PUT THE “F” IN YOUR ONLINE MESSAGE

May 8th, 2008 at 04:45pm Bill Swick

Don’t worry, you don’t have to cover up the eyes of any children and you’re in no danger of this blog getting obscene.

We’ll save you all the scientific stuff (you can find that HERE), but all that great content you’ve whipped up for your website may just be filler…unless it’s optimized for the web reader.

When putting up content on web pages, or long emails for that matter, studies show that those reading from the comfort of their computers may not be catching every word. In fact, after the first few lines, the amount absorbed by readers tends to gradually be less and less.

Kind of like the shape of a letter F.

We’re not saying that you should abandon all of your written web content in favor of flashy multi-media stuff. But organize your thoughts a little bit differently when writing for the casual web browser.

The most important thing to remember is to get to your point. Forgo long introductions and don’t try to build anything up. Also, burying important content in many paragraphs is going to get information lost. If you need to relay many bits of info to your reader, do it with bullet points – or even spread it out over multiple pages.

Obviously, the internet is a constantly evolving medium and there are no definite rules. But it is a great thing to keep in mind the next time your populating those web pages.

Entry Filed under: Uncategorized