Writing For The Web: Why is this text different from all other text?
Text copy for the web is somewhat different than text copy for print, or other media. First and foremost, the web is interactive, and appears on a computer screen. Reading on a computer screen is not the same sort of experience as reading a newspaper, a magazine, or a book.
Today, attention spans being what they are, and given the "place" where most of the web's reading occurs, namely the computer screen (PDAs and TVs now also display web content), text copy for the web has been shown to require brevity, except when readers have consciously selected detailed information to read. Research has shown that shorter copy segments, that allow the user to click to read the next grouping, tends to get read more frequently than longer text selections.
In addition, web text copy should be written to enhance the relevance of pages when search engine spiders "read" them. This means that special attention should be given to the use of keywords for the content, so that the text actually proves to assist in search engine listings.
Writing Web Copy... The Challenge.
How should you group text content? Should web copy be similar to ad copy, where sentence structure can be loose and free? Is using internal content links a cost or a benefit? How should difficult concepts be conveyed?
This area of the site contains articles, notes, and links to other resources that will help you answer these questions. |
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Creating Web Text Content
