There are few things quite as exhausting as visiting a website and being faced with a large chunk of text. Why should you have to trawl through a seemingly endless block of text to find the information you need? This is an example of poor content design.
Too many websites make the mistake of assuming that the quality of the writing itself should be enough to satisfy the needs of the customer. This is not the case. Instead, your writing needs to be presented in such a way that improves the overall user experience.
Read on for some effective tips and tricks to try for yourself.
1. Understand the who, the what, and the why.
The first step is to understand who you are writing the content for, what they want from it, and why. With this knowledge you’ll be better positioned to craft a memorable and engaging experience.
You also need to envision the customer journey. What actions do you want them to take after engaging with your content? This will help influence your CTA (call to action).
2. Use short paragraphs
Short paragraphs can help make your writing more accessible, less exhausting, and far easier to differentiate – especially when switching between themes and subtopics.
3. Utilise H1, h2, and h3 headers appropriately
There’s bound to be some sort of hierarchy in your content and you can make that clearer to your readers by breaking everything up with clear headings and subtitles.
In some cases, you might need to go into so much depth on certain subtopics that H4, h5, and h6 headers are required.
Not only does this make your writing more aesthetically pleasing and easier to digest, but it can also help the reader skip to certain subtopics that they are most interested in reading.
For example, if you are writing about local SEO in Melbourne, for those readers who already have a relatively thorough understanding of the subject, they can use the various headers to navigate their way to that one specific tip they are unfamiliar with.
4. Don’t feel obligated to include imagery
If you include an image with every single line break in your content, there’s a good chance that many of those images will be purely aesthetic and won’t add much to the overall experience.
Yes, it’s important to add imagery, but don’t feel like you have to. Only include images if they add genuine value, for example, infographics and charts to support stats.
5. Always use SEO best practices
Make sure you do your keyword research and naturally scatter your focus keywords throughout, as necessary. Of course, don’t go stuffing your keywords in there for the sake of pleasing Google because it won’t – and it will also make your content look bloated and read poorly.
Also, remember that one of the main ranking factors for Google’s algorithm these days is the overall UX design. What kind of experience are you providing for your website visitors? Does your website load quickly? Is it safe and secure? Is the information presented in such a way that it is easy to scan and digest?
The more thought you put into the user experience, the more likely you will be to attract links and climb the rankings.
6. Get a second set of eyes on your content
Not only should you step away from your content for a little bit before coming back to edit and finalise before publishing, but it’s always worth getting a second set of eyes on it – especially those who have a good eye for these things (e.g., graphic / web designers).
As awesome as your writing might be, if the design isn’t quite right you’ll be turning a lot of potential customers off.
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