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Mac Web Page Design Article
Titles and Headlines occupies a serious spot in your web design strategy. Web does not function like a newspaper and it has got its own style of functioning.
The relevance of titles and headlines to a web design structure must be seen in this light. The user experience from a web page and an newspaper are entirely two different thing.
Also you can't ignore search engine when you do your web design. Titles and
Headlines again takes importance when you think of search engine marketing and
optimization.
Titles and Headlines: It's Not a Newspaper.
What's this? A whole article about titles and headlines? Well, yes. Titles are
some of the most vital parts of your site, especially if it consists of a series
of articles. Yet they're also some of the most ignored elements of all web
pages, and more difficult than you'd think to do correctly. You have to realize
that you're not writing headlines – it's more interactive than that.
Title Bar, History, Favorites and Searches.
Everything you do with your web titles should be geared towards these four
places that the title can appear: that is, in a web browser's title bar,
history pane, and favorites menu, and in search engine results. Never forget
this. Sure, your titles might look just fine on your main page, next to a
picture, but do they work out of context? It's even worth looking at the titles
in each of these places yourself (or doing a mockup of it), just to see.
If your web title exceeds more than eight words, search engines have difficulty
in displaying the results. So your web design must address and plug this aspect.
The best strategy to adopt is to go for a short punch line that covers the
total theme of your site. Think of this when doing your web design. Remember
people also book mark it and it also appears in the history pane.
You also need to have your titles appealing enough to be clicked when displayed
on search engine results. Address this factor too when you plan your web design
efforts.
Be Concise, but Explain Everything.
Keeping your title short and sweet is the best way to go about your web design.
That's why you find most of the quality sites done by web design professionals
has short and crisp headlines.
The thing those four places where titles can appear have in common is this:
they're separated from the context of the rest of your page, and they're limited
in space. Each one will cut off over-long titles and replace it with an ellipsis
('...') – not good if some important detail goes missing in the process.
This space constraint is what you should be aware of about your web design.
Also, the titles stand alone when displayed in all these four places and it has
to stand alone without loosing the overall message of your webpage.
What you need, then, is to be concise with your titles: ten words is,
effectively, an absolute maximum. However, what you can't do is cut out words
that tell the reader what to expect from the article, moving them into a
sub-heading or a picture caption or something similar – this works in print, but
on the web the reader won't always be able to see those things. The challenge,
then, is to create a short headline that tells you what the article is about
even if you can't see any other part of the page.
Useful Words First.
In browser favorites and history, there's usually only room for about three or
four words, not for a whole title. That means that you'd do well to put the most
useful words of the title first. Compare the following headlines:
1. Why Web Titles and Headlines are nothing like Newspaper Ones.
2. Titles and Headlines: It's Not a Newspaper.
What's the difference? Well, if you're looking at it in a browser history view,
the first one would probably read 'Why Web Titles...', while the second would
read as 'Titles and Headlines...'. In effect, it's useful to have the first
three or four words of your title stand alone as a title themselves, while
elaborating in the title's second half. A colon or dash is especially useful for
this, which is why they're so much more popular in web headlines than they are
in print.
The important thing to remember is get the most important words first when you
do the web design. The message of your webpage is absorbed by the user instantly
and quickly.
Keywords.
When it comes to preparing titles for search engines, don't underestimate the
importance of the keywords in your title. Search engines consider the title to
be one of the most important parts of your page, not to mention that it's often
the only part of your content that someone doing a search will see entirely
intact before they click-through. You want your titles to be relevant to what
your users are likely to be searching for.
What does that mean in practice? It doesn't mean that you should make your
site's main keywords show up in every title, leading to string of titles all
sharing the same two words: this is the hallmark of a site that is trying to do
nothing more than game search engine rankings, and the search engines are wiser
to it than you'd think. What you should do instead is simply describe clearly
what the article is about as if you were searching for that specific article.
If you've written a way of doing something, don't be afraid to put 'how to' in
the title (although not first: 'How to Write Better Titles' is bad, 'Titles: How
to Write them Better' is good). If you've interviewed someone, put the word
'interview' up there. For product comparisons, don't shy away from the word
'comparison'. This approach will get you search engine visitors who really want
to read your articles, and are more likely to stay and read more instead of
feeling conned into visiting your site.
Titles and headlines forms one of the most important ingredients of your web
design. Use them with care and planning.
You will find more articles on web design in the other pages of this site.
Utilize this resource fully.
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