Online Marketer Crusades Against Tiny Fonts: Formatting Guidelines for Higher Conversion

You probably already know that your web content or “sales copy” can have a significant effect on the conversion rate of your website. Instead of converting, say, 1 in every 100 visitors into an enquirer, sharp sales copy might convert 2 in every 100 visitors.

But what you may not know is that the way your content is formatted can also influence your conversion rate.

Even mouthwatering sales copy, if laid out in the wrong way, can flop. So this post is to help you avoid formatting mistakes and increase your conversion rate at the same time.

The two concepts that you need to keep in mind when formatting copy for high conversion are Readability and, for want of a better term, Conspicuousness.

8 Important Readability Guidelines

Reading a computer monitor strains the eyes much more than reading a printed page. That’s why many of the layout techniques that have been shown to lead to higher conversion rates are related to readability.

If your copy is easy to read, more users will read it. More readers means more conversions.

Here are a few of the most important readability guidelines to keep in mind when formatting your website:

1. Don’t use tiny fonts (nothing smaller than 11 px). Let users control font size.
2. Use high-contrast colours. Plain old black text on a white background is best for readability (I’m referring to body copy here - headlines and subheads can be other colours). For some reason designers seem to frequently specify tiny grey fonts on a white or grey background. This low-contrast combination is a sales-killer.
3. Use short paragraphs (suggest no longer than 8 lines). These break up your copy into bite-size chunks that are friendlier to the eyes.
4. Indent key paragraphs or place them in boxes. Again, this breaks up blocks of uniform-looking text and gives a “jagged” shape to your copy. This “jagged” shape gives the eyes more reference points.
5. Make links obvious. Where possible, use the default link colours and underline links for added visibility.
6. Experiment With Capitalising The First Word Of Your Headlines, Like This. Again, the “jagged” shape of the words appears to give the eyes more reference points, and this can actually translate into significantly higher conversion.
7. Watch line length. Long lines that stretch right along the screen are much harder to read than shorter lines. No longer than 500 px wide is a fair guideline.
8. Break your text up. Use plenty of subheads, lists and bullets.

Emphasizing the Important Stuff

The other layout concept that can influence the conversion rate of your website is Conspicuousness. In other words, drawing attention to important copy points.

This is because most website visitors “skim and scan” web content before anchoring on a point and starting to read. By using specific formatting techniques to get visitors’ attention, you can draw them into your copy and get them reading.

Here are some ways that you can make your important copy points more conspicuous:

1. Use significantly larger fonts for headlines and subheads - these don’t have to be obnoxiously large, but they should be large enough to become the key focal points of your copy
2. Believe it or not, RED headlines have been shown to produce significantly higher conversion rates than fonts of other colours. The theory goes that because red is a very conspicuous color, it draws attention and gets your visitors reading your headline. While this may be true, red headlines aren’t right for every website. Because they’re so often used for direct response “sales letter” style websites, then can sometimes make your site appear “hokey”.
3. Use boxes to highlight important points (e.g. case studies, testimonials, guarantees etc.) In direct marketing circles, these boxes are know as “Johnson Boxes”, and they have been shown to increase the readership of whatever’s inside.
4. Bright colours tend to attract attention more than dull colours. If you want to attract attention to a certain place, use a bright background
5. “Visual cues” such as arrows, bullets, graphical numbers etc. can attract attention to key points

So those are the key points to keep in mind when formatting your website content for maximum lead generation results.

Exactly how you execute these techniques will depend on the type of site, but they’re handy to keep in mind. And please, don’t use tiny grey fonts - this online marketer couldn’t bear to see any more of those.

Will Swayne Online lead generation guy

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