Writing
for the Internet
It's
More Than Just Putting Words on the Screen.
I never
cease to be amazed at the incredible impact that the Internet has had
on the lives of ordinary people. In the space of just a few short years
the Web has given everyone the chance to be heard by a vast audience
worldwide.
You can
now communicate their thoughts, dreams and aspirations to anyone who
might want to read what you have to say. Suddenly the writer that has
been buried deep inside you can burst forth and talk to the world.
But can
you effectively present your message to the world?
Writing
is more than just a matter of putting your thoughts down on a page or
publishing them on the Web. Writing is about communicating with people,
meeting them at their level and getting your message across in a way
that they can understand. It's also about adjusting your technique for
the medium that you are using.
Sadly,
you only have to look around the Web today to see that there are many
people who call themselves writers and yet fail to understand that basic
principle.
No matter
what medium you are using paragraph and sentence structure is vitally
important. When your ideas are clearly set out in paragraphs and sentences
then you will communicate effectively with your reader. They will have
some hope of understanding the message that you are trying to impart
to them.
When there
are no paragraphs and the sentences are long and rambling the effective
flow of your thoughts and ideas are interrupted. The reader has to spend
time going back to re-read what you have written in an effort to understand
what you are saying. Every time he or she has to go back there is an
interruption to the communication and comprehension is impaired.
That holds
true for print media but it is even more important for anyone who writes
text that will be read from a computer monitor.
Tests have
shown that a person who reads text from a monitor will do so at a speed
that is at least 25% slower than if they were reading from a book. That
indicates that reading from a monitor is less comfortable for the reader.
It's harder to do and so there are likely to be more interruptions and
less comprehension.
Those test
results show how important it is to recognize the fact that writing
for the Internet requires a very different approach than a writer might
use when writing something that will appear in print.
When writing
for the Internet a writer must place a great deal of emphasis on making
the reading experience a pleasant one. Achieving that goal and getting
the message across at the same time is not hard to do. However it does
require some effort on the part of the writer.
So what
do you have to do to write effectively for the Internet?
- You
must use short paragraphs. No paragraph should be more than three
to four sentences in length. Single sentence paragraphs are quite
acceptable and something worth aiming for.
- You
must use short sentences. No sentence should be more than 14 to 16
words in length. That is not always possible to achieve, and I certainly
haven't achieve that here, but you should aim for that if at all possible.
- You
should use short words. Any word that cannot be understood by a 12
year old should be avoided. You have to decide whether you want to
get your message across or you want to impress a few people with your
language skills.
- You
should make sure that your paragraphs are well spaced. A clear break
between paragraphs makes the reading experience much more comfortable
and people are more likely to read everything you have to say.
And there
is the crux of the matter. If what you are writing is worth the time
it has taken you to write it then it's worth putting your text in a
format that is easy to read. Why write something that people are not
going to read because it demands too much of an effort for them?
Not everybody can write effectively for this medium. If you're one of
those people and you need words then you need us.
CopyTextOnline is here to help you.
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