How to care for and feed your new Web site
So, you are the proud owner of a new Web site.
You talked about all kinds of things while developing the site. But now that the big launch day has arrived, you’re faced with the day-to-day reality of keeping your baby running.
Here are some things to remember:
- Write about things your readers really care about. If someone suggests new content for your site, ask: “Who cares?” If nobody cares, you don’t need it.
- Don’t overfeed your Web site. Change content often, but set up a feeding schedule you can live with.
- Use “you.” The most successful Web sites use second person (you) when they write to their readers. You do it, too.
- Organize your site so it’s easy for visitors to use. Do usability testing to see if you succeeded. See if visitors can go where they want to go and do what they want to do.
- Don’t make people click more than three times for information they want. If they have to keep clicking, they may give up.
- Use bullets and lists on your main pages. If you need to, link to secondary pages for more information.
- If someone else has the information your visitors want, link to it, don’t retype it.
Interact with your readers to find out what they care about.
- Make it short. If you write
- 100 words, you lose 25 percent of your readers.
- 300 words, you lose 40 percent of your readers
- 500 words, you lose 60 percent of your readers
- 1,000 words, you lose 80 percent of your readers
- Ask an editor to read a sample of your work about once a year. Feedback like this can help.
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Further reading
The following references are good resources for writing for the Web:
“Testing and Quality Assurance,” from All Things Web, by Terry Sullivan, 1998, www.pantos.org/atw/testing.html.
“The Usable Web,” from All Things Web, by Terry Sullivan, 1998, www.pantos.org/atw/usable.html.
Killer Web Content, Gerry McGovern. (London: A & C Black Publishers Ltd., 2006).
Usability Testing of World Wide Web Sites, U.S. Department of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics, http://stats.bls.gov/ore/htm_papers/st960150.htm.
Rebecca J. Goetz, goetz@purdue.edu
Ginny Quesada, ginnyjr@purdue.edu
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