In Part five of our local business seo tutorial, we learn what ALT tags are and how they relate to search engine optimization and local business. Also, we discuss title tags, how to add alt and title tags in WordPress and other other CMS systems. We also explore WHY we want to take the time to add alt tags to all of your images.
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Transcript of Alt Tags and local SEO
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Mike Z : Local SEO expert (00:00):
Hey, it's Mike with Serr.biz. Right there. Serr.biz. Search engine ranking rules. Today, we're going to talk about ALT tags and how they relate to search engine optimization. First, what is an alt tag? An alt tag assists literally a little bit of code within your SEO code. That gives information about what an image is. Alt tags were created for the visually impaired, blind people. And you add a little alt tag to your image. So when they're viewing your site with a text reader, they get some information about what your image is. Now. Remember, Google bot is a visually impaired robot. It's blind. It can't read the content inside of your image. Handing Google an image is like handing a blind person, a painting and saying, what is it? They can't tell? So using the all tag, we can not only help humans, we can help Google and other search engines read and understand what your image is about. Now.
What does the HTML code look for ALT tags?
Mike Z : Local SEO expert (01:12):
Let's take a look and see what it looks like. So we're over on Serr.biz now and on the local business tutorial, this is a cover image. And if we right click inspect in Google Chrome, it's going to show us the exact code. So image, class caption title. We'll talk about titles in a second. Then the file name the pathway to the file and the file name is "local business SEO tutorial". We'll talk about that as well. And then right there is the alt tag all equals BRAC brackets, alt equals quotations, local business SEO tutorial, and then there's an item property as well. So that little text helps Google know what that image is about. And hopefully it lines up with what the content of the page is about and the page URL, et cetera.
Mike Z : Local SEO expert (02:15):
So that is where it's added. However, you don't have to worry about you know, hand coding the code because most content management systems have a functionality for you to add the alt tag, at least. If your CMS system has no functionality for alt tags, it doesn't automatically generate it based maybe on the title of your page or headers or something, then you probably need a new content management system. However, most people are going to be using, most local businesses, are going to be using WordPress, Joomla Duda, et cetera. I just want to pop over to a WordPress site to show you how you would add a alt tag to your image in WordPress. So I have an image pulled up here. I'm going to say replace image. I have to move myself out of the way. Library. The image that I have it going to keep in place is this one, but as I select it what you would do is you would upload your image.
How do I add ALT tags to WordPress and other CMS systems?
Mike Z : Local SEO expert (03:25):
If you don't already have an image there. Or on WordPress, you have these fields, these fields are important. You don't have to fill them out, but do take the time. If you're going to SEO your local business site, you need to take the time to do this. So over here, the very first tag is the alt tag and just put in some information about what it is. My particular situation here is, you know, I've got text within the actual image, which Google can't read. So I'm going to actually use that text that I chose as a graphic element and put it in my alt tag in this case, it's "what are SEO header tags". I used it for the title tag. I use it for the caption function of WordPress and also the description. And that's it basically.
Mike Z : Local SEO expert (04:14):
So it's selected, it has that. And I've already set it as feature, but I set it again. And so now that image is there. So that's how you would add an alt tag to your image, your featured image in WordPress. If you're adding an image within your WordPress blog or page, what have you, you basically have the same option. You just kind of get there a little bit differently when you're in the body area and you're uploading like right here. If I wanted to upload an image I would just grab it, upload it when I upload it, then I have that option again, of creating alt tags and title tags for it. It is important. You do want to take that extra time. It will help you. So now let's just pop back over to Serr.biz and talk about the title tags.
What does an image title tag do?
Mike Z : Local SEO expert (05:04):
Since WordPress had alt tag and title tag functions and Serr.biz also used alt tags and title tags, and just show, show you what it does. The title tag is pretty much just like an alt tag, except it has a very specific function. See right here, I have a title tag, local business SEO tutorial, and then over on the rendered page, when I hover over the image hover over the image, a little tool tip pops up that tells me what the image is about. In, in this particular case, it's kind of un-needed because the image does have a text built into it and it's easily visually useful. It doesn't really need that title tag, but if I had used an image that didn't have any text and I wanted to give a little more information about it to people who are just, you know, scrolling on the page and looking at it, that's what the tool tip tag is for. To get more information about your image. And I believe that you know, text readers will also pick that up. The last thing I want to talk about related to all tags and images is to point out that Google has a whole image search function results, right? So by helping Google understand the images on your page, they are more likely, Google is more likely to include your images within their image search results. So I've already done a search over here on Google for Serr.biz LLC.
Adding ALT tags helps Google understand and add your images to their index
Mike Z : Local SEO expert (06:49):
And we can see a whole bunch of our images. Some are being pulled from like our YouTube channel. Some are being pulled from other sites that have picked it up. Here's one of the images that's pulling directly from Serr.biz. This image is also being pulled directly from Serr.biz. It's all just a good way to get into Google. The more space you have in Google, the more times they indexed you in different ways, they indexed you, the more opportunity you're going to have to get a human visitor to your website. And that's really what it's all about, right? You need a human to come to your website and buy your product or services. In the local, in the local business aspect of things. Yes, you want to show up for your brand name and you pretty much would and could and will.
Mike Z : Local SEO expert (07:43):
But one tactic, especially in the service industry are before and after photos, right? So as you're doing as you're building your website and you're adding blog content and you're sharing before and after photos, be sure to tag those with alt tags so people can find them. Because some people, when they're searching for local services like painting, et cetera, they might check the images, search results in Google. And if they see a great before and after photo here, they might, well, you know, click through to your actual website. So here I went to mine, which is now on services, et cetera. So you see how that works. So Bing also has an image search results. And so does Duck Duck Go so taking some time to add alt tags and title tags and paying attention to how you name your image, all of those things are little bits that are pieces of SEO that will help you get into the search engines and get ranking and get humans to come visit your website. And, ultimately, hopefully, buy your product or service. So now we know what alt tags are and title tags, and how helps
Mize Z : Local SEO expert (08:55):
with search engine optimization. If you have any questions, please leave a comment below. I'll be happy to answer as soon as I can. Next up, we're going to talk about search engine friendly URLs or SEFS as they're often referred to. Thanks for watching my name's Mike with Serr.biz search engine ranking rules.
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