Images and Tags

It seems that through the years the advice about image alt tags has drastically changed. I can remember several years ago, being told that the importance was because many people were surfing with “images” turned off in their browsers. These days, with faster internet connections, that’s not so much the case. Now Image Alt Tags have taken on a different role in a website.

Not only should you find appealing photos and images to include in your website, but each one should be as relevant as possible to the content of the page. Make sure that the size of the image has been optimized (large files are still a pain in the “you know what” when it comes to page load time), but not so far that it no longer looks clean. NOW-Be sure that every image on your site (except background images) has an Alt Tag, that not only includes a short description of the image, but also a few of your keywords. Yes, using keywords and keyword phrases in your Alt Tags is acceptable, and is very good for Search Engine Optimization!

It can be a tedious task, but it will be well worth it in the end. After all, unless your name precedes you (like Apple.com or Microsoft.com) and you know folks are going to find you anyway, you should use every step available to increase your rankings….and help others to find you!

What is an image alt tag? It’s a simple line of code added to your img tag, that looks like this: alt=”Website Design-Domain Registration, Graphics,Ecommerce” Taking a few extra minutes to add these tags to all of the images on your site CAN make a world of difference!