Writing for the web — Less is more
May 01, 2008
copywriting, website
What's the difference between writing for print and writing for the web? In this episode, you'll learn to say more with less. Use these best practices and tools to make sure you're getting your message across online. (8:37)
show notes + useful links
- www.useit.com
- Web Style Guide
- Writing for the Web 3.0 by Crawford Kilian
- Content Critical by Gerry McGovern and Rob Norton
exercise
- Get out your web stats and look up your five most popular pages.
- Pick one — not your homepage — and copy the content into a Microsoft Word document.
- Use the handy “Word Count” gizmo under the TOOLS menu. When you get the # of words on the page, see if you can cut it in half.
- Now, imagine you are a member of your target audience. Does this content make sense? Is it engaging + interesting? Does it clearly say what you need to know?
- Assuming it does — start by making your sentences simpler and changing any big (multi-syllabic) words into easy (one- or two-syllable) words.
- What about your paragraphs? Are you throwing lots of different ideas at your readers? Can you change to just have one idea per paragraph?
- Finally, consider that 80% of people will just scan — and not read — the content. Can you use bullets, sub-headlines, and other things to make it easier for someone to get what you are trying to say?