Today’s helpful resource is the Plainlanguage.gov’s web language guidelines. While the whole thing is worth at least a skim, we’ve already covered a lot of the content in depth (see, for instance, the content redevelopment series). But I want to just briefly dive into the section labeled Follow Web Standards. There are four items that get their own subsection:
Avoid FAQs: We’ve talked about this before, but it’s worth revisiting. FAQ pages tend to be disorganized and hard to process. Try to eliminate them where you can.
Write effective links: We’ve also mentioned this in the context of accessibility, but it also makes a lot of sense from a usability perspective. Clear links are easier to use.
Repurpose print materials for the web: I think there’s some text here that’s worth quoting:
Don’t cut and paste the text of print documents to create web content. People are more likely to leave your webpage, potentially costing you time and money, because they will not take the time to find what they are looking for.
Print writing is different from web writing.
If you’ve created print materials, you’re going to need to rework them if you want them to be effective on the web. Make sure you’re speaking directly to the page visitor, and using conversational, but clear language. The purpose of print content is different than the purpose of web content.
Avoid PDF overhead: Here’s another quick quote:
The Nielsen Norman Group has done multiple studies on PDFs and has consistently found that users hate them and avoid reading them at all costs.
That should speak for itself. Avoid posting PDFs unless there’s no other option, or unless you need a document to print a certain way.
That’s it for this week, and also this year! Summer starts next week, so I’ll be taking a long break from blogging. Lots more to come this fall, along with lots of detail on the new website!