|  Target Online Readers with These 5 Tips
If you're browsing for a book at a bookstore, you may find yourself leisurely pulling books from shelves, reading dust-jackets, and thumbing the pages. Now, if you were to provide the exact same information online, would your interaction with the books be the same? Not likely. You may be looking for a book, but you may also be chatting with a friend online, checking your email, paying bills, watching an online video, listening to music, browsing, etc… all at the exact same time. So not only are you processing information with new expectations and completely differently than you would with offline information, you're also multi-tasking. Each of these tasks performed online competes with each other for not only your attention - your time too! Bearing this in mind, it's important to properly write and format articles for an audience who thrives on a speedy, effective delivery and still satisfy their needs while meeting their expectations. 5 Tips to Writing Articles for Online Audiences 1. 400-700 Words.* You are more likely to capture your reader's full attention if they can see the beginning and end without having to scroll excessively for more information. Scrolling isn't necessarily an inconvenience - it's a perception of time they are willing to spend. 2. Bolded Headers Bolded headers or subheadings are excellent visual cues to online readers skimming your article. Not only do they help your readers quickly ascertain what you will be discussing further down the article, they also help you further engage your reader's attention. 3. Plain English and Plain Text In order to maintain your credibility and meet your audience's quality standards, ensure your articles are concise and grammatically sound. Also, write in Plain Text (non-formatted HTML text). Only use HTML (i.e. the basics: bold, emphasis, and underline) when it's stylistically correct. 4. 2 Self-Serving Links Per Submission Bombarding your audience with tons of links in your articles will only lead to frustration or confusion, which lower your click-through rates. Provide two highly relevant, self-serving links in the Resource Box of your articles to keep your audience on the right track and increase transparency. 5. Meet Expectations Let your article writing mantra be: Quality and Relevance. Be careful about making assumptions of your online audience. Online audiences today are FAR more educated than ever before and they have MORE access to correct information. Always aim for highly-relevant, quality, original content. Write your next set of quality, original articles to engage a highly interactive and intuitive online audience by keeping the above 5 tips in mind. In doing so, you will draw more exposure and traffic to your whole platform and create an invested audience who will connect with you on a greater level. *Please note we are not stating that readers can't or won't read longer pieces. It depends on the medium (e.g. essays, theses, etc.) and if your medium dictates longer pieces, then right on - keep writing! What quality measures do you take to ensure your articles meet your reader's expectations? Share your comments and suggestions by visiting this post online! | 
To Your Article Writing Success & Passion!
To Your Article Writing Success & Passion!
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