Keywords in ALT Not Important Any More?..

Just noticed that Google started to ignore the significance of keywords in
the ALT attribute when generating the search results. Keywords in ALT do
not seem to have any effect on advancing your site on certain keywords in
SERs. Any observations?

P.S.
This seems to be happening on a particular server only -- Google is starting
to dance?.. may be ...

"Mark Shell" <markashell (AT) REMOVEearthlink (DOT) net> wrote

Just noticed that Google started to ignore the significance of keywords in
the ALT attribute when generating the search results. Keywords in ALT do
not seem to have any effect on advancing your site on certain keywords in
SERs. Any observations?

On Mon, 10 Oct 2005 01:42:57 GMT, "Mark Shell"
<markashell (AT) REMOVEearthlink (DOT) net> wrote:

Just noticed that Google started to ignore the significance of keywords in
the ALT attribute when generating the search results. Keywords in ALT do
not seem to have any effect on advancing your site on certain keywords in
SERs. Any observations?

Are you referring to an image that doesn't link to anything ?

If so, then correct, google etc ignores it.

However, if an image, when clicked on, takes you to another
image/page, then google does take notice.

Unless its changes in the last day or so.

plh
Paul

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It's dogma, unchangeable, and unaffected by reality and whatever facts we come upon in the real world." -- James Randi


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Paul <webmaster (AT) houstoncrafts (DOT) com> wrote:

Are you referring to an image that doesn't link to anything ?
If so, then correct, google etc ignores it.

No.

If you place a unique (non-sense) word only in the alt tag of an
unlinked image, it will be found by google! (tested a few weeks ago)

But whether this *improves* the ranking of a search term, that occurs
within the normal content, I don't know (and is hard to find out).


Michael


--
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On Wed, 12 Oct 2005 09:46:13 +0200, Michael Sattler
<misa4nospam (AT) gmx (DOT) de> wrote:

Paul <webmaster (AT) houstoncrafts (DOT) com> wrote:

Are you referring to an image that doesn't link to anything ?
If so, then correct, google etc ignores it.

No.

If you place a unique (non-sense) word only in the alt tag of an
unlinked image, it will be found by google! (tested a few weeks ago)

But whether this *improves* the ranking of a search term, that occurs
within the normal content, I don't know (and is hard to find out).


Michael

Then it is a recent change.


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On Wed, 12 Oct 2005 09:46:13 +0200, Michael Sattler
<misa4nospam (AT) gmx (DOT) de> wrote:

Paul <webmaster (AT) houstoncrafts (DOT) com> wrote:

Are you referring to an image that doesn't link to anything ?
If so, then correct, google etc ignores it.

No.

If you place a unique (non-sense) word only in the alt tag of an
unlinked image, it will be found by google! (tested a few weeks ago)

It used to be non linked images had no effect on SERPs, few months
back this changed.

Stacey was the first here to notice the change and I'm pretty sure
posted about it.

But whether this *improves* the ranking of a search term, that occurs
within the normal content, I don't know (and is hard to find out).

Yes it does.

So all alt attribute text helps now.

Michael

David
--
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http://www.seo-gold.com/tutorial/

"David" <seodave (AT) search-engine-optimization-services (DOT) co.uk> wrote

On Wed, 12 Oct 2005 09:46:13 +0200, Michael Sattler
misa4nospam (AT) gmx (DOT) de> wrote:

Paul <webmaster (AT) houstoncrafts (DOT) com> wrote:

Are you referring to an image that doesn't link to anything ?
If so, then correct, google etc ignores it.

No.

If you place a unique (non-sense) word only in the alt tag of an
unlinked image, it will be found by google! (tested a few weeks ago)

It used to be non linked images had no effect on SERPs, few months
back this changed.

Stacey was the first here to notice the change and I'm pretty sure
posted about it.

Yep, I did.:-)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.i...a8544 fe052df

But whether this *improves* the ranking of a search term, that occurs
within the normal content, I don't know (and is hard to find out).

Yes it does.

Yeah, of course it would. Any text on a page with keywords can help a page's
ranking. :-)

So all alt attribute text helps now.

Yep. And I know I have mention that Yahoo uses descriptions also, not just
for snippets. Yep you can be ranked with your description in Yahoo.

Stacey