Does Your Website Follow the 3-Second Rule?

by James @HelpYard - View Comments

Web-surfers are a fickle lot:

Why? The web is a fantastic tool for finding out whatever you want, whenever you need to. Want to buy a product? You can find it listed for sale in multiple places instantly by searching on Google.

This is great for consumers, and great for business. But, this ease of access and choice of sites means that your visitors:

make snap-decisions about sites as soon as they arrive
skim/scan your text rather than read it
decide whether to stay, or leave to go to another site within about 3-seconds of arriving

What can you do to make your visitors stick-around?

Tell them upfront what the page is about

Start top-left with a bold, short sentence (5 or 6 words) that tells your visitor what it is that you do, or how they will benefit from the page:

'The best X for doing Y'
'All the info you need on Z'

People read web pages in an 'F' shaped pattern. They start in the top left, sweep across, drop down a bit and sweep left-to-right again, finally sweeping their eyes down the left-hand side of the page to the bottom. All very boring, so why is this important to know?

Position your most important and persuasive content based on this pattern to make sure it's seen first

Write simply

Use words that your customers would use - not industry jargon:

a spade, rather than an earth relocation device

Be concise

try and get your point across in as few words as possible
get to the point
write for someone that's in a rush
less words = more likely to be read

Make your text easy to 'scan'

When people scan a page they're looking for words and phrases that jump out at them for clues on what the page is about, it's quality, and whether it's relevant to what they're trying to find or do.

Help people scan by using easily-'scannable' text: