AR&D Reinventing Local Media

Lots of sites have a feature that turns a crowded, hard-to read web page into an easy, text-only, print page. You’ll often see this when you hit the “print” button on the site. Stories, often broken up into three or four pages are suddenly just a page long. And I have to ask — why not make all pages as easy to use as the “print pages?”

The answer, of course, is “page views.” Sites will break up stories into several pages (clicks, really) to inflate their page views. This is a cheat. If it’s designed so you can make the audience work harder, all you’re doing is inflating the cost of interaction. You’re not building a page the way the audience wants to use it; you’re building a story that will get more page views (should the reader choose to continue, of course).

There are several problems with cutting up stories like this. The first is that people don’t read the Web this way. They skim. You’re missing out on potential engagement time by having possibly interesting, skimmable material two or three clicks away. Next: According to web usability guru Jakob Nielsen, people only read about a quarter of the text on a page. You’re not helping yourself – you’re hurting yourself. And you’re sending a terrible message to the audience: “We make you work for this.”

This is never more maddening than when used in lists. You’ll often see the “Top Ten” or “Top 20″ whatevers. (Businesses, sports teams, etc.) Some sites will simply list them — a best practice. But others make you work — and work hard. You’ll get one item from the list per page. 20 clicks to get 20 items from a list? I’m just not going to do it.

The only exception is in slideshows. Pictures (good ones, anyway) should be seen nice a big. I’m fine if you take up the majority of my screen with a beautiful picture. And I will click to the next picture to see more. I understand that the cost of interaction here is different. In order to get something I truly want – a large picture – I will click ahead. Some sites have the feature that puts a moused-over arrow on the far right and left of each picture, meaning I don’t have to scroll down to the “next” link. Good choice.

Here’s another problem: by chopping up the pages, you’re making the story more difficult to pass along. Why? Because we like to copy and paste. Sorry – but we’re going to keep doing that. My standard method is to include the link, and then copy and paste the text. You’re thinking “big deal – I get no money for that.” But I say you should love that we do this. We’re promoting your site, and we’re telling our friends. That’s marketing, and we’re doing it for you.

Stop carving up those stories artificially. Make them easy to share and make them as easy to skim as a “print this” page. You’ll see results.