Rollover design & SEO

[DCochrane]

After reading this article http://www.seomoz.org/blog/designing-for-seo some questions came up from my developers.

In the article it says

"One potential solution to this problem is a mouse-over. Initially when viewed, the panel will look as it does on the left hand side (exactly as the designer want it), yet when a user rolls over the image the panel changes into what you see on the right hand side (exactly what the SEO wants)."

My developers say" Having text in the rollovers is almost like hiding text and everyone knows in SEO that you should never hide text. "In the article he explains that it is not hidden text since its visible & readable by the engines.What are everyone's thoughts on this? Completely acceptable or iffy?Thanks

[donford]

I wanted to expand on what I said earlier as I feel I may have missed the nuance of the question. If the purpose of the rollover text is to enhance the user experience, then in that sense it not only is good for user but also 100% safe from an SEO perspective. Examples; tabbed content (product reviews, specs, manufacturer info ect.), or expanding images and displaying some captions. The purpose of these sorts of things are to specifically add to the user experience and give them as much information as possible.

My first response I focused on more of what was said then what was meant. My original post still stands if the purpose of the rollover text is specifically designed only to make search engines rank you higher.

[donford]

Hi Samantha,

I really like the way your developers think. It is very very important that as developers they are thinking with SEO in mind. I personally don't think there is much if any risk if implemented in way that is not underhanded, that is because search engines are not yet at the point of being able to compare "visible" vs "invisible" text. That being said, the point of putting the text in rollovers is specifically for search engines and not a sanctioned tag, it is then in essence, trying to trick the search engine to ranking you higher. By sanctioned tags, I mean things like h1, h2, alt text, metas etc... that is an important distinction because those tags are there to help the search engines and recognized as such, anything that deviates from that distinction that purposely tries to lead a search engine is black hat.

In summary, I agree with your developers kudos.

[TakeshiYoung]

Hey Samantha, having text in rollovers should not  be an issue unless you are deliberately being spammy or trying to trick Google about what your page is about.

Modern web design incorporates many design elements that are hidden until the user interacts with them, such as: drop down menus, sliders, contextual help, slideshows, etc. Google understands that these are legitimate ways of presenting content to users, and not a blackhat tactic to spam keywords.

There's always the chance that hiding text could inadvertently trip Google's spam filters, but many of the most popular websites incorporate these design features, and the risk should be minimal.