What texts “kick out” visitors from your site

Before writing this article, I conducted a small survey among those who actively use the Internet to search for information, business partners, goods and services.

And here’s what came out of it.

In total, 90.5% of users read texts on websites: some more superficially, others go into details. And only 9.5% admitted that they do not pay attention to the texts at all, but immediately go, for example, to the price page. It turns out that the text is one of the main ways of communication with visitors to your site. It is necessary in the same way as a manager meeting potential clients in the office.

Imagine you came to a furniture studio to order, for example, a kitchen. The manager does not answer your questions, repeats “buy a cheap kitchen” a hundred times, and his speech is a continuous “boo-boo-boo” on one note. How much is enough for you? I wouldn’t even last two minutes.

Texts work in a similar way. Let’s take a look at what makes users leave the site.

Headline and first paragraph “about nothing”

Google considers a session with only one page view as a failure, regardless of time. And Yandex calls a failure the visit during which the visitor spent no more than 15 seconds on it. Just imagine, in such a short time a person manages to evaluate the quality of the content and make a decision: to continue exploring the site or click on the cross in the right corner.

In order for the visitor to say to himself: “Oh, this is interesting” and stay a little longer, you need to attract his attention with a headline.

The title should be simple, understandable, reflecting the essence of the text. But its main task is to meet the interests and needs of the target audience. Not just “Children’s Toys”, but “Educational toys made of wood for children 2-3 years old.” Not “Installation of air conditioners”, but “Installation of an air conditioner in an office in 2 hours”.

The first paragraph, or lead paragraph, is designed to intrigue the user, let him know that he really found what he was looking for.

It usually takes no more than 5-7 seconds to read it. Just a few lines are enough to convince the user of the usefulness and benefits of your offer. How to build such a paragraph?

• Storytelling. Tell a short story about how someone solved the same problem your site visitor was having with your product or service.
• Factage. The numbers confirm the usefulness of the text, form a loyal attitude of the client to your offer.
• Slippery hill. Start with a short, intriguing sentence of 2-3 words. Engage the reader through the curiosity inherent in every person. And at the end of the paragraph, promise that he will learn from the text what the secret is.
• Inverted pyramid. It works exactly the opposite. In the lead paragraph, you reveal all the benefits of your offer, answer the main question of the reader. Having become interested, he will definitely study the entire text in which you provide additional useful information.

Remove cliches and platitudes from the lead paragraph (and from the text in general): “it’s not a secret to anyone”, “every year more and more gadgets appear on sale”, “innovative technologies provide high quality”, “all cars need service “. Boring, huh? It is not surprising that when stumbled upon this, the user simply runs away from the site.

Lack of benefits and benefits for the visitor

How many times have they told the world (s) that the texts should be useful. Each sentence should serve as an answer to the user’s question. Ideally, by the end of the page, the site visitor has turned into a customer because you have proven to them that your product or service really solves their problems.

The text should answer the questions:

• What happens if I buy this product/order a service?
• What benefits will I receive?
• Why is this company better than others?
• Can this company be trusted?
• How does this product work, how reliable is it?
• What is the price?
• Will my order be delivered to my home?

You can make a complete list of questions only when you study your target audience and find out what exactly worries them.

Include information that is important to buyers in the text. A simple example: which hair dryer will a girl choose: a 1500 watt hair dryer or one that dries long hair in 10 minutes? As a representative of the target audience, I would choose the second one.

“Brick” or “sheet”

Do you think there are no more text-sheets? Come on. You don’t even have to go past the first page of the search results to see this:

Text-sheet, in which there is nothing to catch on

Or this:

Brick text from a law firm. Do you want to get through IT?

You already know that it is important for most people to clearly see the main theses of the text, and for this it is necessary:

• Split text into paragraphs. One paragraph – one thought (clearly according to Ilyakhov?). Leave blank lines at the top and bottom of the paragraph for better readability.
• Write clear subheadings that give a quick read of the page’s content. The reader, having looked at them all in a few seconds, will choose the information that interests him most.
• Use numbered and bulleted lists. By their appearance, they differ sharply from the main text and thus attract the user’s attention.
• Label images so that the caption resonates with the main theme of the illustrated paragraph.
• Highlight important thoughts in bold or italics, for individual words you can use capslock. Underlining is the prerogative of hyperlinks.
• Create sidebars and blocks of quotes, put them on the margins
• Place images in text. They dilute the black and white sheet, hold the reader’s eye and help him catch the main message of the text in an instant.

An example of a callout outside the main text of important information

Design text to reveal its meaning, and not show your knowledge of the rules of typography. The user should instantly highlight what will make him stay on the site, and not what you thought would look nice right here.

100500 keys

Previously, it was enough to cram as many keywords as possible into the text for the page to reach the TOP. Today, spamming often causes a site to be removed from search results. Yes, and it is impossible to read the text, in each sentence of which indigestible constructions such as “plastic windows are inexpensive to buy Moscow” are built in.

How to simultaneously adjust the text to the expectations of users and the requirements of search engines?

• Use keywords relevant to the topic, dilute them with other words
• Reduce the number of requests by combining them
• Decline keys by cases and numbers
• Group requests by narrow topics and make headings based on them
• Use keywords in image captions, table subheadings
• Write texts that are interesting to read and that you want to share with friends

This approach will positively affect the ranking of the site and will not scare away users.

Unreadable font and color

On modern sites, such errors are rare, which cannot be said about long-lived sites. Small changes can significantly reduce bounce rates.

• Font type. Web-readable options are Arial, Verdana, Tahoma, and other sans-serif fonts. Instead, you can sometimes find a font more suitable for paper documents – Times New Roman. These small dashes that complete each element of the letter are harder to digitize and make the text on the computer/tablet/smartphone screen less readable.
• Font size. Many sources recommend 10-12 point size, but my experience is that this size of letters is too small. And it’s not just my myopia, I still wear glasses to work with sites. Even 13 point size will be small, if we are not talking about the mobile version of the site that opens on small screens. The exception is online stores, where it is necessary to place a large amount of information in a compact product card.

When choosing a font size, you need to study the statistics of screen resolutions of your site visitors. If most of them use a desktop/laptop, choose 16 pt. It, provided that the screen is removed 50-60 cm from the eyes, is perceived in exactly the same way as 12 size in a book, which we hold much closer while reading.

• Variety of styles. The text on the site is not a coloring book, do not try to diversify it with different types of fonts, letter colors and fill colors. The constant adaptation of the eyes, first to one type of text, then to the second, to the third, and so on, tires the eyesight. The ripples in the eyes make the user literally run away from the site, especially since the multitude of colors and styles do not contribute to focusing attention, but, on the contrary, scatter it.
• Column alignment. One of the examples above clearly showed how inconvenient it is to read a justified article. Notice the irregular spaces between words. And if the text is still accompanied by a chaotic indentation of the red line, it seems that customers are simply not respected here. For comfortable reading from left to right, it is necessary to align the text to the left. This increases the speed of reading and improves the visual perception of the text.

The optimal column width is no more than 50-60 characters. Check to see if lines stretch to more characters on widescreen monitors.

• Background and contrast. Too high contrast can quickly tire your eyes, so the combination of white backgrounds and bright blacks is slowly becoming a thing of the past. Softer shades of white are increasingly used for the background: milky, alabaster, light beige. The black font is changed to grey.

The other side of the coin is when light text is not visible on a light background. Keep a balance. Be careful when placing text on a multi-colored image/photo when it is partially in the light area and then in the dark area. In some cases, a single-color substrate is required.

And don’t forget literacy. One or two missing commas will not change the attitude towards your company, but common typos and gross spelling (syntactic, grammatical, lexical) errors reduce customer loyalty.

Take a fresh look at the texts posted on your site. Is there anything to fix? That’s all, I don’t distract anymore, do it).

Author: Olga Tonkushina. Copywriter since 2010. Works with construction, furniture and jewelry projects.