Whist researching what my fellow Alex Jeffries students were writing about, I found this excelent tip from Karen Kalata and decided the information was so valuable I needed to share it;-
I was looking back at a few of my own blog posts yesterday at work, and something occurred to me.
It was a lesson that I learned, years back now, about writing for the web. Something that apparently slipped my mind in the midst of all of this excitement.
I almost forgot – how to write for the web.
But first, I want to share with you, that up until now, all that I know about website development and having an online business, I learned from Ken Evoy, the founder of Site Sell.
One of the things that I learned from Ken, early on, is that when we are writing for the web.
We need lots and lots of white space….
Lots of line breaks…
And short paragraphs.
And why are we doing this?
We are doing this for our readers, yes, the people that land on our webpages and blog posts. We have to consider what they see and think when they arrive.
The last thing that we want to down is drowned them out with a sea of words. So they just initially look at our blog post and think…
“Well this looks exhausting,” and just click away.
We want to make our pages as reader-friendly as we can, and help our readers get through our writing, so we can get our message across.
And the way to do this, is to shorten our paragraphs.
And yes, included lots of line breaks.
And make sure there’s lots and lots of white space on the page.
See, how easy that was to read?
I can take this a step further, too. And share a bit more, and this is about the font that we are supposed to be using when writing for online reading.
The font is Verdana.
Verdana is apparently very easy on the eyes when reading on a computer screen. And we should be using this font with all of our post, pages, and ebooks.
Because the idea is make what we write for online reading, as user-friendly as we can. So we don’t loose our visitors.
We worked hard to get them to our sites and blogs, and we want them to stay.
Because remember, it’s just one-click and they’re gone.
So do everything you can to make what you write, really easy to read online.
This is so your visitors can get through your masterpiece.
Your thoughts and ideas…your writing.
For more information from Karen, visit her excellent blog at http://karenkalata.com/
(Now I need to work out how to change the Font on my Blog)
Popularity: 6% [?]
Al Vaughan
Bob
Justin
Kenneth Yu
mick fallon
Remi Vladuceanu
Vance Sova
Hi John,
I am flattered that you’ve posted this article on your blog.
I would also like to mention that you have done a wonderful job yourself with your blog, I think that it’s coming out beautifully.
I stopped by last night, but I was rushed out the door, so I came back today to read some of your posts and I need to tell you John, you’re a well-spring of good ideas!
Keep moving forward, I really look forward to coming back and spending more time here. The post on Attitude was a great read.
Take care,
Karen
Thanks Karen,
I know there are so many improvements I could make to capture leads and get people to sign up for eBooks, but I’m in Thailand at the moment, so I’m trying to find content that Newbies like us will find interesting.
It’s wierd, but I’m almost wishing my vacation away so I can get back to my blog, but whilst I’ve been out here I’ve tried to record some video clips of myself for the site to act as an incentive for me to be successful so I can come back.
Speak to you soon,
John
I’ve managed to change the font style from Georgia to Verdana in the body section of the blog.
I did this from WP-Admin, Selecting Appearance, then Editor and simply overwriting the Style sheet value.
Hope it looks a bit better.
Hi John…
YES YES YES! You “get it!” White space. Short sentences. Short paragraphs.
Well done!
I have been trying to teach this to people but they still keep writing like lawyers do – ie start in the top LH corner and finish in the bottom RH corner with 1200 words and very little punctuation. It’s ridiculous!
No wonder so many people have few or NO visitors. Their blogs look just TOO HARD to read!
Yours is great BTW!
Incidentally, my new e-book (almost finished) is about copywriting and I have devoted a fair bit of attention to this very subject.
Thanks for your visit to the TEMPLE – LOL!
Gary Simpson
TEMPLE
Actually – working example for everyone else to see the difference. Hi John… YES YES YES! You “get it!” White space. Short sentences. Short paragraphs. Well done! I have been trying to teach this to people but they still keep writing like lawyers do – ie start in the top LH corner and finish in the bottom RH corner with 1200 words and very little punctuation. It’s ridiculous! No wonder so many people have few or NO visitors. Their blogs look just TOO HARD to read! Yours is great BTW! Incidentally, my new e-book (almost finished) is about copywriting and I have devoted a fair bit of attention to this very subject. Thanks for your visit to the TEMPLE – LOL!
BIG difference huh?
Gary Simpson
TEMPLE
Hi Gary,
Nice example, glad I’m starting to get on the right track.
John
Hi John,
Thanks for dropping by my blog yesterday and leaving a comment.
I am glad that I have now visited your blog as I picked up some useful information from this blog post in particular, which then led me to Karen’s blog as well.
I am very concious of website and sales page layout and content and your tips build on what I already new. I know that we are supposed to “Don’t get it right, just get it going” but I think a shoddy site or sales page (ie one that is not well laid out, has different fonts for different paragraphs and too many spelling and grammatical errors) put people off. They do me. I think that if the sales page looks like this then the product is not going to be good quality either. So you leave the page/site without taking action. As you say…first impressions are important.
I can tell that you appreciate the finer points of layout and content, and if you follow a few basic rules it shouldn’t take much longer to put the page/post together and the results should be much better.
BTW…..one suggestion that I would make about your blog layout (and Karen’s as well) is that perhaps you should think about using the Read More.. option in Wordpress. I have recently added that to my blog and it is so easy to use. It means that the reader can more quickly scroll down through your blog looking for the headings that interest them. This way they don’t get the “this blog looks exhausting” feeling. If you don’t know how to apply the Read More option in Wordpress just let me know and I can tell you.
Sorry….didn’t expect to make this comment so long.
Cheers,
Andrew
Andrew Graham´s last blog ..How to Opt-Out of Google
Hi Andrew,
Thanks for the tip about the ‘Read More’ widget, I’ll get that added later on today after taking the kids to their golf lesson.
As you say, I just tried to get my blog up and running rather than right first time which would me my natural instinct.
I’ve found a blog theme called Thesis which I’m currently investigating. It’s made by a compant http://www.diythemes.com and you do have to pay for it, but apparently it is very SEO friendly and has vast flexability to edit including the option to turn the sidebar off on pages if required. The idea being to reduce the distractions available to viewers when talking about a lengthy topic (such as List building) embedded in which you could add your affilliate links.
I’ll keep you posted.
John
Hello John,
Sound advice indeed and I must admit I tend to write a post and forget about white space.
I have to say I keep looking at the Thesis theme as it is really isn’t it.
I don’t think you have a problem with white space as your posts are very clear.
Regards,
David
Dave Whittle´s last blog ..How To Activate RSS On Your Website