SEO value of using the title attribute of the A tag

Is there any SEO value in using the title attribute of the A tag?

For example on my navbar I have the following link:

Code:

<a href="/articles.php">Articles</a>

The linked word can't really be expanded to include keywords etc as this is a nav bar item at the top of every page. However I was wondering if the following would have any benefit

Code:

<a href="/articles.php" title="keyword rich but human readable description of the articles section">Articles</a>

Tried googling for this, but only came up with pages talking about the <title> tag.

anchor titles are more for accessibility (ie, blind users with screen readers) than for SEO. They certainly don't hurt, but they should be CONCISE. I would NEVER SUGGEST a 'keyword rich description". I would use simple "articles" as the title on that link.

To give a more real world example I am considering the following as title text:

Motorbike articles: mechanical, buying and riding advice.

The way screen readers work, when that particular link is tabbed (or otherwise) navigated to, it reads something like "Link: [anchor description (ie, between the <a>HERE</a>), anchor title]"

so, in your case, it would read "Link: articles,
Motorbike articles: mechanical, buying and riding advice"

The longer you make the text, the longer it takes for the user to find what he/she is looking for.

At the same time, however, I would imagine very few blind people ride bikes....

Originally Posted by briansol

At the same time, however, I would imagine very few blind people ride bikes....

This is true

So would there be any value in added the title tag, would search engine include this in their indexes - because if they do then I imagine it would be very useful to have these keywords/phrases on almost every page.

It's up to you...

I personally don't use them for SEO purposes.

maybe this article will help you on your decision:
Makeshift Anchor Text... Link Title Attribute vs Image Alt Tags: Which is Better? : SEO Book.com

That was an interesting read, it would seem that there is little to no value in the title tag

In fact after reading I tested this as there is a link on my homepage that has a title that is unique to the site, and that title has been in place for over a year. Searching for that unique title text yielded no results so it would seem that Google do not index them at all.

However it would seem, from that article, that alt tags on images do add SEO value so I am going to investigate that option. Like most site I have a clickable image logo that takes the user to the homepage, at the moment the alt on this is "Homepage" so I am going to try expanding that alt description to include some keywords, and then see what happens.

I will report back, so watch this space.