Banners not worth it?

[MHJ]

Are banner not worthwhile for SEO as opposed to text links? Do the crawlers have a hard time finding banners? Or are banner just good for direct sales?

[geline]

This is one question that hasn't come into my mind. Seems to me that spider crawlers go to links but I don't think banners don't mean anything to them, too. Any expert on this?

[JTingly]

Hm, i've been hearing spidercrawlers everywhere. But, when i tried googling it, it either gave me no definition at all, or just a really crappy one. Can you kind of explain it to me?

[geline]

Hello, JT :)
We're talking about spider crawlers which 'crawl' and index the sites that they meet along the way. For sure, they will index the links but we're not sure if they will index the banners, too.

[QuietLunatic]

There's no reason for them to find the banners, since most banners are .jpg files and the text is not readable to spiders. You'd have to have alt="same text as the banner" for it to be read. I think.

[SweetCharity]

My best guess from the little I know of them is no, spiders can't read banners. There's nothing for them to read. But I could be wrong. :-D

[MHJ]

There's no reason for them to find the banners, since most banners are .jpg files and the text is not readable to spiders. You'd have to have alt="same text as the banner" for it to be read. I think.

Yes, I think this may be the reason that they aren't picked up on. Thanks for the info

[lavanay]

A HTML banner will definately be readable to a spider. However, if you are using an image banner then you must use alt="Anchor Text"

[SweetCharity]

Search engines aside, are they worth it just in terms of attracting people to your site? I find I'm less likely to click on a banner ad than I am on a text ad with a little description of the site. Does anyone else find that to be true for them?