How to get extra SEO love with image and alt titles

Rachel Green
Jun 7, 2021
2 min read

Updated: Apr 30

Every image on your website gives you SEO power.

All online images have a file name and an alt title.

Your file name is the name used to save a graphic on your computer or cloud. e.g women’s denim playsuit.jpg

Alt text (mistakenly often called alt tag) is a description of what’s in each image. Alt text is used by Google and visually impaired users to understand what’s in each image.

If you want to move the needle on your SEO, optimising your images is one way to do it.

Why are alt and image titles a thing?

Google serves up blended results in all searches. So, if you type in “how to paint a wall arch” you’ll get text, video, shopping, map and image results. Google Lens makes image search even more popular.

If you want to increase your visibility in search results (everyone, right?) do your business a favour and get on top of your image and alt titles.

In my experience as an SEO copywriter for small business, it’s very possible your competitor hasn’t SEO’d their images. Which gives you a double advantage.

Here’s how to write them

Rule of thumb? Use your keyword/s for the respective page the image appears on plus a description of what’s in the image.

e.g if you’re an interior designer with the keywords “Sydney residential interior designer”, you might give this photo this image file name “heritage terrace facade Sydney residential interior designer.”

The alt title could be "heritage terrace facade Sydney residential interior designer by BRAND NAME."

If you’re a florist, you could use “yellow ranunculus buy online Melbourne florist” for this product:

Where to put alt and image titles

Your first step is to rename the image you want to use on your computer, Google drive or wherever you save your images. Use the same file name as alt text – just copy and paste to save time.

Every website platform back end is different but usually when you upload an image to your gallery, it has an alt text field.