Wed, 17 Sep 2003 -- Media Matters No. 36
Keep it simple!

Saying less often communicates more. That's a key concept to keep in mind as you put "content" on your website.

The more you say, the more people tune out your message. That's a difficult message to hear -- especially if you're a researcher or involved in academic projects with peers who are used to long discussions and technical details.

If your website is complicated by lots of lengthy explanations and discussions, you will simply lose the interest of media persons who come to your site to get information they can use in news articles.

When you put research findings on your website, scrutinize every sentence. Are you complicating what could be expressed more simply? Each little piece of extra wording may seem relatively innocent, and only robs a reader of of a few seconds. The cumulative effect, however, is much worse: visitors to your site will start to tune it out, thus missing important information that's sometimes embedded in jargon and overly complicated sentences.

Studies of content usability, says web usability guru Jakob Nielsen, typically find that removing half of a website's words will double the amount of information that users actually get.

When you put content on your site, keep the end-user in mind: Are you saying something that benefits your visitors, or simply putting it online because you have it -- a report, a series of findings, a research paper?

In editing things for your website, follow this mantra: If users don't need it, don't write it.

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