Winning the hearts - or at least the eyes - of the online audience

Communication World, March, 1998 by Helen L. Mitternight

But if you were reading this online, your eyes would be jumping up, down and across as though you were spectator at a pinball match. It's exhausting, and it's why we as communicators have to find a new way to deliver information, according to Shel Holtz, ABC, in his IABC seminar, "Writing for the Wired World."

"Online, there is more to writing than mere words," Holtz says.

Precisely. If you are holding a copy of Communication World, you are reading words that remain stationary while your eyes scan them. If you were to look at the electronic version, you'd be scanning, a physiologically different and more taxing way to read.

According to a study from Sun Microsystems, it takes 50 percent longer for an individual to read material on a computer screen; consequently, 79 percent of online readers scan text instead of reading word-by-word. The fact that people are spending much less time reading online, the implications for the way communicators present information are many. It's critical that each screen of text contains just what a reader might be looking for, and that the information is easy to find.

"You have 20 seconds to capture the reader," Holtz says. "If information is below the first screen, you have no guarantee that the person who came to your site will still be there one screen later."

So how should communicators adapt to writing for the wired world?

It will take more than simply throwing some fancy electronic graphics atop existing information.

"You cannot take a document and throw it up on a web site and say it's been digitized," Holtz cautions.

In all writing, you have to start by developing a message and a strategy for delivering that message. But that delivery is where online and traditional writing diverge wildly.

Holtz says that online communicators must think both verbally and visually from the outset. They need to provide readers with a "map" to get to more information because that's why people visit the web - to get information.

The difference is a crucial one.

Where before someone could take one of your press releases, and "know" about an issue or about your company, people aren't using online reading to gain knowledge. It's information they hunger for and they may use only one isolated fact from your release before they move on to the next bit of information they need to collect. Like readers who go first to a book's index and then read only the parts that interest them, online readers are looking for keywords that can quickly get them information. This obligates communicators to provide that information quickly and easily - and save the context for those readers who want to hyperlink to it.

The need to communicate in a whole new way involves new writing lessons that fly in the face of what we learned back in the days of the five Ws.

"Discussion groups - this is the future of the online medium," Holtz says. "Virtual communities are going to be the marketplace of the future."

Because anyone from the company - from those in the boardroom to the folks in the mailroom - can participate in online discussion groups, Holtz advises that commentators should be accountable for accuracy the same way as they would be offline. He points out that people will be commenting in discussion groups whether you want them to or not. He urges communicators to get proactive and provide fact sheets for those commenting on company matters. But communicators should equip themselves with the skills required to write in the near-real-time world of discussion groups to effectively represent their organizations.

Holtz says that unless communicators learn to master the rules of the wired world, they are not really communicating.

"For you as a communicator to grab attention in this environment and influence behavior, you have to know how to communicate in this venue," Holtz says. "You have to learn, how do you write in such a way that what you'll put up electronically gets the kind of attention you hope it will get?"

Online Writers Must:

* Write in a non-linear way.

Think of it as writing in chunks, with each idea or information contained in each "chunk" (or component of your writing) complete unto itself. Identify elements of your writing that contain a single unit of information and recast it into a "chunk" that can both stand alone and work with the rest of your online piece. And, even more than most writing, shorter is better - documents written for the web should be 50 percent shorter than their print counterparts, according to the Sun study.

* Adapt your writing style to the online world.

The online style is like writing on caffeine - there is no time for long leisurely discourse. Use lots of lists and bullet points, short sentences and conversational style.

* Use hyperlinks.

All of that background information that you regularly stuff into your writing can be sloughed off by using hyperlinks. Did your company have the best year ever? You don't have to prove that in your release, simply hyperlink over to another document that demonstrates your company's earning trends. That way, the reader gets the information only if he or she wants it.