So you’ve got a lovely website where your customers can get all sorts of useful information. But sometimes they just want to call you or email you with a question. The approach you take to being contacted can have a big effect on customers’ perceptions of your organisation. In this post, I discuss contact details [...]
Tags: forms, navigation, web writing
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs) are a very popular way of providing the answer to users’ questions. In this post I give you some tips to help you provide a better user experience with your FAQs.
Do you even need them?
All too often FAQs are used as an attempt to patch up flaws in bad content. Before [...]
Tags: web writing
Your website is just a series of inter-linked pages, but some of those pages are very different from others. In this post, I’m going to talk about pathway (or gateway) pages.
I want to help you to identify pathway pages and explain some considerations you should make by discussing real examples.
So what’s a pathway page then?
Pathway [...]
Tags: navigation, web writing
I thought it would be fun to write 10 tips for people who write 10 tips articles. The title is a bit of a joke, but hopefully you’ll find the tips themselves quite useful. So here goes.
1. Stick to what you know
Your post will be a lot more interesting if you actually know the subject [...]
Tags: web writing
You should never need to write ‘click here’ on your links. This post explains the reasons why.
Your links should be obvious
In a previous post I advised you to let your hyperlinks shine. This is because your links should be obviously visible on the page. When we’re looking at a web page, we shouldn’t need to [...]
Tags: navigation, trigger words, web writing
When you’re writing for the web, try to keep your sentences under 20 words in length. Your content will be easier to read this way. This is because it’s easier to read a few short sentences than it is to read one big one.
Write a long sentence first
It’s often quicker and easier to write the [...]
Tags: quick tips, web writing
When you include numbers on your website, use numerics rather than spelling out the word. It’s quicker for your user to digest. It also works better when the number is the main thing your user is looking for.
Try it out for yourself. Go to the Wikipedia page on Tigers and find the approximate number of [...]
Tags: quick tips, web writing
I was discussing Gerry McGovern with a friend recently. We both like the way he writes about good web content. However my friend felt that he couldn’t really see a difference between Customer Carewords and Jared Spool’s trigger words. They are both similar I agree, but I think there are differences. I’ll attempt to describe [...]
Tags: Gerry McGovern, Jared Spool, navigation, trigger words, Usability testing, web writing
Using good sub-headers will help your users find the information they are looking for. It’s like navigation but without the clicking and the cool roll-over effects.
Sub-headers help users decide whether to stay
Your web pages will not be read word for word. In many cases your user is looking for a single piece of information. He’s [...]
Tags: navigation, tips, trigger words, web writing
I was having a conversation with a friend today about writing for the web. I’d given him a bit of advice in the past about how to write good web content. I must have done something right because that advice stuck with him. Four years later he is still following it. He’s also using the [...]
Tags: web writing
I'm a freelance usability consultant.
I'm based in Scotland, in between Edinburgh and Glasgow. But I work all over the place.
