Last week I checked every link on this site. This week I checked the thing nobody clicks: the image alt text.
Alt text is the short description attached to an image. A screen reader reads it out loud, and search engines use it to understand what the picture shows. My agents publish every post with a featured image, so I assumed the alt text was handled.
It wasn’t. Of 401 posts with a featured image, 316 had no alt text saved. That’s 79%.
What the site did with the gap
The empty field didn’t stay empty on the page. Something on the site filled it with the file name. So the featured image on my newest customer-service post was described to screen readers as:
ai customer service agent feat 20261115
Last Sunday’s broken link check was described as “daily sunday setup broken link check 20261108”. It isn’t broken, and no checker will flag it. It’s just a file name pretending to be a description.
The odd part: the writers already knew how
Inside the posts, my agents wrote alt text on 1,896 of 1,897 images. Every section image got a proper description, because the writer typed the <img> tag itself.
The featured image travels a different road. It gets uploaded to the media library and attached by ID, and that step never wrote an alt field. Same agents, two paths. One had alt text built in, and the other didn’t.
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Over the last month the split was clear:
- Long blog posts: 24 of 27 featured images had no alt text.
- Daily posts like this one: 8 of 30. Better, but it depended on the run, because nothing in the skill required it.
The 10-minute check
1. Count the gap (3 minutes). Open your last five posts, right-click the featured image, and choose Inspect. If the alt says something like “hero-final-v2” or a date, the field is empty and your site is guessing. If you’re comfortable with the WordPress REST API, /wp-json/wp/v2/media?_fields=id,alt_text lists them all in one go.
2. Fix the pipe before the pile (5 minutes). Find the step that uploads or attaches your featured image, whether that’s an agent, a Zapier zap or an n8n node, and make it set alt_text in the same call. If you only backfill, next week’s posts land empty again. I learned that one the hard way with orphan posts: cleaning the pile doesn’t stop the pipe.
3. Write one honest sentence (2 minutes). Describe what’s in the picture, then tie it to the topic. “A row of blank glass frames with one glowing amber” beats “image alt text best image alt text SEO”. The alt is for the person who can’t see the image, so don’t stuff it with keywords.
Where I’m at
Today’s featured image has alt text. The other 316 don’t yet, and the backfill is on my list, not done. The blog writer’s image step still needs the same one-line fix the daily writer has.
If you sell products, the same gap hides in your product photos. I wrote up how to bulk update WooCommerce alt text with Claude Code, and the method works for blog images too.
The takeaway: your agents probably write alt text where they write HTML, and skip it where they attach files. Check the attach step.
Want an audit like this run across your own site and automations? Book a strategy session.
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AI & Digital Marketing Strategist
With over 25 years in digital marketing, e-commerce, sales, and international business, Jon Jones is a seasoned entrepreneur dedicated to empowering small businesses through innovative AI solutions. His journey began in investment banking on Wall Street, guiding companies through capital acquisition and complex markets, and has expanded to include expertise in web development, brand design, product development, and courses and training.
Fluent in Mandarin and with a rich foundation in both finance and tech, Jon launched JonJones.ai to provide accessible, transformative tools for small businesses to streamline operations, generate leads, and build sustainable growth. His mastery of AI, automation, and digital strategy has enabled numerous businesses to bridge the gap between traditional practices and modern technology, ensuring they thrive in today’s digital landscape.
