent concepts and information like photos and illustrations.
  • Decorative images: Purpose of an image is to add visual decoration.
  • Functional images: An image can have a specific function, in the form of a link or a button.

Informative Images

As said above, if you want to describe an informative image, try to imagine you’re calling your friend; describe it to him in up to 10 words.

What would you say to him if you see this car?

picture of car

Source: Wikipedia.org.

You say What he sees
A car Too broad!
BMW There are so many BMW cars.
White BMW Okay…
White BMW M3 Ringing a bell.
White BMW M3 2018 Sure, I know this car.
White BMW M3 2018 with dark wheels I know! I have seen the exact one on a parking slot.

woman on computer

Source: Pohodo.sk

You say What he sees
A girl Too broad!
A girl sitting behind the desk Okay.
A smiling girl with glasses sitting behind the desk and using a laptop Great.

There are a few simple steps on how to create the best alt text.

Alt text checklist of an informative image:

Alternative text should typically:

  • Be as exact as possible
  • Be relatively short; up to 10 words, but can be a bit longer if necessary
  • Include keywords
  • Avoid phrases like “image of” or “123.png”

Decorative Images

Sometimes the only purpose of an image is to add visual decoration to the page. Then, the image should be added to a web page with CSS or alt should be empty (alt=””):

Alt image to add visual decorative images

Functional Images

Sometimes an image can have a specific function in the form of a link or a button. Here, the alternative text should describe the functionality of the image. For example, a picture of a search button has a “search” function. Therefore, the alt attribute should contain “search”:

If you want to know more about how to use the right alt text in this case, you can find help here: decision tree from W3.org:

alt image decision tree

The Conclusion

Informative images like photos and illustrations are most important for SEO. Image SEO holds over 20% of the search engine market share. And the competition isn’t so steep. Take this opportunity!

Don’t forget, when you create alt text, always think about its context. Sometimes, the most important thing about the image is its function. And sometimes the image has only a decorative purpose.

Sources

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Jan Januska

Janko is CEO of the SEO tool Spotibo. He has experience with SEO for e-commerce, press and non-profit websites.
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Comments

  3. Informative images are really important in writing about abstract issues. And yet they are the most difficult to design: they tend to be very specific so generic images won’t help. Then, writing the seo-friendly Alt Text with only 10 words is even more challenging…

    Reply

  4. I just recently discovered I was doing my alt text all wrong. I was trying to stuff keywords in, instead of just describing the image in detail, as you demonstrated.

    I also read that ensuring the file name of your image is also relevant to SEO as well. The easier to read, the better.

    Between alt text, file name, and ensuring the images are compressed for size – many ways you can edge your competition.
    Christopher Lequia would love you to read ..Things to Do When Bored: 297+ Ways to Use Your Free Time!My Profile

    Reply

  10. Hey there, it’s really helpful for those who think that they should avoid alt tag or keywords column blank, it’s necessary to be filled for better results. Thanks for sharing I’ll definitely share it with my friends

    Reply

  12. Optimizing images is just easy SEO real estate that most marketers tend to overlook. Why not make it relevant to your page topic and include a few target keywords to help Google bots read your site better? It will just make your page that much more relevant to your subject/niche.
    Ronaldo would love you to read ..Why SEO For Small BusinessesMy Profile

    Reply

  14. Thank you very much for such an amazing article.

    You have completely changed my mind about alt tags after reading your article i felt very confident and i am sure that i will get success by all the points you have mentioned in the article.

    Your article had a very unique ways i will suggest everyone should read this beautiful article.

    Once again thank you very much.
    Marthias Reuben would love you to read ..Best Domain Marketplace to Sell your Domain Name in 2019My Profile

    Reply

  17. i am a seo analyst this article really helpful for me. i learned lot of information from this post. article is nicely explained easy to understand. thanks for sharing this valuable information with us. keep your good work.

    Reply

  19. Just i read your article really great article about SEO image and alt tag because alt tag is the very important port of image SEO. Please keep shearing in future these type of helpful articles.

    Reply

  23. Jan,

    Such a detailed article on Image SEO, especially about the significance of alt text (that often neglect). And, I go with your point using keywords in the alt text. I prefer to use related keywords in the different images that I use on a page or post.

    And, I like the way you have narrated about ‘describing an image’ with examples (Car and the girl). Great inputs. I still admire how you take a narrow topic ‘alt text’ and offer such broader details. Thanks for it.
    Sathish Arumugam would love you to read ..Grammarly Free Vs Grammarly Premium – It’s Really Worth Buying!My Profile

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  24. This is honestly one of my biggest points of struggle with an image heavy photography magazine, the lack of words really limits crawling so the real power lies within alt tags I suppose, though even then it’s a big challenge.

    Reply

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