Tooltips

I've been in SEO and online marketing for over 20 years and I'm here to share the wealth of knowledge , hints and tips I've amassed over that time . Hello , welcome back to SEO is not that hard . It's me here , ed Dawson , hosting , as usual , and today I'm covering tool tips , and so this isn't tips for tools that I might suggest people use .

This is actually about tool tips on web pages . So you know the little things . You normally have something like a question mark , something like that you can hover over , or it's next to something where you can get some additional information just by hovering over it . Tooltips , um . So this is something that's really okay .

It's both usability and seo , but it's one that's really worth talking about . So , yeah , let's uh dive into it . So , first of all , let's define what a tooltip is . So , really , a tooltip is a brief , usually informative message .

Hopefully , that appears when a user hovers over , focuses on or taps an element on a web page , so it's a way of providing additional context , information or clarification about something on your web page without cluttering up the interface . So tooltips are commonly used to explain icons , abbreviations , form fields , row headers , that kind of thing .

They're designed to enhance the user's understanding and interaction with your web pages . So you might be thinking okay , tooltips improve user experience , but how does that relate to SEO ? Well , there's a good question .

But while they are primarily a usability feature , they can indirectly influence your site's seo performance by improving user engagement metrics , which we know is important now , and providing opportunities to include sort of relevant , topically relevant keywords and text on your page . So let's like have a look , first of all , while why tooltips are good for usability .

So , first of all , they enhance your users understanding . So they're there to provide immediate contextual information without requiring users to navigate away from the page to try and find out what's going on .

So , for example , if you have a complex term or an unfamiliar icon , a tooltip can offer the explanation on the page , ensuring users aren't confused or frustrated . Secondly , they reduce the cognitive load .

So , by offering additional information only when needed , tooltips help keep your interface clean and uncluttered , so users can then focus on the primary content and access extra details that they need on demand , which makes for a smoother user experience rather than having to wade through loads of text , especially as they get used to using the page .

They wouldn't need to have that reminder every time . It improves your form completion rates . So in forms , especially when you've got information that might not be completely obviously clear , where people have got to provide , a tool tip can give information on how to fill out specific fields correctly , which reduces errors .

It means you're more likely to get successful submissions , particularly useful for complex technical input fields . Tooltips encourage user engagement , so interactive elements like these can make your website more engaging and users are more likely to interact with content that provides them with immediate feedback or different information in a user-friendly way as they go along .

And finally , it's got accessibility benefits . So if you implement them correctly , then tooltips can improve the accessibility for users who rely on screen readers or keyboard navigation , meaning that you're going to ensure a broader audience can use your website .

Okay , so that's the usability side of things , which is worth doing it just for that usability in itself , because it'll help , like I say , with a whole bunch of stuff , including conversion rates . Um , but when it comes to pure seo benefits , you know there are benefits that tooltips may have when it comes to seo , so let's run through them .

So one we've got increased time on page , so providing this additional information encourage interaction . This tooltips can keep users engaged for longer and increase to old time signals to search engines that your content is valuable and relevant . Secondly , it reduces bounce rate .

You know better user experience means a user is less likely to bounce , leave your site immediately . So a lower bounce rate can positively affect searches and rankings . We know that , as it indicates user satisfaction , you get an improved click-through rates .

If tooltips are used in navigation menus or call-to-action buttons , they can guide users more effectively than just having a page without them , and this can lead to high click-through rates in important pages .

Keywords Tooltips offer that opportunity to include relevant keywords phrases topically relevant that may not fit naturally into the main content of a page , and this can help with your semantic SEO . A search engine can then understand more about the context and the relevance of the content and the page because of this tooltip information .

We've talked about the enhanced accessibility . Accessible websites often rank better because they're catered to a wider audience . So using tooltips correctly can improve your site's accessibility , which can indirectly boost your SEO and , yeah , and overall user behavior signals .

Positive user interaction , such as hovering over elements engaging with tooltips , can contribute to favorable user behavior metrics . So these metrics can influence how search engines will perceive your site's quality . So , however , it's important to note that for tooltips to have these SEO benefits , they need to be implemented properly .

Search engines primarily crawl static content , so if your tooltips are hidden behind JavaScript or aren't accessible in HTML , search engines may not index that content . The caveat is , yes , google does render pages .

It does try to do its best with JavaScript , so they may still work if it's all done in JavaScript , but why not do it properly the first time around , where you know it's definitely going to work ?

Okay , so if I've got you sold on why you should be using tooltips , then here's some best practices for how to implement them in a way that will work best for usability and also for SEO . So , first of all , use semantic HTML and ARIA labels .

So if you use HTML elements and ARIA I call them aria because it's actually here to say it stands for accessible , rich internet applications attributes just google a , r , I , a and you'll you'll learn all about it and this . This will ensure that screen readers . Search engines can both access the tooltip content .

You'll find loads of examples online of how to do this . Secondly , keep your content relatively concise . Tooltips there should be valuable information that's directly related to the element that they're associated with . So , you know , keep that text concise so that users can quickly grasp and understand what you're trying to get through to them .

Optimize your tooltip content with keywords . You know , make sure if you just , you know , get your keywords in there . Don't be spamming , but but get it in . Naturally it will help . This is going to add extra relevance to your SEO and provide that additional context to the search engines .

Ensure mobile compatibility , especially on a lot of sites now get most of the traffic from mobile users . So you want to make sure that on touch devices it works , because on a touch device there's no hovering option . So make sure your toolt tips are accessible via taps so they don't interfere with the user's ability to interact with other elements .

Use um , yeah , ara attributes like the um area , dash , label area , dash , described by or role equals tool tip to make tool tips accessible to those users with disabilities , because this not only broadens your audience but it also can possibly positively impact seo . Avoid overuse . Too many tool tips can overwhelm users , so and that can cause your interface .

So use them just for the elements that genuinely need additional explanation and provide fallback content . In case javascript's fails or is disabled , ensure your tool tip content is still available . Um , you know , if that's something complex , then talk to a developer on how to do that . And , yeah , and style Be consistent with your style .

So have a consistent design for tooltips on your site so once a user's discovered one tooltip , they'll be able to spot where all those are on your site . And finally , yeah , if you can monitor user interaction , so you can use analytics tools to track how users have interacted with tooltips .

So if you find ones that just aren't needed , it means you could possibly remove them . Or if you find ones where people are having to , you know , continue to have to use them , maybe it means you've got some more education you need to do around , whatever that topic is Okay .

So for a real world way that tooltips are used , we've actually just updated our um content optimization tool that integrates with google search console , because that has got a lot of very kind of well , technical terms in them , or well , technical terms that don't necessarily have um , an obvious explanation if you don't know what they are .

So , for example , things , things like similarity is a column on our you know , for pages and queries and things like that , where we're looking at , you know , create these embeddings code some similarity . If you don't know what it means , you know you want to get the full explanation . So we've got tool tips for that , to explain what the similarity is .

Also , what's the difference between page position and best query position on you know , some of these data tables we've got .

So all these things now we've now got tooltips next to them so that people can understand them , Because we were finding , when we were doing usability testing , that people , although they appreciated that we've got all this data , they didn't necessarily know what each column meant and what it related to .

So , with this now , tooltips are there so that if people want a reminder or want to learn what each one is , they're there . Um , it's not going to be something that makes a big difference to seo because you know , google doesn't crawl on those pages . This is , you know , this is , this is a web app where it's not publicly accessible .

So , yeah , google's never going to see . It's not going to help us seo wise . Um , but there are other places on the site where we do have tool tips and that will be helping us with our seo is whether it's helping our usability .

So's tooltips which you may not have ever considered before in terms of an SEO thing , but let's remember they enhance usability , help users with additional context without cluttering interface , which can improve user satisfaction , get conversion rates up . It has indirect SEO benefits .

So , again , those user engagement metrics help , but obviously there's also things like the keyword and the context of the text in those tooltips that will help your SEO . It's really key to implement it properly .

Use HTML , use that A-R-I-A method of getting it implemented and avoid the common pitfalls , as in don't hide critical information , don't neglect accessibility and don't overcomplicate your tooltips . So yeah , I hope you found that useful . Any questions , any thoughts , get in touch with me as usual .

All the ways of doing that are in the show notes and until next time , just remember keep optimizing , stay curious and remember SEO is not that hard when you understand the basics . Thanks for listening . It means a lot to me . This is where I get to remind you where you can connect with me and my SEO tools and services .

You can find links to all the links I mention here in the show notes . Just remember , with all these places where I use my name , that Ed is spelled with two Ds . You can find me on LinkedIn and Blue Sky . Just search for Ed Dawson on both . You can record a voice question to get answered on the podcast . The link is in the show notes .

You can try our SEO intelligence platform , keywords People Use at keywordspeopleusecom , where we can help you discover the questions and keywords people are asking online .

Post those questions and keywords into related groups so you know what content you need to build topical authority and finally , connect your Google Search Console account for your sites so we can crawl and understand your actual content , find what keywords you rank for and then help you optimize and continually refine your content and targeted , personalized advice .

Keep your traffic growing . If you're interested in learning more about me personally or looking for dedicated consulting advice , then visit wwweddawsoncom . Bye for now and see you in the next episode of seo . Is not that hard .