Web Text Compass
For Humans and Search Engines!
Modern search engines like Google no longer rely solely on keywords – they analyse context, relevance and meaning.
My tip: Write for people first – engaging, clear and helpful. Once your text resonates, optimise it with focused SEO tweaks.
Your Target Group – Clearly Defined?
The foundation of any successful web text is your audience.
Visualise your ideal user and answer questions like:
- Who is my ideal customer?
- What are their needs?
- How old are they?
- What does their daily life look like?
- What is their education and interest level?
- What devices do they use?
- What tone or language style appeals to them?
Personas – Give Your Audience a Face
Personas help create clear images of your core users. Use portraits that represent your ideal target group.
Give each persona a name, age, job, education, income, interests, goals and challenges.
Helpful link to create personas:
Focus Beats Scattershot
Each target group speaks a different language.
A student needs other info than a CEO. Families expect something different than singles.
You can reach everyone – but to succeed, focus on the people who really matter to your business.
Broad Audience? Structure Brings Clarity!
If your services are diverse, structure your content by audience group.
Example: Bank
- Private Clients
- Accounts & Cards
- Real Estate & Financing
- Pensions & Wealth
- Business Clients
- Company Accounts
- Loans & Investments
- International Services
Or a fashion webshop:
- Women
- Clothing
- Shoes & Accessories
- Sports & Leisure
- Men
- Kids
Your Brand – Clearly Positioned?
Define what your business stands for and how it should be perceived:
- What’s at the core of your offer?
- Are you modern, bold, innovative?
- Or established, reliable, traditional?
- How do you communicate – friendly, factual or emotional?
- What makes you different from your competitors?
- What image should come to mind?
These answers define your brand voice and communication strategy.
Show Your Expertise
Highlight your true strengths – not everything you can do, but what you excel at.
At Bluesun, our focus lies in:
- Web Development
- Digital Solutions
- Design & User Experience
- Multimedia & Photography
This creates trust and clearly differentiates you from others.
Tasty Words
Endless Possibilities
The web offers amazing – sometimes unprecedented – opportunities. But keep in mind: your competitors have access to the same potential.
That’s why your unique selling points matter.
Focus on what makes your offer valuable to customers – highlight real benefits.
What customers love to hear:
- Fast delivery & production
- Affordable, economical, cost-effective
- Free shipping
- Exceptional service
- Personal, professional advice
- Stress-free, comfortable, smooth
- Guarantees & security
- Eco-friendly, sustainable, fair
- Direct contact persons
Find the Right Words
Your wording and tone should match your audience, brand and offer.
Decide on your tone of voice – emotional or factual, youthful or mature, bold or reserved. Use positive and activating language.
Build a short word list before you start writing.
Use an active voice – vivid, clear and real. Prefer strong verbs over nouns. Use adjectives purposefully and avoid clichés.
Reduce modal verbs (can, should, must, might...) and avoid the subjunctive.
Helpful links:
Jargon or Simplicity?
Avoid technical terms or foreign words your users may not understand. Use simple, everyday language instead.
Resources:
Test Readability
Analyse your text online – sentence length, word choice, filler words and more.
Tools like the Flesch Reading Ease Index or the Gunning Fog Index help improve readability. Aim for 60–70 points in Flesch. The "Wiener Sachtextformel" is used for German texts only.
Useful tools:
Your Personal Word List
Write down words that reflect your product or service. For example:
- High-quality
- Unique
- Reliable
- Secure
- Certified
- Sustainable
- Quality & Guarantee
Impactful Words for Headlines
- You & Your
- Action
- Effective & Successful
- Discover
- Secret
- Now & Instantly
- Easy & Light
- New & Innovative
- Premium
- Save & Benefit
Book tip: Write Like a Pro
by Hans-Peter Förster
Paint Word Pictures
Use vivid verbs and strong visuals to create emotional resonance.
Example: The girl walks to school
→ better: The girl runs to school
or strolls to school
.
Book tip: The Lexicon of Word Worlds
by Stefan Gottschling
Prime Location
Your homepage is your top address
Did you know that your website's homepage is like a storefront on Fifth Avenue
, the Champs-Elysées
, or Zurich's Bahnhofstrasse
?
Use this prime location wisely and skip welcome phrases like Welcome to our homepage
. Intros like that no longer engage anyone.
Instead, show attractive offers your visitors really care about. Make your images and text clear, concise and compelling – and guide your visitors toward deeper content.
Thanks to clearly defined core competencies, you can showcase your key products or services prominently on your homepage.
Fast and intuitive navigation
Place your core services or product groups in the main navigation. A page like About us
also belongs there.
The main navigation should be clear and concise – ideally five to seven points like About
, Services
or Products
.
Use submenus to organise detailed content logically. A well-structured navigation helps users quickly and safely find what they’re looking for.
The footer navigation is great for legal or formal pages such as imprint, privacy policy or press information.
Build trust
Your visitors don’t know you yet. To gain their trust, they want to learn more about you and your business.
Create a compact, authentic About us
page that tells them who you are and what you do.
A separate page with your company story is a great addition for users who want to dig deeper – and can be placed less prominently than the About us
page.
Your contact page also builds trust. Offer an easy way to get in touch, including:
- Business address
- Contact person
- Phone number
- Contact form (keep it short!)
- Directions
- GPS coordinates
- Opening hours
- Social media profiles
My tip: keep your contact form short – only ask for the essentials.
How to engage your visitors
Start with a strong headline. It’s the hook – the moment your visitor decides whether to read on or leave.
The teaser that follows determines if they stay. Make it short, exciting and end with a cliffhanger.
Your visitors are asking themselves:
- Is it worth staying?
- Will I find what I’m looking for here?
Make sure the answer is yes
– and before you reveal everything, offer more tempting content to spark new interest.
Format your web text right
Do you know the latest trends?
Find out more in the section Through the Eyes of Surfers
below.
Stay credible
Your web content should be transparent, clear and credible. Use superlatives sparingly – exaggeration undermines trust.
Arguments without evidence are just claims. Visitors are critical and will fact-check. Stay honest, stay factual, and back up your claims with solid data.
Credibility is a crucial success factor – especially online.
Through the Eyes of the Surfer
Modern Look & Clear Structure
Clean, uncluttered and responsive – that’s today’s web standard. Flexible layouts and modern fonts ensure a fresh and user-friendly experience.
Design your layout to be easy to read, light and contemporary. A clear design builds trust and signals professionalism.
Structure Your Web Content Effectively
Your content is read on smartphones, tablets and desktops. That’s why web texts need to be formatted differently than print – mobile-friendly, well-structured and easy to scan.
Choose Modern Fonts with Intention
Pick fonts that match your project. Classics like Arial or Verdana can feel outdated. Fonts are powerful design elements.
Google Fonts offers a wide range of modern, free web fonts:
Combine Fonts Smartly
Use two complementary fonts – e.g. for headlines and body text. This creates a clean, modern visual appearance.
Size, Spacing & Reading Comfort
Body text should be at least 16–20 pixels today. A line spacing of around 150 % is pleasant to read.
Ideal line length: 8–12 words per line.
Short, Clear, Well-Structured
Avoid long sentences and dense text blocks. Use left-aligned text (ragged right) for better readability. Structure your content in a logical and user-friendly way.
Users Scan, Not Read
Web content is rarely read linearly. Users scroll, scan and extract. Structure your text so scanning turns into real reading.
Headline: Your First Hook
Your headline must stand out. Use large font, a strong message and no more than six words. Grab attention immediately.
Teaser: Short and Snappy
The teaser summarises your message. Keep it to 30–60 words and spark curiosity. You can highlight it visually.
Paragraphs & Subheadings
Break text into short paragraphs (20–40 words) and use subheadings to improve readability significantly.
Optimal Text Length
Online content can be long – if well-structured. Users prefer scrolling over clicking through endless pages.
Provide a short summary for longer texts.
Typical lengths:
- Product description: 100–150 words
- Blog article: 500–1000 words
- About us: 300–600 words
- Research article: up to 4000 words
My tip: End every page with a clear next step – e.g. with a strong call-to-action.
Short Words Work Better
Use short, precise terms. Long words can often be replaced with simpler synonyms or made more readable with hyphens.
Highlight with Purpose
Use bold to draw attention to key terms – visual anchors for the eye. Less is more: 3–5 highlights per text block.
Example:
Sed ut Africa perspiciatis unde omnis iste natus error sit Kenya voluptatem accusantium safari doloremque laudantium, totam rem animals aperiam, eaque ipsa quae ab illo inventore veritatis et quasi adventure architecto beatae vitae dicta sunt explicabo.
Style Your Links
Make links stand out from body text – for example by using colour and underlining. External links should open in a new tab using rel="noopener".
My tip: Only underline links – never regular text.
Lists Improve Clarity
Bullet points help users grasp content quickly:
- reliable
- confidential
- personal
Numbered lists show steps:
- Plant
- Harvest
- Sell
Hyphen vs En Dash
The hyphen (-) connects words, the en dash (–) separates them.
- Hyphen: 3-way, web-technology, header and footer
- En dash: Zurich–Basel, 2020–2025, –20 %
My tip: Use a non-breaking space before en dashes to prevent line breaks.
Use Tables Wisely
Tables improve clarity – but only if they’re mobile-friendly. Use responsive table layouts.
My tip: Always test your tables on small screens!
Call-to-Actions (CTAs)
CTAs guide your visitors and boost conversions. Make them eye-catching, friendly and clear.
For the Press
Your Press Section – professional & up to date
A well-designed online press section increases your chances of getting picked up by the media.
Many journalists research online for facts, figures, and stories for their articles.
Be sure to provide the following content:
- Company Profile
- Mission & Values
- Core Competencies
- Year founded, location(s), team
- Key milestones
- Press Releases
- Product or project news
- Expert articles
- Interviews or statements
- Media Materials
- Images & logos
- Portraits, products, graphics
- Downloads in 300 dpi resolution
- Media Coverage
- Published articles about your company (with publisher's permission)
- Newsletter Subscription
- For media updates and press distribution list
- Press Contact
- Contact person with photo
- Phone & email
- Postal address
Professional Press Releases
Offer press releases as both PDF and Word files. PDFs should be copyable (not locked).
Use a clean layout, clear structure, and up-to-date content. List releases in chronological order, newest first. Include an image, a concise headline, and a short teaser text.
Indicate that the materials may be used freely, and specify how credits should be given, if needed.
Tips for your Press Section
A clear, well-maintained press area makes journalists' work easier. Place it visibly in the main or footer navigation.
Keep it up to date and avoid access restrictions.
My tip: An easily accessible press page increases your visibility and simplifies contact with editors.
Final Destination in Sight
Final Proofreading for Web Texts
Errors creep in easily – and are often overlooked on your own screen.
My tip: Print out your text and read it on paper. You'll catch mistakes that you miss on screen.
These strategies also help:
- Read slowly and attentively
- Read aloud
- Change location (e.g. sofa, train, outdoors)
- Take breaks and review with a fresh mind
- Use text-to-speech tools (e.g. in Word)
My tip: If it really matters – have your texts professionally edited. It brings clarity and confidence.
Comment
Do you have any questions or feedback about Writing for the Web
?
Feel free to drop me a line by email at romeo.ruesch@bluesun.ch
Wishing you lots of success and joy with your next web content project!
Best regards
Romeo Rüsch