Content plays a big part in Web site design and development. Without content, you would just have a lot of Web sites linked to other Web sites with nothing interesting of different on each one. As much fun as link clicking is I think if we took content out of the picture, people’s interest might stray a little. So to help you with your content writing, I figured I would share a few tips.

1. The first tip that I would like to share with you is that paragraph breaks can be your friend. Nothing gets under my skin more than one large block of text with no separation to be seen. Do you see magazines or newspapers using this technique? No. You must give the reader’s eyes a break. Separating things by idea or topic is a good way to get yourself started on writing better content.

2. Ordered lists can be your friend. When it comes to listing a number of topics, using ordered or un-ordered lists can be really helpful. It breaks up the type of content being served up and it yet again helps the eyes navigate a little easier. You read the page and see a topic. Then you see that topic is divided even more. Then you move on to the next topic in the next paragraph. It sounds simple, but many places on the Web still do not get it.
3. Don’t be afraid to give a few headlines and sub-headlines for people to follow while reading. The heading for a section or sub-section should tell the reader what they are about to read. Give the reader a summary of what is coming next so they can decide if they are going to continue reading or skip ahead to the next thing that interests them.

I know that I am probably only scratching the surface when it comes to really good content writing - but this should be more than enough to get you started. Look over some of your own Web sites and specifically the text on those Web sites and decide for yourself how easy or hard you are making things for your visitors.

[tags]content, writing, tip, headline, paragraph, list[/tags]