Does "Title" in WP link count as anchor text?

[Sweet Tooth #3]

I don't know if this is really a Wordpress question...maybe a linking or anchor text question.

In the WP post/page editor; when you place a link within your post body, it asks you to enter a title underneath where the link url goes. And then the link HTML looks like this. <a title="Title" href="http://website.com/">anchor text</a>

Above, where it says "anchor text," I know that's the link anchor text. But do keywords or phrases you enter under "Title" count in any way as anchor text also? Or does it give any keyword relevance to the target page being linked to? What you enter as "Title" is what shows up in the little window when you hover over the link.

I just was wondering if keywords entered into this "Title" field could affect keyword ranking for the target page.

[deepsand]

Given the purpose of the Title attribute when used in an Anchor element - to provide information descriptive of non-textual content targeted by the link for use by a browser or other user agent - it would seem unlikely that it be viewed by an SE as being either superior to or necessarily amplifying of the anchor text.

Given that it is not rendered for the user's eye to see in the absence of a mouse-over using certain browsers, and that it thus lends itself to keyword stuffing in a manner like that of the meta keyword tag, I should not be surprised were it here wholly ignored by an SE.

See W3: Links (http://www.w3.org/TR/html4/struct/links.html) and ZDNet / Techguide / Web Development / Using title attribute to provide more data about HTML elements (http://www.zdnetasia.com/using-title-attribute-to-provide-more-data-about-html-elements-62046782.htm).

[holyhttp]

The title is obviously different from the anchor text. It just provide a description of the link to give the user a hint about the target URL. It's also good for SEO and accessibility.
Anchor text in the other hand is the text that's shown as a link and clickable. As for as keyword in the title since it's usually hidden keywords in the anchor text have more weight.
So use the title text just to increase usability/accessibility not for SEO purpose.

[JezC]

I've worked on a few sites where the designers have only had images (without the useful SEO ALT attributes) in the anchor with no text at all, and used anchor titles in an attempt to provide SEO clues to search engines. It doesn't work. Add an ALT tag and it makes a bit of difference. Replace the image by real text, and use Image Replacement techniques, and you make more impact.

So, I infer that titles do little for you.

Easy experiment. Make up three nonsense phrases. Check the phrases on Google to see if it finds them. If it does, change the phrases to be unusual (low competition).

On one page (to equalise the factors), preferably a page that already appears in search engines and is crawled reasonably frequently, add one phrase as an anchor title, one as an image ALT and one as a piece of anchor text. Wait for for your page to be crawled, and then see which phrases Google picks up. It's easy to do and illuminating.

Cheers, JeremyC

[snakeman]

Thanks for the question sweet tooth and thanks for the answer deepsend. My experience with wordpress blogs mirrors your explanation given. Having said that, when you do "off page" SEO at various places in terms of a single web page it becomes more difficult for a novice like me to work out which SEO actions and where is having the greatest impact on SERP's.
All the best

[deepsand]

The title is obviously different from the anchor text. It just provide a description of the link to give the user a hint about the target URL.
Only if the user's browser supports its being displayed on a mouse-over.


It's also good for SEO ...
That's not a given, but rather is the OP's question.


... and accessibility
Nope; that's what the alt attributes is for.

[deepsand]

T... when you do "off page" SEO at various places in terms of a single web page it becomes more difficult for a novice like me to work out which SEO actions and where is having the greatest impact on SERP's.
Given that each SE stands alone, and that each continually makes modifications to what are opaque systems, that is to be expected.

And, a strong argument for putting what your users need and want first and foremost.

[iandoc]

.... - it would seem unlikely that it be viewed by an SE as being either superior to or necessarily amplifying of the anchor text.

Given that it is not rendered for the user's eye to see in the absence of a mouse-over using certain browsers, and that it thus lends itself to keyword stuffing in a manner like that of the meta keyword tag, I should not be surprised were it here wholly ignored by an SE.


Could not agree more ! Such an obvious area for keyword stuffing that is actually not visible through a browser, so the search engines would have ignored a long time ago.

[weegillis]

The OP is answered, so there is no point repeating, the TITLE ATTRIBUTE is not LINK TEXT, and should not even describe the link text, but the TARGET of the link. We need to be clear on what @deepsand posted above: (paraphrasing) It will come as no surprise that 'title' attributes have NO SEO VALUE, whatsoever. Not by the spec, and not directly by SE's.

TITLE attributes on link tags do have USABILITY VALUE as they provide 'additional information' which lends itself to SEO indirectly, by way of site quality metrics; but, this is not SEO and gains are negligible at best (unless you're a user of the site).

Before the search engine ever enters the picture, the W3C specifications combined with WAI recommendations guide user agent vendors to work toward bettering the user experience by supporting consistent rendering methods and providing mechanisms for all manner of users, be they sighted, visually challenged, using a screen reader or magnifier, using an aural device, or a braille machine, and so on. Of course, each vendor had to put their own spin on how the spec would be applied in their UA. Far be it for me to go down that road.

In spite of their differences, they (the main browser vendors) do have consistency in the rendering of 'title' attributes, which role is to inform, as stated above. All the visual browsers offer a tool tip on mouse over, and may all one day offer a tool tip on focus for keyboard users, as well.

The attributes discussed and dilly-dallied over time and again are so ancient, they predate all the modern search engines (http://askville.amazon.com/search-engine/AnswerViewer.do?requestId=420222) (ref. RFC 1866, Nov. 1995 (http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc1866#page-32)). They are not SEO on the surface. Do we (developers/site owners) benefit from using them? SHOULD IT MATTER? Does the USER benefit from their proper implementation? This is the real question.