Easy Web Writing II: Easy-to-Scan Content
Google ranks each of our websites by applying a complex set of algorithms, checking it every so often and adjusting the search engine rankings. The spiders that go out to our sites and pick up statistics on many things, one of which is the length of time your visitor stays. Your website can encourage a “stay and visit” attitude with way the textual, visual and technical is constructed. (See “Easy Web Pages Writing,” this website, for details.)
One aspect of a well-constructed website is easy-to-scan content. Yes, scan! – The old-fashioned, move your eyes from top to bottom, quick as a wink, scan. Each visitor is looking for a word or phrase that holds promise to solving his current problem. Once the reader’s scan discovers words of promise he is inclined to read further and stay longer. If no such promise exists, click! He is on to the next site.
The question that remains is how can a site encourage one to “stay and visit?” One key way is in the text through:
- reduced word count
- short descriptive headings and sub-headings
- chunking
- linking.
These remain the best ways to make your webpage easy-to-scan. Well-selected and positioned words make the difference and your visitors will stay longer, increasing your Google ranking and attracting yet more visitors. Do this and you will create an ever growing circle-of-life for your website.
Reduced Word Count
“Life” on reddit essay writing service your website is all about your product or service and each of us want to share our volumes of knowledge about it. For me, the desire to share everything about my web-based writing services is high. Readers however, do not want to know what you all that you know, quite the opposite. They pop in and scan. Killian Crawford in Writing for the Web says that reduced “text… can interest impatient surfers and make them read what you’ve written.” Because visitors dislike reading endless reams of text on screen and scrolling up and down, reducing word count to clear yet concise content is the key. Writing your content and then editing to cut, cut, and cut with focus on preserving meaning and readability.