Communicating effectively with the audience and attracting their attention despite all the noises and distractions in our surroundings is of great importance. Content plays a key role in strengthening these connections. Content may be to address a need, user problem, or brand voice, and may even guide and direct the user. So content with whatever purpose is produced, plays an important role in the business’s success.
This is why business owners invest a significant amount of time and money in teaching their employees how to write so that they can reap the benefits in the future. Because they know that writing high-quality content is one of the best ways to convey the brand and business message to the audience.
UX Writing is one of the skills whose use is increasing day by day. The biggest companies in the world, including Google, Amazon, Dropbox, and PayPal, are looking for people who are UX writers or experienced writers. As a result, it can be said that experience writing is one of the key parts of UX design.
The principles of UX Writing are the basis of the experience writing section that is discussed in this article.
Table of Contents
What is UIX writing?
UX Writing is the art of writing content that is displayed in the user environment of digital products such as websites and applications. This writing should not be confused with producing content that is used for marketing purposes. As applications and websites grow, their complexity also increases. This is where the importance of user guidance comes into play.
UX writer, with his art of writing, uses sentences, phrases, or even words that, like traffic signs, guide the user on his way around the product. As digital products have become an integral part of our daily lives, it is only natural that we look for products that we can have a pleasant experience using.
Without UX writing, the user may not be able to work with the product easily and may leave the product forever as a result of having a bad experience. For example, suppose there is a section for user registration on the site or application, and you want to guide the user for this task with a sentence or phrase. Without considering or following the principles of UX writing, we will face such a text:
“Dear user, by clicking on this section, you will access the registration form.”
The text above is nothing short of a disaster in terms of UX. Why? Because it is long and not clear.
A UX writer, instead of the long sentence above, just writes: “Register”. So easily!
You might think this doesn’t matter much, but what separates UX content from ordinary sentences is:
In UIX Writing, the goal is to display your message to the user in the best possible way.
Principles of UX Writing
Principle number 1: Clarity
One of the main differences between UX writing compared to other skills related to writing is its clarity and clarity. UX content should be written in a way that leaves no doubt for the user. To make sure your writing is clear enough, answer the following questions:
- Does the user understand the sentence or phrase?
- Does the sentence convey the desired information correctly?
- Is the sentence simple enough?
- Are the terms used ambiguous?
Answering these questions will help you create quality UX content. But this principle is not limited to these cases. There are other tips that if you follow them, you will have perfect content. Below are two of these points.
1. Do not use specialized terms
Many people do not have high computer knowledge. For this reason, you should not use specialized and technical terms in UX content. Of course, you may have to use a specialized term in some cases. Anyway, the important thing is to pay attention to the method of providing information to users with unequal and different knowledge levels.
2. Write scannable content for the user
Research shows that users don’t read the content when they land on a page, they scan it first. That is, with a general look at the content, they decide whether it is worth spending time and reading it or not.
The most common pattern among users is the F pattern. To make the most of these templates, keep your content short and simple. If there is a lot of information to convey, write it in bold.
Principle number 2: Write concisely
One of the main challenges for UX writers is space limitations. This limitation becomes more prominent in applications, especially mobile applications. This is why brevity is one of the key principles in UX writing.
Brief writing in no way means sacrificing the message and concept for a smaller amount of writing. Rather, it means writing information in the most effective way possible.
Principle number 3: Write usefully
One of the main goals of UX writers is to help the user navigate the site or application in the best possible way. As a result, UX writing content should be helpful. A UX writer should always look for a way to guide and guide the user. One of the best ways to do this is to design an attractive CTA. Creating an attractive CTA is the job of a UI/UX designer. In other words, it is the user interface designer who decides where, what size, and what color the CTA should be placed. But the content that is placed in this CTA is the task of the UX writer. The UX writer should write a word, phrase, or sentence to guide the user in the best way to what will happen after clicking on the CTA.
Principle number 4: Be in tune with the tone and voice of your brand
When we talk about the principles of UX writing, we should not neglect the tone and voice of the brand. The tone of the UX content should not be too different from the tone of the brand. To find the right tone for our content, we need to think about what personality the brand would have if it were a person. Was the person witty and energetic or formal and serious?
Principle number 5: Empathy
UX is not complete without empathy. Empathy in UX means putting ourselves in the user’s place and understanding what the user expects from the product and how we can best meet their expectations. Consider the example below. As you can see, UIX Writer has paid attention to what might cause the user’s concern on this page and has placed content to address this concern at the bottom of the page.