Visitors spend more than twice as long looking at the left side of your webpage
When it comes to viewing time, usability expert Jakob Nielsen says, web visitors spend:
- 69 percent looking at the left half of the screen
- 30 percent looking at the right half of the screen
- 1 percent looking at any part of the page that’s visible only by scrolling horizontally to the right
Stick to the conventional layout
To make the most of this reading pattern, Nielsen counsels that you:
- Keep navigation to the left of your page.
- Showcase your top story between one-third and halfway across the page. This is where visitors focus most of their attention.
- Place secondary content to the right.
More reading patterns
Visitors also pay more attention to information that’s on the first screen (“above the fold“) of a webpage.
And they read in an F-shaped pattern, focusing on the first line of the page’s main content.
This research studied websites in countries that read left-to-right.
Think Like a Friend, Fan or Follower
Craft story angles that humans will read
“There’s a lot of ME in social MEdia,” says Brian Solis, principal analyst at Altimeter Group. “And there’s a great big I in TwItter.”
Sadly, talking about yourself and your stuff works about as well on social channels as it does at a cocktail party. Watch your social media reach and influence grow when you deliver relevant, valuable, useful content to your readers.
Watch your social media reach and influence grow when you deliver relevant, valuable, useful content to your readers.
At Get Clicked, Read, Shared & Liked — our in-house Social media-writing workshop — you’ll learn how to:
- Find the right story — and craft the best story angle — for blog posts, content marketing pieces and social media status updates.
- Position your company as the expert in the field and draw readers in with news they can use to live their lives better.
- Get more likes and shares with stories that better serve your audience.
- Make sure your status updates are welcome guests, not intrusive pests, by passing the 70-20-10 test.
- Tap the power of the most-retweeted word in the English language. And avoid the one topic nobody wants to read about.
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Source: Jakob Neilsen, “Horizontal Attention Leans Left,” UseIt.com, April 6, 2010
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