Usability technology is an array of devices which can be adapted to the user’s individual requirements. One of the examples of how usability is beneficial is the fact that it has been used by people to shop online as well as communicating with other users.
Usability Technology for Improving Your Website
Use subtitles to break up long articles
Most of the internet readers inspect the WebPages in sections and blocks. This is what is referred to as block reading. When a user looks at a page, they tend to see as a section. In addition to that, they read blocks. They normally do this by going directly to the items which they are matching what they are looking for.
An eye tracking study which was conducted recently revealed that eye movement patterns supports the idea that web users reads in chunks. They swipe their eyes from left to right then they continue reading down the page in a F-shape pattern. Hence, they skip a lot of content which is between.
For you to accommodate their reading patterns, there a number of strategies which you need to do. One of them is to break up long sections so as to enable users to easily skim down the page. This is applicable to block reading.
Before writing a text, you have to put into consideration the organization of your thoughts. This can be done by first outlining what you need to write. Apart from that, you need to use simple words and headings. Moreover, use headings which are keyword rich so as to assist in skimming.
Ensure that you keep the content to be very concise
It has been known that most of the website users have short spans of reading articles thoroughly. According to the studies which were investigating the change in the reading habits, the digital age behaviors concluded that most of the people skim WebPages in order to find the information which they require. In fact, you only need to search for keywords and read non linear fashion instead of reading the context from top to bottom. As a result, it has lowered the attention spans.
With usability technology, the idea of frugal when it comes to reading some contents on the web is reinforced. According to a recent study which was conducted, it claimed that there is 58% increase in the usability which can be achieved by growing through half of the words which are on a web page.
In order to influence the ease of reading, you need to know that short articles can enhance readability. In fact, the length of the sentences is some of the factors which can determine the ease of reading.
The following are some of the things which you need to do so as to keep the content to be precise:
- Use shorter, easy to understand, common words and phrases
- Remove all the unnecessary information
- Avoid long sentences and paragraphs
- Be precise. You need to ensure that you get to the point as fast as possible
- Use attention grabbing and time saving techniques. You have to use numbers instead of using words such as 1.000 rather than one thousand. This will facilitate skimming and scanning.
- Test the style of using the reading formulas which will gauge how it will be easier for the users. Nevertheless, the readability test tool will allow you to plug in a URL. Consequently, it will give you a score depending on the readability formulas which are popular such as Kincaid Flesch reading ease.
Assist readers to be able to scan your WebPages faster
As highlighted above, users can skim the content. For you to improve usability, you need to structure and design the WebPages while keeping in mind the need to improve usability. What you need to do is: to make the 1st two words to count. This is because nearly all the users read the first two words of the heading as they are skimming the WebPages. Secondly, you use passive voice to be an effective way of writing the text. Lastly, Use a writing style which is know as inverted pyramid. The style is used for placing important information at the top of the article.
Use text formatting and bullet lists
Some research have also revealed that the attentions of the users are text formatting and bullet lists. These are text styling tools which can garner the attention. This is because of the distinctive appearance which assists in speeding up reading as well as breaking down the information into discreet parts. Nevertheless, it highlights the phrases and keywords.
The actions which you need to take are to break paragraphs into bullet points and highlight significant information in bolds and italics.
Give the block text enough spacing
The spacing between words, characters, paragraphs and lines are very vital. The way it is set in your webpage can affect drastically the reader’s eligibility. It has been discovered that what can affect the reading compression speed is the manipulation of the amount of margins.
The following are some of the important steps which you need to take so as to ensure that there is sufficient space in the text blocks: first, you need to evaluate the topography of the webpage and modify the CSS site as required. Secondly, be aware of the CSS properties which affect the spacing of your text. Examples of some of the CSS properties are: margin, word-spacing, text indent and letter spacing.
Make the hyperlinked text to be user friendly
The main advantage of web based content is the ability of using hyperlinks. When hyperlinks are properly used, it can assist readability. Thus, you need to indicate the type of links which have been visited by the CSS selector. Another duty is to use the title attributes which offers the hyperlinks extra context. Users will therefore know what to expect when they click on the link.
Conclusion
The above are some of the guidelines which show how one can use usability technology to improve his or her website. As mentioned above, usability technology is an important tool which can benefit you.
