By Heather Dorff, Web Content Specialist
We find ourselves repeatedly answering identical questions from our clients in regards to the best way to layout content. Here is a list of best practices to follow when developing and laying out new content in order to improve your company’s website.
Less is More | How Much Content to Include on Pages
One of the questions I hear is: “How much content should I include on any given page of my website? Is there a general rule or limit to follow?”
Although there is no official “rule” that says ‘Please don’t make your webpages super long scrolling and never-ending text’, you still shouldn’t do it. It may seem natural to include long winded paragraphs detailing everything under the sun about a particular service, but you will lose your customer’s interest.
On the Internet, everyone has attention deficit disorder; people scan for information and decide, within seconds, if your content is relevant to their interests or issues they need solved. By burdening them with too much text, you’re only providing obstacles and you may lose them.
For each subpage:
- Trim down your text.
- Then trim it again … and again… only leaving essential information.
- Use bullets instead of long paragraphs to list steps or benefits.
- Keep paragraphs at or under 3 sentences.
- On the web, a very important sentence can be its own paragraph.
- Use images to fill out the layout and describe your services or brand.
The result is a page that communicates value and authority in a timely manner that piques your readers’ interest and converts them to new customers.
Quality over Quantity | Include Images in Moderation
This fits into the “Less is More’ category but imagery could use its own write-up here.
Images are a great way to help your website ‘pop’ and draw a visitor’s eye. They are an instrumental tool in establishing your brand or selling a product or service. Too many images jam packed alongside minimal or non-existent text, however, can look a bit ridiculous.
The Fix: Balance your use of images with the overall design of your website. Consider these questions when adding imagery to a page:
How much text is included on the page?
- A paragraph or less of text cannot support an image within the content area by itself. Be sure that your text works with your images to tell a complete story.
How many images are in the website’s design?
- If you have a large, image-heavy masthead, then avoid including non-essential imagery on most pages.
Do you have your own images or are you using Stock imagery?
Your first choice should be to use professional high quality images taken by a photographer. This is a good investment that will best reflect the quality of your goods.
If this is not possible, stock imagery can be a great way to illustrate your content. There are several file-sharing sites that supply stock images, such as ShutterStock and iStock.
Avoid using repeated stock images. Your images should be unique to each page on your site. Having multiple gavels, people holding paperwork in a meeting, or ambiguous happy-people snapshots can give your site will give the impression that your website is unoriginal.
Consider hiring a professional photographer for your website photos. Professionals photos will accurately show the value of your products, services, and staff personnel.
How many pages already have imagery on your site?
Survey your site and determine if the images add or subtract from the user’s experience. Determine if the layout and look add or subtract to your visitor’s experience. Use your space wisely so that your imagery works well in placement and alignment with your text.
Resize & save images as web-safe.
- A website will load more slowly if it has to render images that have not been optimized for the web. This will result in your visitors quickly leaving your site. Make sure all your images have been optimized for web using any image editing software.
- For example, http://www.pixenate.com offers a free, easy to use, online photo editing program.
Three Cheers for Consistency | Formatting Website Content
Your overall font and heading treatments should be consistent and match your overall website design. Stylized heading treatments and paragraph font, with consistent color, on a on a canvas that is simple and easy to read on all devices, is essential to the overall success of the digital content.
The Fix: Maintain consistency by directly installing new content.
Work with your website development team to ensure that your fonts and heading treatments are consistent and in your overall web design.
Avoid text inconsistency is to by making sure you are not copying and pasting text as plain into the content space of your site.
When you pull text from an external source, such as a word document or PDF file, it contains formatting code that when entered into your website can result in erroneous fonts, characters, colors, or spacing to appear.
Pasting foreign text can even embed hidden harmful code that could cause errors or security risks on your website.
Always paste as plain text!
No Copycats | Duplicate Content is Your Worst Enemy.
Duplicate content is content that is used on more than one web page.
The use of duplicate content is sub-optimal for two reasons:
- It is seen by Google as trying to “game” their search algorithm by using bad SEO techniques
- It is a bad experience for the visitor because they are not given a unique experience on each page
Your website can be penalized by Google for failing to operate within their recommended practices. This means you would lose business as your web pages fall from Google’s search results pages. There are several examples of what duplicate content is and how it can harm you.
Let’s also look at it from the visitor’s perspective.
The first page people land on will most likely be your homepage. The very next page they navigate to has the EXACT same text they just read. This will make your business appear unprofessional. This also translates as a lack of value for the visitor, and they will search elsewhere to find what they need.
The Fix: Make each page on your site a new experience for the visitor.
Google wants websites to have unique content on each page so that they can serve the most relevant pages to users in their search results pages. Each page should address a unique topic.
Do the same on your website. Devote a page to each product and service you offer and create content that addresses that fully.
If you find yourself stuck-in-a-rut on content writing for your website, head over to websites you admire.
Research how websites create their content, whether they are competitor sites or simply sites you visit often. Look over the pages that are similar to your own for ideas and inspiration.
Ask employees to take a bit of time to review for ideas, edits, and overall opinions. Having others familiar with your company review your text can be a great way to help cover all your digital content bases and quickly catch errors or holes within your text.
That’s All Folks!
So there you have it, a few guidelines and tips to help you on your quest in writing, updating, and laying out text and imagery on your site.
Remember to take note of your own likes and dislikes when you navigate the interwebs to help you improve your website’s content. Chances are that the very same things that annoy you about website content will annoy visitors on your site as well. Use the force wisely, young Padawan.