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September 15, 2002
Plan It. Design It. Build It. Put Your Web Site To Work (cont'd)
Design Scannable Pages
What are the secrets for creating Web pages that visitors can take in at a glance? Here are seven tips to get you started.
Centering. Don't! Centered text is difficult to read smoothly.
Headings and Subheadings. Make headings and subheadings bold. Consider using a different font so that they stand out. Indent the content of separate sections so that headings and subheadings hang to the left. This makes them easier to scan.
Text Eye Magnets. Think about why someone might click the link to come to this page: what problems they are trying to solve and what questions they want to answer. Then identify text in your page that is related to those problems or questions, and make them bold, larger, or a different color. Somehow accent the text so that the scanning eye is drawn to it.
Image Eye Magnets. Images are another way to draw attention to specific parts of your page. Find an image or symbol related to what people might be searching for and insert it into your page. Images draw attention.
Bulleted Lists. When there are two or more items in a list, they should be bulleted. It is easier for the scanning eye to see the information as a list, and a bulleted list is easier to read.
Short Paragraphs. Shorter paragraphs are easier to scan. In addition, a page with many short paragraphs looks like less reading than a page with a few long paragraphs. Paragraphs should be about three sentences in size.
Choose the Best Format. If a graph conveys the information more effectively, then use a graph. If the message is best delivered with an image, then use an image. If text does the trick best, then use text.
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