Link with image and text

Does anyone know what a search engine considers the anchor text if you use an image and text in the anchor, like this:

<a href="page.html" title="myPage"><img src="image.jpg" alt="myImage"><br>go to my page</a>

HTML:

what would google read the anchor text as?

I read that if it's just an image, the anchor text is the image's alt text.

 

thanks great post

 

thanks...

I posted the same question in a different forums, and this answer is only based on theory (as most SEO is), but here's what we came up with:

the anchor text ('go to my page') is probably what search engines focus on, but they may put some weight on the image's alt text.

 

I think it's the alt text. the argument being that this is the text shown if the image cannot be displayed so it must convey the purpose of the image and hence link.

 

I do agree with that, but I figure that if there's plain text in an anchor tag, they must use it even if it precedes an image.

 

Search-engines consider "Go to my page" as the anchor text. However, the SEO effect of the anchor text and especially the attributes is a matter of debate. There is an excellent article about the Google search engine ranking factors on SEOmoz (see the topic "Keyword Use in Alt Tags and Image Titles") in which this issue is discussed. All SEO experts agreed that the alternate attribute in the image element has a moderate effect, whereas the anchor text is of great importance. The title attribute carries no weight in search-engine optimisation, as I already mentioned in a recent thread of mine on the SEO effect of the title attribute. However, it is possible that the page that is linked to is indexed for the keywords in both the alternate attribute and the title attribute, as mentioned in the discussion on SEOmoz. Of course, pages are indexed for the keywords in the anchor text. In fact, the anchor text has a large and positive SEO effect, although using the same anchor text too often is considered spammy and therefore has a detrimental SEO effect. I hope this helps.

 

Thanks LawnchairLarry - I'll look through these sites - it's something extra to think about.

 

Does it help in targeting a certain keyword or phrase?

 

If it does have an affect (effect?) it's probably very little.

 

Anchor text in this code would be "Go to my page". It is very important to be as specific as you can when creating a link. I would suggest if your link page is about "News in Hampshire", then use this text as your link text. Always try and incorporate your keywords for that page.

 

"alt" text and the "title of image acts as the anchor text.Alt>title but it is not clear how much weightage does google gives to alt text

 

very good advice man

 

the 'alt' text matter the most for google image bots.

also try to name your file accordingly. names like "adsdsfgfb.jpg" are not going to do anything to your blog .
all the best , pal .

 

Thanks itcoll.

What do you guys think about the title tag in an anchor?

I saw this video blog, and some guy (I don't remember who he was) highly suggested using the title tag in links. <a href="my-widget-page" title="a tutorial on widgets">. Others have said that this tag is worthless.... What do you think? Should I keep using this on my links?

 

Actually, there's two, both the Href anchor text and the ALT text, both will be read by the search engine.

 

thx for sharing....

 

I think alt and title attribute have also effect on SE. Those are both readable by bots and I think it can help our site ranking.

 

Should it be like this?:
'go to my page' is the anchor text for the destination page - in this case 'page.html'.
on the other hand the alt text 'myImage' is a keyword for the page where that image was placed.