Type E:

From Beyond the Envelope™

The alternative text issue — 1.

Of all of the pieces of email content, alternative text is arguably one of the most neglected. But, it is arguably one of the most important.

A few years ago, I decided to turn images off in my email client of choice, Apple Mail. I did this for two reasons. One, to experience the emails I received without their images. Two, to experience their images’ alternative text, some of which were bad and some of which were good.

In this issue, I’ll look at some of the bad experiences of alternative text I’ve had over that time and what we can learn from them.

Numbers

Numbers form the alternative text for most of the images on this email. In and of themselves, they convey no meaning to the recipient. The images are products, and the numbers are their product codes. The numbers are meaningful for the brand but not the recipient. It would be more appropriate to insert descriptions of those products into their respective alt attributes.

Words and Numbers

A combination of words and numbers, separated by hyphens, form the alternative text for most of the images on this email. Once again, they’re meaningful for the brand but not the recipient. They refer to the articles they’re associated with and the email’s send date. Given this email’s rich visual nature, it would be more appropriate to insert descriptions of the images into their respective alt attributes.

Jargon

‘Display images to show real-time content’ is yet again meaningful for the brand but not the recipient. The difficulty with this image is that it’s dynamic content, and it’s a challenge to write alternative text for an image that’s constantly changing. It would be more appropriate to write generic alternative text or leave the alt attribute empty.

Too Many Heroes

‘Hero image’ is jargon for an email’s first feature image. However, on this email, ‘hero image’ forms the alternative text for the first and a further three images. As this email features beautifully designed and beautifully manufactured products, a description of those products accompanied by their product names in their alternative text would be more appropriate.

Placeholder

‘Alt Tag Goes Here’. Plainly, a placeholder, and placed with good intent. Nevertheless, it illustrates how easy it is to neglect alternative text.

Another Placeholder

The number sign, pound sign or hash. Another placeholder.

Mind Your Language

‘Unsere Empfehlung 1’ is German for ‘Our Recommendation 1’ (so Google Translate tells me!), and it appears that the sender created this email in Germany. All other text on the email is in English. When working on multi-language emails, it’s important to ensure that both visible and ‘invisible’ text is in the same language and the correct language attribute is used (e.g. lang="en-GB").

Repeated Text

‘Benefit Offers’. ‘Benefit Offers’. ‘NARS Offers’. ‘NARS Offers’. On this email, some images have alternative text that’s identical to the live text that follows them. It results in a repetitive recipient experience for those using screen readers, leaving them none the wiser about the image content. Image descriptions would be more appropriate.

Branded

‘Brand name’, ‘Brand name’, ‘Brand name’, ‘Brand name’. A few emails have landed in my inbox where most or all of their images’ alternative text is their brand name. Image descriptions or depictions would be more appropriate.

White Noise

Apart from the live text in its navigation and footer, this email’s all image. Its headings, paragraphs and calls to action are all images, and none of these images have alternative text inserted into their alt attributes. As such, if you can’t see this email’s images, you can’t read it, engage with it, or buy products from it!

Conclusion

It’s easy to neglect alternative text. It’s hidden within HTML, and as such, it doesn’t appear on proofs. However, neglecting it can result in a poor recipient experience, as we’ve seen. So, let me conclude this issue of Type E: by giving you some alternative text tips:

1. Pay attention to alternative text. If possible, commission a copywriter to write it.
2. When copywriting alternative text, dictate, depict or describe:
• Dictate text embedded into imagery (images of text).
• Depict the context of imagery (e.g. a scene).
• Describe the content of imagery (e.g. a product).
• If you can’t dictate, depict or describe, use a null alt attribute (e.g. alt="").
3. Consider its context and how it reads in and amongst its surrounding live text. Read it out aloud.
4. Avoid repeating alternative text, either in an adjacent image or in an adjacent piece of text.
5. Ensure all images include alt attributes.

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