If your website/blog uses images, image maps or pictures, you should always make use of the ALT tag. ALT tags are a property of the <img src> tag. It displays alternative text for users who cannot load images or have a problem loading an image. Search engines don’t see images, they read a website, so it’s a good idea to give your images a ALT description. In other words, giving your images alternative descriptions, will give search engines a verbal description of your images.

If your website/blog consits of a large number of images, it is vital to use alternative tags, as with many images, your content will probably be on a minimal side. A good image to always give an alterative tag to is the header image at the top of your website - this is often one of the first things a search engine will view.

The general layout of this tag is as follows:

<IMG SRC="image.ext" ALT="Alternative text in here">

An example would be:

<IMG SRC="header.jpg" ALT="Webtrepreneur Home Page">

The above example would give search engines a great idea of what the website is all above. I would suggest going a little further than my example above, and rather use the alternative tag to describe the website, like so:

<IMG SRC="header.jpg" ALT="Webtrepreneur making money online">

This will allow the search engine to understand your website right from the beginning. For Adsense users, this is a excellent way to get your adverts displaying relative media on a website with a large quantity of images.