Using Alt Text in stock photography good?
-
Hello,
I got a client who told me that he bought his images from a stock photography website. I know it looks awful and all, but the client can't afford a photographer to get some decent pics.
So, How positive it is to use Alt Text on images that aren't yours? The purpose of using alt text properly is to get traffic from an imaged based search right? So if the business shows up with some stock photography it looks kinda bad.
Is it worth optimizing images in this case? Or just leave em without optimizing?
Changing pics isn't an option.
Thanks
-
Thanks for your quick response Aaron. What you said makes sense, and now I can go to bed with no worries.
-
I don't see any reason why not to add alt text to the stock images on your website (I say this both as a site publisher and as a professional photographer). The alt text doesn't imply ownership of the images, but rather it's designed to provide an assistive description as to what the image represents. The only area where I think you would be deceptive is if your alt text claims something that is blatantly false, such as showing a stock image of a man and the alt text indicating that it's a photo of your CEO.
Descriptive alt text, including keywords, will have a positive effect on SEO.
Got a burning SEO question?
Subscribe to Moz Pro to gain full access to Q&A, answer questions, and ask your own.
Browse Questions
Explore more categories
-
Moz Tools
Chat with the community about the Moz tools.
-
SEO Tactics
Discuss the SEO process with fellow marketers
-
Community
Discuss industry events, jobs, and news!
-
Digital Marketing
Chat about tactics outside of SEO
-
Research & Trends
Dive into research and trends in the search industry.
-
Support
Connect on product support and feature requests.
Related Questions
-
Why not just use an alias if the only change is a different domain Name?
We are rebranding our store with a new name. We have purchased a NewDomainName. Can I just make the "Old Domain Name" an alias for the "NewDomainName"? The site will not change in any other way than having a new logo. This is an e-commerce site with over 100 categories of artisan made products. So once we move the site, the old domain will be empty. Thank you Stephen
Branding | | stephenfishman1 -
Use of Keywords throughout articles
Hi everyone, I have another (very basic) question! It's about the use of keywords throughout articles - is it worthwhile putting keywords and associated phrases in bold and italic and also underlining them at various points throughout my website articles? I have read that this helps google to know what the article is about. Any comments would be much appreciated!
Branding | | ClareO0 -
Are there any benefits to using Google+ for business if it has no followers and no user engagement?
My G+ for business currently has 55 followers and no engagement - apart from me liking the posts from my personal G+ Apart from the benefits of having content indexed faster, is there any other benefits for me in this situation, from an SEO perspective? I would like to grow the followers and engagement but not sure how as my social marketing skills are not as strong as my technical seo.
Branding | | AjazMozPro2 -
Reducing Amount of Text on Web Pages-Risk of Killing Ranking?
We are a commercial real estate brokerage firm in Manhattan. Our site (w w w . m e t r o - m a n h a t t a n . com) is text heavy and somewhat uninviting. Ranking is fair. Conversions awful. Our niche is very competitive. We plan on reducing the amount of text and making the site more visual. Among the planned changes: -Reduce amount of text in home page and text heavy pages. More emphasis on product (listings)
Branding | | Kingalan1
-Much larger photos for listings
-Lighter cleaner design with more open white areas
-Use of more visible fonts
-Better forms New design will be like: http://www.dernieretage-paris.com/ Theme and graphics based on Manhattan. More visuals. Better photos. Less text. But are we shooting ourselves in the foot by reducing text? Is there a risk that Google will reduce our ranking? Can we compensate for reduced text that is visible to visitors by completing meta tags more fully? Any thoughts??? Thanks,
Alan0 -
A 2014 perspective on using Awards/Badges for backlinks?
Hi all, Just wanted to get a modern-day perspective on this tactic as a method of obtaining back links. We've recently (legitimately) polled our customer base both on social media and through our email database (40,000+ people) to rank a bunch of different locations / attractions and put together Top 10 lists based on the results. I was intending to put together "awards" badges and provide them to the operators who won along with a back link from the badge to the main article page with the finalists. I thought I'd ask here though to see what public opinion is on this as a link building tactic in 2014 as all the resources I could find were a couple of years old. Bear in mind we aren't paying them anything at all, but it is still an obvious attempt to both give them their recognition as well as add to our link profile. Do you think in this day and age that this kind of action would invoke any Google penalties? And if not, is there any indication why they wouldn't pass as much juice as regular text links? Thanks for any and all feedback.
Branding | | ExperienceOz1 -
Can i use the same keyword or similar keyword on title tag of multiple page ?
Greetings support, I would like to know if i can use similar keywords into my index title tag and than the similar keyword into the title tag of another page from the same site. Example:The site selling ''Dubai Apartments'' ''Dubai Vacation Rentals'' ''Dubai Holiday Apartments'' and ''Dubai Accommodation'' and would like to rank the index page for ''Dubai City Apartments'' and ''Dubai Accommodation'' and the category page /apartments/ for ''Dubai Apartments'' Is this ok ? because I do not want to lose the rank for the index page because it's already higher for ''Dubai City Apartments'' and ''Dubai Apartments'' I also have use this title tag on the home page: Dubai City Apartments | Dubai Accommodation | sitename brand and than i have category page such: /apartments/ title Dubai Apartments | Dubai Apartment Rentals | brandname /vacation-rentals/ title Dubai Vacation Rentals | Holiday Rentals Dubai | brandname /holiday-apartments/ Dubai Holiday Apartments | Dubai Vacation Apartments | brandname P.S. My index page is already rank for keyword such: dubai apartments, dubai holiday apartments, dubai vacation rentals and dubai accommodation but i want to know rank the category page. Any suggestions would be appreciated. Best, Giuseppe
Branding | | WorldEscape0 -
Subject: Brand anchor text distribution. Does the HP url classify as brand anchor?
Hi guys, I just wanted to know what your take is on this and whether anyone knows if google has published any info on this. I am wanting to analyse a fairly large backlink profile. The idea is to discover how far it correlates alongside recent SERPS ranking data (based on anchor text distribution) information that has been published across the web. There is so much data to categorise and segment. This is due to overlaps in categorisation, (which is possibly a good thing as it appears more natural) though I often it difficult to decide which goes where. My question today relates to brand anchor text - in determining the % of overall brand distribution for a backlink profile - Which out of the below do you think rings true? 1.) Should I be considering the homepage url anchor text as a branded link anchor? 2.) Should the brand % just be 'pure brand' anchor text? 3.) Should it contain partial brand + KWD data? 4.) Should it comprise of all of the above elements? 5.) Should I divvy up / segment partial brand, pure brand, brand + kwd, citations etc into new sub categories and see how this individual data correlates to current ranking factors in the SERPS? (Not sure if there is any recent published data in this amount of detail) Anyway, I just wondered what you guys thought about this in the eyes of Google., and also to find out how you go about classifying and segmenting backlink profile data. Thanks for now
Branding | | Turkey0 -
What are good paid white hat link building opporunties?
What are some good sites that offer white hat link building opportunies for the Hospitality vertical? I like the guest blogger option but dont know what site(s) are the best options?
Branding | | Melia0