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One of the first questions new members often ask me is \u201cWhat are ALT tags?\u201d While I go into a much deeper explanation in A Cup of Content\u2019s <\/span>membership<\/span><\/a>, I thought it deserved a bit of explanation over here on the blog.<\/span><\/p>\n ALT tags are often referred to by several different names, like \u201calt attributes\u201d and \u201calt descriptions\u201d and even \u201cimage tags\u201d. Essentially, they are all the same thing. At their bare bones, ALT tags are the written copy that describes an image to the internet and to those who are visually impaired. As businesses, we want to make sure that our ALT tags work for us in terms of SEO, or search engine optimization.<\/span><\/p>\n Know this: when you write an ALT tag for the images on your website, they should include the keyword phrase for the particular page the image is placed on. <\/span>Every image on your website should have an ALT tag.<\/b> You can include all sorts of things in your ALT tags, obviously, but you need to be careful of blackhat (or naughty) techniques that can get you in SEO trouble with search engines. Blackhat techniques can include keyword stuffing techniques like adding a bunch of keywords to all of your images. For example, I could easily add these keywords to every single image on my website: <\/span>SEO, search engine optimization, learn SEO, what is SEO,<\/span><\/i> and so on. But Google sees one image and thinks, \u201cWell, how can that image <\/span>possibly<\/span><\/i>\u00a0rank for all of those keywords? It\u2019s just not possible. So let\u2019s move them down the list.\u201d Thus, my website gets moved down the list…based on an image. <\/span><\/p>\n Granted, there are a lot of other factors that contribute to this. But chances are: if a website is trying to do this type of blackhat technique with an <\/span>image,<\/span><\/i> they are most likely doing it with every page on their <\/span>website.<\/span><\/i><\/p>\n Naughty, naughty.<\/span> A running theme I have throughout my membership is contextuality, and it\u2019s with reason. We are long past the days of writing a blog post for the sake of writing a blog post. If you are posting content because you <\/span>know<\/span><\/i> you need to do it but you don\u2019t know <\/span>why<\/span><\/i> you need to do it, then don\u2019t bother.<\/span><\/p>\n Of course, you want to write a blog post to make it interesting for your audience, right? But you also need to write a blog post for search engines. Many SEO companies who ghost blog (meaning they write blog posts for businesses and pretend to \u201cbe\u201d the business when they write) are only writing content to help the business get found. The content is boring, dry, and chock full of keywords they <\/span>believe<\/span><\/i> will get the business moved up in search. But guess what? No one is reading that boring content. It\u2019s so generic and boring and so far from who the business really is that it\u2019s not driving traffic. <\/span><\/p>\n It\u2019s doing more harm than good.<\/span><\/p>\n This kind of content is without context. Yeah, you could go and <\/span>look up<\/span><\/a> the word \u201ccontext\u201d, but in terms of SEO you need to know that you have to write not only for search engines but for your audience, too. And a lot of SEO people are so techy that they can\u2019t be creative. (If you\u2019re looking for a creative techy SEO writer, we do that for businesses, too!<\/a><\/span>)<\/span><\/p>\n Well, you could sign up for our trial and start learning. IT\u2019S REALLY THAT EASY! I guarantee that in just one week, you can learn something that will drastically change your business. All you have to do is get your hands a little dirty and try. You up for the challenge? Click that shiny pink button below. I triple dog dare you.<\/span><\/p>\n [\/et_pb_text][et_pb_button button_url=”\/join\/” button_text=”Start my trial!” admin_label=”Start your free trial Button” _builder_version=”3.26.6″ button_text_size=”16px” button_border_width=”0px” button_letter_spacing=”2px” custom_margin=”|||” custom_padding=”12px||12px|” animation_style=”fade” button_letter_spacing_hover=”2px” saved_tabs=”all” button_text_size__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_text_size__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_text_size__hover_enabled=”off” button_text_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_text_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_text_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_border_width__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_border_width__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_border_width__hover_enabled=”off” button_border_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_border_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_border_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_border_radius__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_border_radius__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_border_radius__hover_enabled=”off” button_letter_spacing__hover_enabled=”on” button_letter_spacing__hover=”2px” button_one_letter_spacing__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_letter_spacing__hover_enabled=”off” button_bg_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_one_bg_color__hover_enabled=”off” button_two_bg_color__hover_enabled=”off”][\/et_pb_button][et_pb_code text_orientation=”center”]What are ALT tags?<\/h2>\n
\n[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/acupofcontent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/What-to-include-ALT-Tags-YT-thumb.jpg” align=”center” align_tablet=”center” align_last_edited=”on|desktop” _builder_version=”3.23″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.15″]<\/p>\nWhat should you include in your ALT tags?<\/span><\/h2>\n
\n[\/et_pb_text][et_pb_image src=”https:\/\/acupofcontent.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/09\/ALT-Tags-SEO-contextuality-YT-thumb.jpg” align=”center” align_tablet=”center” align_last_edited=”on|desktop” _builder_version=”3.23″][\/et_pb_image][et_pb_text _builder_version=”3.26.6″]<\/p>\nALT tags and SEO contextuality<\/span><\/h2>\n
How can I learn to write like this, Kim?<\/span><\/h2>\n