WordCamp Notes -- Content Design: Getting The Most From Your Content And Images, Dawn Pedersen

November 12, 2015

WordCamp Notes -- Content Design: Getting The Most From Your Content And Images, Dawn Pedersen

How users read on the web?
don't read word for word
instead they SCAN

looking for stuff that's meaningful
need to make the page scannable for users
so they can jump around w/ their eyes

avoid the "wall of text"

the inverted pyramid
most newsworthy info on top
should be able to read the lead paraphgram and get the gist
try to keep to 30 - 35 words
as the content gets lower on the page, get less important, more highly detailed
2nd paragraph -- take 1 idea from intro and flush it out a bit, etc.
(standard "essay rules" from high school english)

write simply

1 reason people don't read a lot on the web is "eye fatigue", it's better now that resolutions on devices is getting better, but still read slower and no patiences for lots of text vs lots of text on paper

avoid jargon whenever possible (explain the jargon if you must use it)

use vocabulary that is easy to follow
get to the point quickly w/
short words and phrases
concise 2 - 3 sentence paragraphs

writing for the web means using HALF as many words

can't always optimize for the user AND for SEO. it's a balancing act
or just stick w/ what the user needs but take to heart that SEO might be affected by that.

replace passive phrases with active phrases
"we were visited by our mother" -- passive
"our mother came to visit us" -- active
passive -- subject of the sentence isn't doing the "doing" (we were visited by our mother)
active -- the subject and the subject's action (our mother came to visit)

need to consider ourselves "story tellers"
make the story compelling
active voice is more compelling -- the story is being told TO the ready BY the author
it feels "punchier"

don't make columns of text to "wide" so users' can't find the next/previous line easily. this is often affected by font size.

put keywords and beginning and end of paragraphs

Hemingway App ***
gives your text a 'score' like a "grade" so you can tell what level of education one would need to read this text. you're trying to REDUCE the grade level required to read your text

But also consider your audience.

Yoast SEO uses "fliches easiness reading test"

Break text into lists --
instead of just separating by commas IN a paragraph, just break it into a bulleted list. more eye catching

headings and sub-headings
help break up big walls of text

highlight keywords
<strong> tags
<em> tags
use them sparingly

make use of blockquotes
attracts the eye

Widows -- single word all alone on the last line of a
paragraph < -- like that

tricks to avoid -- takes extra massaging and time. a form of art direction.
&nbsp; is 1 trick that helps.
or just let the "web be the web" since it's not print. and don't worry about that too much. viewports will change, screen sizes will change, don't worry too much about it if you don't need to.

excerpts --
hand-craft a post and decide where the "read more" link should be.

links to other content --
link to your old content in new posts (as long as it's still relevant)
it keeps users moving thru your site
makes the older content useful (if it's evergreen)
google "rewards" that too

images --

featured images - use nice large ones
most pro themes will make use of featured images
often pulled by Facebook, Google+, LInkedIn to display along side your content
begin w/ best quality images you can get.
start in Photoshop, optimize before you upload

PictureFill.js
image for desktop, retina, and mobile
so it will flip between the appropriate image for the given device.

take care when left-aligning images
content wraps oddly around anything left floated, especially with bulleted lists

if the pic is gorgeous, give it its own line, make it fill the width of the content

if your image doesn't speak for itself, use captions

use images that are relevant, interesting, and appealing
avoid cliches -- apples for education, etc.

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@bluelobsterweb