Content & Style
Writing For the Web: Best Practices
Website visitors read web content differently than printed pieces. To improve your site’s readability and usability, follow these guidelines:
- Be concise. Short sentences and paragraphs are more easily consumed by people reading online. Front-load important information at the beginning of a page so visitors don’t miss it if they don’t scroll all the way down.
- Use web-friendly formatting. Most web readers scan pages for relevant material rather than reading word-by-word. Guide the reader by using headings, subheadings, bulleted lists and periodic bold text. Use of all capitals or exclamation points should be avoided.
- Use headings appropriately. Use headings to structure your content but not as a way to format content that isn’t a true heading. Use one H1 heading at the top of your page, and then use levels H2 and lower on the rest of your page. This allows search engines to appropriately index content and allows screen readers to navigate content easily.
- Do not publish web pages as under construction or coming soon, as this can lead to a poor visitor experience. Instead, wait to publish a page until you have the content you need to share with your audience.
Accessibility
Accessible web pages ensure that all audiences can access the university’s website, regardless of ability. Accessible web pages keep the university in compliance with federal law and improve search engine rankings.
- Documents such as PDF files should always be accessible. To be accessible, documents should be built with machine-readable text so that they can be read by screenreaders.
- Avoid publishing graphics with text content that is unreadable by screenreaders.
- Use unique, description link text and avoid generic labels such as “click here” or “more info” that don’t adequately describe a link’s destination.
SEO
Optimizing university pages for search helps pages rank higher in search engine results pages when students and other visitors search for relevant keywords. It can also help to drive traffic to the site, improve brand awareness, and safeguard credibility and reputation.
Appropriate heading and subheading use will allow pages to be indexed accurately by search engines. Be sure to use relevant keywords in writing web page copy so that search engines can rank your page for those keywords. However, avoid “keyword stuffing,” or bloating the copy with as many keywords as possible in hopes of boosting the page rank. This can harm the site’s rankings and make it less readable for users. Reviewing your site’s search analytics can give you a clue what words your users are looking for.
Brand Voice
A brand voice that is consistent across all of the university's communications helps to build trust and credibility with our audience. This is especially important for prospective students and their families, who are making a big decision about where to attend college.
- Eliminate all “happy talk.” All text on a Web page should be as concise as possible, with nonessential information removed. Happy talk is the self-congratulatory promotional type text seen on many Web pages. Phrases like “Welcome to our website!,” “We provide the best ever…,” and “Thank you for visiting our website!” should be eliminated.
- Be approachable. Aim for a conversational tone that is not overly technical or academic.
- Use familiar words. Visitors are not necessarily familiar with acronyms and abbreviations used within your department or region. Use words that are familiar to your visitors and avoid the use of jargon. If acronyms and abbreviations are used, they should be defined on the page.