welcome to writing for the web
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Welcome to Writing for the Web. Login to http://www2.le.ac.uk/training/writing See Film awards and prizes What can be done with this page? There is no one right answer. Don’t be afraid to change things. Housekeeping. Who are You?. Your name? Where do you work? - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
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Welcome to Writing for the Web
• Login to• http://www2.le.ac.uk/training/writing
See Film awards and prizes• What can be done with this page?• There is no one right answer.• Don’t be afraid to change things.
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Who are You?
• Your name?• Where do you work?• Experience of writing
for the web?• Expectations?
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Writing for the web
Mike SimpsonSenior Web Communications Officer
Teri BrowettIT Training Specialist
Division of Corporate Affairs and PlanningIT Services
www.le.ac.uk
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Writing for the Web: Overview
• Print vs online• Structure• Writing style• Consistency
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The great ‘Writing for the Web’ information huntPlease don’t start looking yet!
Task 1: Jan Zalasiewicz feature: Of Barrie and Barrande
• Which three places did the King of France travel to, accompanied by his grandson’s tutor, after he was deposed?
Task 2: Botanic Garden website• What are the three different groups of
Whitebeams represented in the tree collection in the Arboretum?
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Web writing is fundamentally different to writing for print:
• People read the web in a different way.
• They are impatient, intolerant, busy.• No-one reads the web for fun.• Website visitors have a specific task
which they want to complete.• They don’t care about anything else.
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Paragraphs
• Break long paragraphs at natural points.
• Two or three sentences is fine. (Just one if it’s long.)
• Tabloid newspaper structure, without a tabloid writing style.
• You don’t have to understand what the text is about.
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Bullet point lists
• Bullet points are often frowned on in print…
• …but they are a web-writer’s friend.• Any list of three or more things can
be bullet-pointed.– Sometimes just two things or even one
thing.
• Use the bullet-point icon.• Use numbering if the order is
important.
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Headings and subheadings
• People don’t want to read the whole page – just the bit that they want.
• Web users scan a page, looking for subheadings, links, highlighted text etc.– “Is this relevant to me?”
• If you try to make them read the whole page – they will go elsewhere.
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Your writing ‘voice’• Write in the second person
– ‘You can do this’, not ‘Staff can do this’
• Write in an active voice– ‘X does Y’, not ‘Y is done by X’– “Exams are taken by students at the end of
each year.” Would be better as?
• Write positive instructions– What people can/should do
• Write clearly– Plain English, please!
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J&A
• Jargon and abbreviations• Think about your audience(s) and the
language they use.• Approach each page separately.• Don’t be afraid to simplify – readers
will simply skip over explanations they already know.
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Plain English, please…
• Postgraduate taught (562 hits)• Pastoral care (351 hits)• Programmes of study (177 hits)• Presessional course (12 hits)
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Cut out the waffle
• Get straight to the point• Be as terse as you can without being
rude• People don’t want a chat, they want
answers• They want the most important
answer first*– *the answer to the most important question
• The inverted pyramid
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The inverted pyramid
The important bit
Some context Optional stuff Limited interest
The important bit
Some contextOptional stuff
Limited interestUsefulness decreases down the page.
No-one has to get past irrelevant stuff to find
useful stuff
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Linear vs non-linear
• Print communication is linear…– …because it has to be.
• But the order is often arbitrary.• Group things together by:
– Similar or overlapping content– Natural groups (under a single
subheading)– Amount of space required/available
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Emphasis
• CAPITALS DO NOT EMPHASISE• They actually make things harder to
read because they change the shape.• Italics do not emphasise either - they
change the shape of the letters.• Emphasise paragraphs using styles.• Emphasise words and phrases using
bold.
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Links: the essence of the web
• Provide links where these are mentioned:– Organisations– Other pages or other websites– People (if there is a relevant page)
• Make the word(s) into the link• Link to front page or deep link?
– Where will people probably want to go?
• Make your links meaningful and useful
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Three types of links to avoid
• http://www2.le.ac.uk/webcentre/plone/plan/webwriting/linksthatwork
• Links that take you to this page.
• Click here.
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PDFs – Portable Document Format
• Information in a PDF is not ‘on the web’.
• A PDF is a picture of a piece of paper.• Use only when:
– Users might to want to print it out, and/or
– It is important to show the layout of an existing print document.
• Would you produce a leaflet from screen shots?
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Structure – the bigger picture
• Biochemistry research page
• Recruiting Postgraduate Students: print vs online
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House style
• Rules of grammar, punctuation and spelling which are applied consistently within an organisation.
• Listed on the Web Centre• Always proof-read from a hard copy
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The best web page has just three components:
1. Everything a visitor wants.2. Nothing that a visitor doesn't want.3. Links to everything a visitor might
want next.
People read the web differently
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Good web writing has:
• Short paragraphs• A non-linear – but logical - structure• Subheadings• Bullet points• Useful links• No waffle
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Film awards and prizes revisited
• What can be done with this?• There is no one right answer.• Don’t be afraid to change things.
