Writing For The Web

You should know this upfront...your visitors will not read every word on your web page. They are more likely to scan it over quickly. Also, reading great amounts of text online is very hard on the eyes because of the flickering screen. Knowing this, you should know a few things about how to effectively structure and write your web pages.

Keep your paragraphs short and sweet. Don't have anymore than 3 sentances per paragraph...2 would be ideal and sometimes even one is nice. Radically different than writing for print.

Use bullet points or a numbered list whenever possible. Try to keep list less than 8 items. This makes it very easy for a reader to get to the "point".

Use creativity and keywords when creating headlines and subheadlines. This allows your visitors to scan the page and find something of particular interest to them.

Format the most important in either bold or underline. Formatting jumps out in a sea of text. As you see in this document, it's easy to scan the page and get the jist of the message.

Be friendly. Write as if you were talking to a friend. It makes it much more personal and helps to build a certain level of trust and openess.

KISS. Keep It Short & Sweet. You want to make it as easy as possible for the vistor to read your message without much work. Scrolling is a hassle so make your articles or message short. This is true for an optin page but not necessarily true for a sales letter page.

It takes the average person longer to read from a computer screen than from printed material so write for some one who scans. Finding information will be easier and they may be more inclined to visit some of your other pages.

Tracy Matthewman
		About the author:
		Tracy Matthewman is the publisher and editor of Women Can Do Anything, an online community and business resouce for business women and female entrepreneurs. She is also a graphic designer, website programmer and Internet marketer.