What is Alt text? How to write effective Alt text when SEO images
Not only does Google offer search by text, but you can also search by image. Thanks to images, your article becomes more intuitive, attractive and less boring for readers.
Images are also considered an important factor to bring your website to the top of Google search results. However, if you simply upload an image, it will be very difficult for Google to read the content in your image, so you must describe your image in HTML and that description is called Alt text.
So what is Alt text? And how to optimize Alt text SEO standard? Find out with me in this article!
What is Alt Text?
Alt text is translated to mean alternative text. Alt text also known as “Alt description” or “Alt attribute”, is an HTML attribute applied to an image tag to provide alt text to search engines. Alt text is an important attribute in website optimization for SEO purposes.
alt text
Alt text positively affects your ranking on Google
The Alt tag is important because it helps search engines determine what an image's description is. Alt-tagged images will positively impact your search engine rankings.
Why is Alt Text important?
Increase accessibility
The primary purpose of alt text is still to describe the image for visitors who don't see the image. The reason can be due to weak network, browser blocking the image, or people who cannot visually recognize the image.
In addition, the alt attribute is used for features that help blind people interact with computers by creating audio descriptions that they can hear. Image alt text ensures that all users including those with visual impairments can absorb the content on the website.
SEO Images
In addition to providing a good user experience, Alt text also brings a lot of benefits to image SEO in particular and website SEO in general. This is one of the important Onpage optimization criteria that SEOers cannot ignore.
Search engines have improved their image recognition capabilities, but search crawlers still limit the ability of websites to see images, so the interpretation of images makes more sense. That helps search engines understand the correct way to rank your website instead of getting it wrong and missing out on ranking.
The alt text is also an opportunity for you to add your target keyword. Using main keywords is one way to increase the ranking factor on search engines. Create image description alt text that is both descriptive and can include your target keywords and keyword phrases.
Google does not encourage SEOers to use too many images, but should use text to replace the content of those images.
How to write Alt Text that works
As I said above, in addition to the image description Alt text is also an opportunity to integrate relevant and meaningful focus keywords to enrich the content, providing a good user experience.
Alt text brings good user experience
When writing Alt text for images you need to keep the following points in mind:
Describe the image objectively: Alt text will be displayed when the image fails to upload or the upload fails. So let the user understand the content of the image when the image is not visible.
Provide context to images: Information will be collected for correct indexing.
Alt Text should be short and concise: Avoid image phrases, long descriptions that are not effective.
Avoid keyword stuffing: Create Alt Text purpose is to make the best article quality. Keyword stuffing will not work for both the content and the Alt text.
How to create a standard Alt text
Describe specific images: When images cannot be displayed, descriptions of images help users understand meaning and value. That's what design intent means.
Short: Make sure it's under 125 characters, as common screens only contain that range.
Use keywords: Alt text is an opportunity to add your target keywords to your page, helping search engines better understand which particular query would be relevant to this content. Although the first priority is still descriptive, providing context for the image.
Avoid keyword stuffing: Google will penalize you if you make a keyword stuffing mistake that doesn't provide any context for the image. Alt text only adds relevant target keywords when it makes sense.
How to write standard Alt text in SEO
Avoid using text in images: The tool cannot read text in images, so avoid using text in images but add image explanations in Alt text.
Do not use the phrases “image of”, “photo of” in alt text: The image used already references it as an image, no need to use redundant words to make it more verbose.
Use the tag longdesc=””: This is useful when you have complex images that need long descriptions.
Use Alt for Form Buttons: If you use an image as a “submit” button or a command button, provide an Alt attribute describing the function of the button such as “subscribe now”, “search”, “buy now”,…
Some common problems with Alt text Images
The description of Alt text when optimizing for SEO images will sometimes encounter some problems that you need to understand. When auditing your website, you need to check and check if the image is having any errors.
Common problems with alt text in SEO
Audit website to check if your images are having problems?
Image is broken
Broken, poor quality images give a bad impression to the website, immediately you are underestimated no matter how good your product or content is. This is also recognized by search engines and low ranking websites.
The website audit tool will highlight the causes of broken web images, you can rely on that and fix:
Wrong URL or invalid path: Correct typos in the URL, if the moved image file no longer matches, fix the URL to point to the correct location.
Image does not exist: If the image file is deleted, damaged, or changed to another location, remove it from the HTML of the page if necessary.
It is important to be aware of whether the image is damaged internally or externally. If the images are not reaching the best, replace them.
Image without Alt attribute
An empty image with the Alt attribute is like missing out on a better image rating opportunity. In addition, it does not bring a good experience for users who are visually impaired.
Use the website audit tool to check all images without alt attributes and fix it.
Notice the empty alt attribute here:
<img src=”magename.png” alt=” “>
Change this to:
<img src=”imagename.png” alt=”alt text well-written with keywords”>
https://gtvseo.com/alt-text/#Phat_hien_su_co_voi_Alt_Text_hinh_anh
Frequently asked questions about alt text
How to find Alt tag on the page?
To find the Alt tag on the page, right-click on a white space in the page and select “inspect” or use the keyboard shortcut Ctrl+Shift+I. The source code will appear on the right side of the screen.
Next, you select the first icon to the left of the HTML codepage, then find the images you want to see and click on them. The HTML code of that element to be marked up, which contains the image's attribute.
How to read Alt text in HTML code?
You perform the above operations to display the page's source code table. Alt text tags have content such as alt=”abc”, the abc part is the alt text description.
How to tell if an image has Alt Text?
When you check the source code, if after alt=” ” shows 2 quotes without content, the alt attribute is empty.
How to add Alt text to a JPG file?
When you work in Microsoft Word, right-clicking on an image will have the command “Edit alt text”. Fill in the image description in the input box and select Close.
Is it possible to use commas, periods in Alt Text?
Yes, normal use, as long as the content properly describes the image, providing a good user experience.
How long should the alt text be?
Up to 125 characters.
Alt text is an important part of image SEO, helping to increase user reach. Optimizing Alt text seems like a small problem, but you absolutely must not take it lightly if you want your website to rank high on search engines.
If you are using the WordPress platform then this job will be a lot easier. Hopefully, with the knowledge that I have just shared, it will help you understand what Alt text is, the importance of Alt and create user-friendly pages.
