Satisfying, visually pleasing site content is made using text and images in conjunction. However, search engines favour text above image, and it’s well worth knowing this when creating content. To understand why you should use text to improve SEO, take note of this key information.
Why is text better than images?
Text is more easily understood by search engines than images are. Text is superior in terms of SEO, page speed and accessibility, both on mobile and web server. For this reason, a company’s key information should be conveyed using text, not images.
Though one might argue that using image links alone can create more visually dramatic sites, Googlebot cannot see and determine what these pictures are, which means accompanying explanatory text is vital. Even a sentence can help both users and search engines better understand what your site is about.
Information that should be text
Using text in images instead of pure text can crop up a lot without you necessarily realising. Here are some prime examples of information you should ensure remain as text.
– Business name: If your company’s name is only shown in a logo image, make sure you use text elsewhere for your business name.
– Company description: Don’t let your entire site be graphics. Make sure you use text to describe your purpose so that people can find your business easier. ALT tags will only get you so far.
– Address: Your company’s address should exist as text on your website at least once.
Making images more search engine friendly
By no means should you abandon using images on your site. They offer aesthetic value and help break a page up for people viewing your site. However, it’s well worth making images more search engine friendly by giving them ALT tags.
For cases like drop down menus displaying images instead of text, you need to make sure that the image has an ALT tag describing its function. So, if you were clicking on a “homeware” tab, you’d simply give the image the ALT tag of “homeware”. This allows the search engine to get a better idea of the image’s content.
In short, continue to use images on your site, but make sure you stick to text for important names, details and links.