The goal of creating materials on the web is communication. The checklist below provides a test to see if your materials will communicate effectively.
Accessibility
- Have all your images got <alt> text - for use by people who rely on screen readers?
- Have you used h1, h2, h3 etc in an order that makes sense? So that people who rely on these to interpret the pages structure are not confused.
- If you’ve set text and background colours, do they have enough contrast?
Useful resources
Active voice
- Have you written your materials using an active voice throughout?
eg. “The board proposed the legislation” not “The regulation was proposed by the board.”
Useful resources
Building scent
- Do all your links to other pages contain enough information to let people know where they’re going?
eg. “More information“ not “Click here for more information”. - Have you underlined text that is not a link? That will be highly confusing for your audience.
Useful resources
Why you shouldn’t use click here
Scannability
- Can your materials be quickly scanned? (Noting that people actually read very little - about 25% - of most web pages)
- Are they broken into small chunks?
- Do they have headings that are easily understood?
- Do they use bullet points rather than lists in paragraphs?
seful resources
Front loading
- Have you started with the material that’s most important for your audience, with extra detail further down?
Useful resources
Inverted pyramid style of writing
User language
- Are you using terms that your audience will understand?
- If your audience was searching for this material, what terms would they use?
Useful resources
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Posted: 27 March 2017
Tags: Content management Advocacy