Writing for the web differs from writing on paper in one fundamental respect: most people do not read the text continuously but scan it with their eyes, looking for whether it contains what they need. Good text is shaped accordingly – the main information comes right at the start, not at the end after a long introduction, paragraphs are short, subheadings name the content of the section that follows, and important figures are highlighted or set out in a list. It helps to use the customer's language instead of internal terminology and to replace general statements with specific data – a deadline, a price, a quantity, an example. Corporate texts are most often spoiled by what every reviewer added to them: cautious wording that says nothing, and sentences that a competitor could equally well have written. Cutting the text in half generally increases its effectiveness.
See also: Filler content, Microcopy, Typography and readability.
