How to Tag Images for SEO

Google wants your content to be easy to read by humans. That means making it look visually attractive. Lists, bullet points, section headings, and other formatting all play a role in ranking your pages.

So do images. Images make articles easier to read.

Hover over an image and you might find that nothing new appears next to your cursor. That’s a lost opportunity. Let's fix it.

Image ALT Tag

For every image you add to your content, add an “Image ALT tag”.

This is a short phrase - usually related keywords for the page - to indicate what the image is about.

Featured images, such as those residing at the top of your article or labeled “Featured Image” in WordPress, should use your exact keyword phrase to build on your keyword emphasis.

The Dreaded Red X

If a website visitor has modified their browser to accommodate for accessibility settings with images disabled, they will see a red “X” in place of the image or nothing at all.

By using the Image ALT tag, the visitor will see the text that describes the image so they have context. Google views this tag as an important SEO ranking factor.

How Many Images to Add

There is a balance of how many images to add to your page. Remember that Google wants your page to be easily ready by humans. That means for long articles, the more images your page has which include related keywords, the higher your chances of increasing your ranking.

If you add too many that make your article feel cluttered, that will take away from your SEO scores which reduce your rankings.

My own research indicates that you should have a minimum of two, including your featured image at the top and another one somewhere in the middle. For articles over 1200 words, add four or five images. For longer pieces, add more.

A good rule of thumb is that when you scroll through your article, you should try to have an image (or some other visual element, like a section heading, bulleted list, video) be displayed. Too much text reduces the readability.

Getting a Bonus Boost With Images

Original images with ALT tags might also appear in Google's image search results. For example, if you have a chart or graphic that illustrates a key point, people who search Google for images may see that chart and visit your site.

Example: when I ran of my prior companies, MailerMailer, we released an annual report on email marketing metrics. We created images for each chart and then labeled the ALT tag with related keywords.

This meant if you searched "best time of day to send email" our chart that depicted our data popped up as one of the top results.

How to Add the IMG ALT Tag in Wordpress

If your website is on Wordpress, the easiest way to add the ALT tag is to open the image and type in the keyword in the "Alt Text" field. See below:

You may have heard me say that SEO is a series of 1, 2 and 3 point plays, just like in basketball. There are no 7 point plays where doing one single activity suddenly gets your site's rankings to skyrocket.

Add IMG ALT tags and you'll send Google another signal about your site's keywords.

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