Google: Alt Text Is Not A Factor For Regular Web Searches

Google: Alt Text Is Not A Factor For Regular Web Searches

    Creating descriptive alt text for images is crucial for the success of your website. It helps Google understand what an image is, and increases its chances of appearing in search results. Not all web users want to see the classic blue hyperlinked search results - many would rather see embedded images. Adding alt texts will make your website more visible and appealing to users. Lately, Google's ranking factors have changed. Alt text is no longer a ranking factor for web searches.  That doesn't mean to quit using it altogether.  Alt text is still important for people who use screen readers.  <a href="https://www.[SEO](https://bkthemes.design/parents-with-disabilities/) purposes, it will help. For example, if your images don't load properly, Google will display a placeholder instead of the image.

Adding alt text to your images is not necessary for regular web search. Adding it to your images is important from an accessibility standpoint, but it has little effect on regular web searches. However, it's useful for visitors who use screen readers, and it is highly recommended from an accessibility point of view. If you're unsure about whether or not you should add alt text to your images, you should consult your <a href="https://www.[web developer](https://bkthemes.design/) to ensure that it meets Google's requirements.

 

Alt Text Should Not Be Abandoned

 

The importance of alt text cannot be underestimated. It's an essential tool to help provide a better user experience and convert organic traffic. With the use of alt text, images will become hyperlinked search results. It also increases your page's ranking in image search. Even if the link isn't the first option on a search query, your images will still be shown in the image pack, where they can be displayed in any organic position.

When you're creating images, you should consider adding alt text. This will help your website's SEO rankings and will help users with screen reader access. It's also a good idea to monitor alt text's impact on the user experience of your images. If you have a website that's dedicated to making your site accessible to all users, then it's a good idea to add alt text for images.

 

Images Rank as well

 

All that being said.  It is still very important to include with the images.  Images rank in their own way within Google.  If you do an image search you will see what I mean.  Just enter a keyword or keyphrase and watch what images come up. Leveraging what to put there and not overpowering your page with content Google already has.

 

Alt Text

Should Be Descriptive

In a case like this I would avoid the situation where you're just repeating the same thing over and over. So avoid having like the title of a product be used as an alt text for the image, but rather describe the image in a slightly different way. So that's kind of the recommendation I would have there.

I wouldn't just blindly copy and paste the same text that you already have on a page as an alt text for an image because that doesn't really help search engines and it doesn't really help people who rely on screen readers.

From a more general point of view, the alt text is meant as a replacement or description of the image, and that's something that is particularly useful for people who can't look at individual images, who use things like screen readers, but it also helps search engines to understand what this image is about.

If you already have the same description for a product around the image, for search engines they kind of have what they need, but for people with screen readers maybe it still makes sense to have some kind of alt text for that specific image.