Within your site, you may have discovered that certain images wrapped in anchor tags lack alternative text descriptions (alt text) or are completely missing the alt attribute.
Why is this important?
Alt text adds crucial context to images on your pages, promoting accessibility for users with visual impairments who rely on screen readers. It also provides a textual alternative when the image fails to load. For images encompassed by links, alt text can serve as anchor text that conveys information and context to search engines.
What does the Optimization check?
This Optimization is activated for any internal link that includes an image with a hyperlink, when the image tag is devoid of alt text or completely lacks the alt attribute.
Note: Tracking images, often designed to be pixel-sized and invisible, do not count towards activating this Optimization.
Examples that trigger this Optimization
Consider the following instances where an linked image omits alt text:
<a href="https://example.com"><img src="https://httpbin.org/image/png" alt="" /></a>
Or, when the image lacks an alt attribute entirely:
<a href="https://example.com"><img src="https://httpbin.org/image/png" /></a>
If there are various linked images and only one includes alt text:
<a href="https://example.com"><img src="https://httpbin.org/image/png" alt="Descriptive alt text" /></a><a href="https://example.com"><img src="https://httpbin.org/image/png" alt="" /></a><a href="https://example.com"><img src="https://httpbin.org/image/png" /></a>
Why is this Optimization marked 'Opportunity'?
At Loud Interactive, we categorize this Optimization as an Opportunity, suggesting an actionable step for optimizing your website that could enhance your search engine visibility.
While neglecting alt text on images does not directly penalize your website's search engine rankings, taking the time to provide descriptive alt text, especially for key images, can be beneficial for SEO.
How do you get more data from Sitebulb?
Access more information by selecting the Optimization Details from the URL List. This presents a detailed overlay with specific data regarding the Optimization for each URL, including any images missing alt text which will be highlighted in the HTML code. A scrollbar to the right will guide you to the location of the highlighted element.
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