Know your vowels
The process of creating effective website content can be
compared to the steps taken when fishing. First, you try many lures until you
find one that is successful. Then, you set the hook, real the fish in, and
repeat the process to see if you get the same results. You also make
adjustments as you go to ensure that you catch as many fish as possible.
Creating successful website content goes through a similar process. We use a
simple acrostic with the vowels A, E, I, O, and U to help us remember the
necessary steps.
A – Attract:
This is the word or phrase that you present to catch the
users’ attention. It should be displayed in
a prominent place and in a visually compelling manner. SEO statistics can be
useful in determining what word or phrase most users are searching for when
they are interested in this topic. You need to measure this attract statement
to see if it is working. If it is a button or link, then it can be directly
measured using Google Analytics to see how many users visiting this page are clicking
this link. If it is a header to an Engage paragraph, then you may need to
measure the ”get more info” link on the Engage statement. You might consider
A/B testing to test many Attract statements at once to see which one is the
most influential.
E – Engage:
This is a short paragraph-- two or three sentences-- that is
intended to validate the users’ interest. After reading this, they should feel
comfortable that they are in the right place and are ready to hear what you
have to say on the subject in much more detail. If the engagement
paragraph is at the top of a lengthy page of information, you may want to have
a link that reveals the remainder of the content, or you can measure the offer
click to determine how the success of the copy.
I – Inform:
If users make it this far, you have their permission to give
the details. Now, don’t get carried away. Remember that this is the web and
most readers read at about 20-30% slower from computer screens1.
Jokob Nielsen suggests that you use concise, objective, scannable text to get
optimal usability2.
O – Offer:
Now that you have a completely engaged user, it’s time to
convert them. Some of you may be asking, “What does it mean to ‘convert’ a
user?” This is the process of getting the user to do something measurable.
Conversion activities could be signing up for a newsletter, requesting a demo,
downloading literature, or the like.
U – Understand:
There needs to be some form of measurement. W. Edwards
Deming says “You can expect what you inspect.” 3 If you expect your
website to produce results, you must measure activity and respond to the
results. Use Google Analytics or your favorite statistics gathering tool to
capture key behavior from your website and measure it to determine if you are
truly engaging and influencing your users to do what you want them to do.
There is a lot more complexity in each of these steps, but I
think this should get you started with how to think about creating content that
produces.
Sources
1 - Dillon, A. (1992) Reading
from paper versus screens: a critical review of the empirical literature. Ergonomics,
35(10), 1297-1326.
2 - Jakob Nielsen's Alertbox
for October 1, 1997, "How Users Read on the Web"
