How To Facilitate Visitors Reading Experience

[ildarius]

Good day,

I have heard some people mention the following trick.

In order to facilitate reading.

You need to break down your text into as many paragraphs as you logically can.

Is that true?

Has anyone tested it?

Think this thread was easy to read?

[intellect22]

I will agree with that, many people do not want to go to a sales page and see a HUGE paragraph.

I guess it's becuase people want quick answers and if they have to do what looks like a lot of reading they get bored.

When you break up the sentences into 2 -3 line paragraphs it makes it seem like less to read and easier to follow.Just my opinion,but it also seems to be what most good/decent copywriters do as well.....

Kevin

[ildarius]

Thank you for the input!

My thoughts exactly, I actually heard about it in an MP3 interview with John Carlton.

He said that newbie copywriters should break EVERY sentence into a separate paragraph.

This applies to me 100%, even when I read warrior threads, if the thread is a wall of text, I have
to force myself to read it.

[Alex Cohen]

There are, of course, numerous other ways to enhance your prospect's reading experience.

One is, long lists of bullets should be alternately bolded. By doing so, the bullets become easier to read and comprehend.

Alex

[Justin Mandel]

It's all about flow and ease of reading.

Breaking it down like this does both...

Test it on yourself - find a big paragraph (your eyes probably don't even want to scan it).

Then compare that experience to one where eash sentence is a separate paragraph.

It enhances the reading experience and make it more enjoyable IMHO ESPECIALLY if it's great reading

[Loren Woirhaye]

People are accustomed to reading ads and articles in newspapers
and magazines that are in narrow collumns. This is the most
readable format but it doesn't work well with HTML and the
scrolling behavior of website visitors.

Making paragraphs less than 6 lines mimics the brief chunks of
words found in newspaper "leads" which are meant to draw the
reader in.

You'll notice that some of us (like me) usually keep our forum
posts to a narrow width. This is to enhance readability. In
email you will get better comprehension if you keep your lines
under 60 characters. This way the eye doesn't have to work
so hard going back and forth, which reduces comprehension
quite a lot when the reader is tired, not good at reading, or
only vaguely interested.

[ildarius]

You're absolutely right about 60 character width.
Got goose bumps when I read that, that's so true.

Sometimes the eye, can't find the beginning of the
second line and ends up reading part of the same
line twice.

Good advice, thank you!

[Norma Holt]

I keep e-mails to 60 or less and websites to about 75% of view page. Use black on white for best read but I also use a dark brown, bigger font, and words that an 8th grader can understand. Colour is so important to keep eyes focused. You are dead right about breaking paragraphs up into smaller easy to read sections.

Earnest Hemingway wrote short sentences and short paragraphs and his books are so easy to read. I think this is a good format for all copywriting. Hope this helps

[ildarius]

Definetly helps, I'll keep that in mind, makes me wonder why most of these "funky"
templates always use, super light grey in their fonts.

What do you guys think is the best font? Wonder if there was a study done on this.

[Kyle Tully]

Originally Posted by norma

I keep e-mails to 60 or less and websites to about 75% of view page.

Be careful with using % in websites, it can look horrible on larger monitors.

E.g. I've got both a 22in and 24in screen, and 75% of 24in feels like a marathon to your eyes.

You're better off sticking with fixed width layouts.

[Kyle Tully]

Originally Posted by ildarius

What do you guys think is the best font? Wonder if there was a study done on this.

There have been studies done. They're easily found on Google, and probably the old forum.

For body copy...

Online, sans-serif fonts are easiest to read: arial, verdana, tahoma etc.
Offline, serif fonts are best: times, courier, georgia etc.

For headlines it doesn't really matter, although you'll often find people use the opposite of their body copy. Impact & Tahoma are popular and easy to read.

[Norma Holt]

Originally Posted by Kyle Tully

Be careful with using % in websites, it can look horrible on larger monitors.

E.g. I've got both a 22in and 24in screen, and 75% of 24in feels like a marathon to your eyes.

You're better off sticking with fixed width layouts.

That's when you don't have a table with the width expressed. I always keep mine to around 650-750 with the text 75%

[ildarius]

Online, sans-serif fonts are easiest to read: arial, verdana, tahoma etc.
Offline, serif fonts are best: times, courier, georgia etc.

For headlines it doesn't really matter, although you'll often find people use the opposite of their body copy. Impact & Tahoma are popular and easy to read.

Not that easy, mate

Thank you for the info though

[justdowhatimdoing]

THANK YOU! I've already learned a great deal and never even saw it coming; well done, gurus!