Alt text etc

[Stevie-]

Currently going through a bit of rebranding/separation of Weddings from the usually studio work.

Using Wordpress and pro photo I'm knocking together a new site.

In terms of the uploading of images what information should I be putting in the:

Title
Caption
Alt text
Description.


SEO and other techy black magic I am not to great with.

 

[Stevie-]

Bump for the evening shift.

So for example a wedding image, bride and groom. In say, at Andrews in the square, Glasgow what should I be putting?

 

[petersmart]

If it's only for photos then it should be self evident from the picture really.

Title: So and so getting married in Glasgow at St. Andrew's Church, Glasgow
Caption: The wedding of (names) at St. Andrew's Church, Glasgow, on (date)
Alt: Wedding Photography by (your company name or you)
Description: Bride and groom (names) photographed by (your company name or you) at St. Andrew's Church Glasgow

Obviously this is just a general outline.

 

[Stevie-]

If it's only for photos then it should be self evident from the picture really.

Title: So and so getting married in Glasgow at St. Andrew's Church, Glasgow
Caption: The wedding of (names) at St. Andrew's Church, Glasgow, on (date)
Alt: Wedding Photography by (your company name or you)
Description: Bride and groom (names) photographed by (your company name or you) at St. Andrew's Church Glasgow

Obviously this is just a general outline.

Ta - I had concerns over general optimising the captions for SEO purposes.

 

[Musicman]

Alt: Wedding Photography by (your company name or you)

Er, no!

The Alt text attribute is used by screen readers to communicate the content or function of a specific image on a page to people with visual impairments.

If there is sufficient context, such as a caption or title for the image, it is probably best left empty (but not omitted from the img tag e. g. alt="").

It should not be used for other purposes.

Reading on the topic

http://webaim.org/techniques/alttext/

 

[Phil V]

...

The Alt text attribute is used by screen readers to communicate the content or function of a specific image on a page to people with visual impairments.

If there is sufficient context, such as a caption or title for the image, it is probably best left empty (but not omitted from the img tag e. g. alt="").

...

Absolutely!
That is why we have alt text.
But these bits...

Er, no!
...
It should not be used for other purposes.

Reading on the topic

http://webaim.org/techniques/alttext/

Complete rubbish

Visually impaired people are not the only things that can't see images. Neither can the bots that crawl your website for the Search engines. They really could do with as much information as possible about your images, particularly on a site where the images make up a large proportion of the content. It's really useful and is good housekeeping and good practice to complete the alt text field and all the other fields for your images.

Search engines like people to dot the i's and cross the t's, this is just part of that strategy and will be rewarded.

 

[Musicman]

Yes, alt tags are not there *exclusively* for use by screen readers for visually impaired visitors to a site. Nor did I claim that. Search engines and other software make use of them.

I probably wasn't clear - I meant it shouldn't be used for other *semantic* purposes than for a description of the image whose tag within which the alt attribute is used.

"Wedding photography by x" in the example I replied to is probably an inappropriate use. It doesn't tell you much about that image, since it really is more appropriate as metadata about the page or the whole site.

 

[petersmart]

Yes, alt tags are not there *exclusively* for use by screen readers for visually impaired visitors to a site. Nor did I claim that. Search engines and other software make use of them.

I probably wasn't clear - I meant it shouldn't be used for other *semantic* purposes than for a description of the image whose tag within which the alt attribute is used.

"Wedding photography by x" in the example I replied to is probably an inappropriate use. It doesn't tell you much about that image, since it really is more appropriate as metadata about the page or the whole site.

Yes I have to agree with that so change what I said to what he said.

 

[Phil V]

Yes, alt tags are not there *exclusively* for use by screen readers for visually impaired visitors to a site. Nor did I claim that. Search engines and other software make use of them.

I probably wasn't clear - I meant it shouldn't be used for other *semantic* purposes than for a description of the image whose tag within which the alt attribute is used.

"Wedding photography by x" in the example I replied to is probably an inappropriate use. It doesn't tell you much about that image, since it really is more appropriate as metadata about the page or the whole site.

Metadata is largely irrelevant. And has been for a long time.
You're right that "Wedding photography by x" is inappropriate, but then it's also useless for SEO too.

However "Wedding photography Local Venue" is both relevant to the photo as Alt text and helpful for SEO. As we always say, you can't see SEO in isolation, it's just a part of good practice for lots of things.

 

[Stevie-]

Alright - so for talkings sake - This image.

TITLE - Dave and Jen, Married at Glasgow University Cathedral, Glasgow

CAPTION - Marriage of Dave and Jen at Glasgow Cathedral - Glasgow university.

ALT TAGS - Bride and Groom wedding photo by Stevie Weir, Glasgow and Lanarkshire wedding photographer.

DESCRIPTION - Photograph of Dave and Jen at their wedding at Glasgow University Cathedral by creative wedding photographer Stevie Weir.

Something like that? There are alot of images that will have to be dealt with and I'd rather get it right first time and give the SEO the best chance I can.

 

[Phil V]

Long tail keywords!
Glasgow and Lanarkshire wedding photographer is a bit rubbish, it turns into:

Glasgow
Glasgow and Lanarkshire
Glasgow and Lanarkshire wedding
Lanarkshire wedding
Lanarkshire wedding photographer
wedding photographer
photographer

Whereas, Lanarkshire wedding photographer Glasgow gets you:
Lanarkshire wedding
Lanarkshire wedding photographer
wedding photographer Glasgow
wedding photographer
photographer Glasgow
photographer
Lanarkshire
Glasgow
Which is a better bet all round!

Other things I'd tidy up, no-one searches 'married', stick with wedding, church wedding, civil wedding etc.
Don't be scared of mentioning photograph, you appear to have shied away above

You can forget the studio name too, having the URL is enough to get you to the top of searches for you.

I might not be doing it brilliantly but I aim for something that can be copied and pasted through the fields then delete bits as I go along. It seems to work for me.

 

[Stevie-]

Thanks - I have no idea why I didn't mention photograph. After a while seo stuff just looks like a mash of words so something copy and pasteable would be ideal.

 

[nass]

Long tail keywords!
Glasgow and Lanarkshire wedding photographer is a bit rubbish, it turns into:

Glasgow
Glasgow and Lanarkshire
Glasgow and Lanarkshire wedding
Lanarkshire wedding
Lanarkshire wedding photographer
wedding photographer
photographer

Whereas, Lanarkshire wedding photographer Glasgow gets you:
Lanarkshire wedding
Lanarkshire wedding photographer
wedding photographer Glasgow
wedding photographer
photographer Glasgow
photographer
Lanarkshire
Glasgow
Which is a better bet all round!

Good post. many people miss this, the order matters. Think 'words that are adjacent to each other'