Best Practices for Links on Websites

Prefer to read? Here’s the video transcript about links on websites:

Here are some things I want you to keep in mind.

First off, links need to have really good information scent. You might be wondering, "What the heck is that?"

Information scent refers to the visual and textual clues that suggest what information the link may lead to.

That's why things like "Click Here" aren't great because they don't provide good information scent. (Plus that's not helpful to anyone using a screenreader either.) Somebody needs to have a sense of what they're going to get if they click on a link.

Help USERS Make INFORMED DECISIONS

Here are some examples of information-rich links using descriptive text. This language is pretty clear about what you're going to get if you click on it.

• "Meet our interim program director," is probably going to be either some kind of video or some kind of article about this new person.

• "Newest animal babies" - that totally makes me want to click on it, I don't know about you.

• Here it's very clearly an article about "4 signs of alcohol abuse."

These are the types of links that we want. These descriptive links will have a lot of meaning for people. This will help them make an informed decision about whether they want to click.

Words to Avoid

Here are the words you want to be careful with:

• “Click here”

• “Read more”

• “Learn more”

• “More”

These words are really vague. If I come across those on a website, and links like this will catch my eye, I still don't know what exactly I'm going to be getting into.

Should I click on these links? As much as possible, avoid using these vague words without context. If I have to use them, they need to be very closely related visually to whatever the item is.

For example, it's some beginning of the article and you get to continue the article, you can read more. So at least I know, OK, I'm continuing with this same article, that sort of thing. Otherwise what happens is these words pop out to me on a page as links, but then I have to kind of sit around and wonder what they're connected to.

Be aware that it's always better to have good information scent. It's better to be more clear about what somebody is going to get when they click on the link.

Link Length

The best practice I've seen based on research would be having a length of three to seven words. When it gets beyond seven words, it feels too long, but sometimes one word isn't enough. So here is the best practice to aim for on your links.

Here are some information-rich links that are better and longer than if I just wrote, "Learn more."

• “Learn more tips to stay healthy”

• “Read about our newest program”

• “Top tips for better eating here”

These will help the user make good choices about whether this link is worth clicking on it from their perspective. Great UX helps people make informed choices.

Color

Let's talk about color now. Color is fun to talk about and you can definitely have variety with your colors before your links. They definitely need to be accessible. So that means there needs to be a good color contrast between the color and the background.

So, for example, I've seen websites that have chosen orange as a color for links. That is not accessible on a white background. So you want to be sure to check color contrast.

I use a color checker called the Web AIM color checker. There are other ones you can find online. Use whichever one because you definitely want your links to be accessible.

Underlined Links

There's a good argument that links probably should be underlined, right, because not everybody sees colors in the same way. And if a link is underlined, it's very clear that this is a link.

If you don't want to underline from the get go, you would want to change that on. But, you could change the color as well as add an underline.

Visited Links

You may use another color to show visited links. Then it's very clear that, hey, this is a link after somebody has visited a page on your website. This is especially important if it's a larger site with a lot of content. Visited links may be in purple or whatever other color might be helpful. This is for the user to know, "Oh, I've already explored that area of the website in those pages."

So you can have fun with links, but just be sure they are accessible. We want to make sure we have great links that are information-rich that people want to click on.

Want to learn more about UX, check out Birdcall courses for nonprofit and small business websites.

Best Practices for Testimonials

The transcript for “Best Practices for Testimonials” is below:

Testimonials are a common thing to have on a website that is public-facing. They help increase credibility and trust.

Why Use Testimonials?

Why testimonials? We know that people influence other people and how they act. Also, credibility can increase very quickly when others are talking about you positively. And trust is essential for most organizations to really connect with their target audiences. And that is what you want to do. You want to build trust. Testimonials are a way to speed up that trust.

To increase credibility and trust testimonials should have a few characteristics if possible.

Full Names of Real People

We love to have a full name attached to a testimonial. That means it comes from a real person that people could look up to see who that really is. Also, including a title or an industry gives the context of who this person is. Then nobody does have to go look up, "Who is Mary Jones?" Well, you can give them more information. They then say, "Oh, that's somebody who I recognize or somebody from an industry that I recognize or who has a title similar to me."

Photos if Possible

Showing a photo of the person giving a testimonial also really helps increase credibility. Now, sometimes you run into issues around anonymity or privacy. Those are more important than you getting a testimonial. And those cases, sometimes you can use the quote and you may not have a full name.

Maybe you'll only have a first name or no name at all. At least it is something, and at least it will be told in words that are not yours. Somebody else's words can feel more real to other people. But as much as possible, you want to show that these are real testimonials from people like those viewing your website.

Off-Site Testimonials

We know that recommendations on third-party sites are also really helpful for organizations. Things like GuideStar, Yelp, or Facebook are places where people may put recommendations. For an organization for e-commerce, that's a lot easier. There are sites like Amazon and eBay where people are giving things stars and making recommendations. But even if you aren't selling a product, it doesn't mean you shouldn't see if you can have off-site recommendations as well.

A Common Issue with Testimonials

The biggest issue I see with testimonials is that they are often too long. Here's an example of a testimonial about an event. It has lots of great things to say about the organization and the event and even the employees. But it's just like a wall of words. It's a lot of words here. And so it's more likely that somebody would just skip over it.

But if I picked the thing that I wanted to emphasize, and we use just that line from the testimonial, it might be way more powerful. It will be more likely to be seen.

Let's say I wanted to take this line, which is really an impressive testimonial line, and I would just pull it out. And I would let there be white space around it, so it really pops out on the page. That kind of white space or negative space around words makes them stand out and will draw the attention there.

Sprinkle Testimonials

So keep an eye out for testimonials on your website. See if you can make them shorter. If you aren't yet using testimonials, then think about how could you possibly start incorporating them in. Sprinkle them throughout the site, not on a separate testimonials page. Sprinkle them in to help increase your credibility and trust.

Learn More

Get more practical tips to improve your nonprofit homepage by grabbing 3 Free UX Lessons to Drastically Improve Your Nonprofit Website here.

Editing and Proofreading Online Articles

We know from research that typos affect credibility.

We want to build trust with the people coming to our websites. Don't erode trust with typos.

Watch the video above for tips or you can read the same content in written form below.

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Let's talk a little bit about editing and proofreading. So I know you're most likely a writer, and you've worked a lot with tech, so you probably have your own process. But sometimes it's valuable to hear how others edit and proofread their work. You might pick up something you want to try.

Write First, Then Edit

The first thing I always do when I need to edit a page online, a newsletter, or whatever happens to be, is write it. Then I wait.

I give myself the luxury of some time. Don't try to edit as you go along, just write first.

Of course, this wouldn't work if you're doing some crisis communication. But for most things, you can wait a day and then come back to the writing. I will definitely find things I want to change and typos the next day, after my eyes have had a little bit of rest.

Your Time of Day for Details

I also encourage you to find that time of the day where you are best at detailed work. For me, that is first thing in the morning from eight to 10 a.m. If you give me something to look at it at four p.m., I will be terrible. I can't do it, don't give me math at that time! You know you. And if you don't, you need to figure out, when can I do really detailed work? That is the time to check for typos and that sort of thing.

Print It Out

Another thing I want you to do (and I feel bad for saying this for the trees) is print it out. Printing it out makes a big difference. There are times we can't see typos online, but once we print it out, we can see "Oh, there's a typo right there." We also may think, "I would definitely reword that phrase."

So don't print it out 10 times, but do print and look it over carefully. That will help you catch things you wouldn't catch otherwise.

Read Aloud

Another thing I do is I read it out loud. I print it out, and I will read whatever I wrote out loud. I'll see if there are any sentences I tend to stumble on. That is a sign to me that maybe I need to think about shortening that sentence. Maybe it's a little bit too complex or worded awkwardly.

Find a Colleague or Pal

Another thing I like to do is pass the writing off to a colleague. If you are solo in an organization that can be hard. You can sometimes find somebody outside of your organization who may trade with you. If you look at their articles and they look at yours, that sort of thing could be a win-win. It definitely helps to get somebody's eyes on it who didn't write it. That will help you catch typos. I always say this to any reviewers, "Please check me for typos and any kind of weirdness. Tell me anything that is not clear."

More Checking After Launch

Finally, after the writing/website/whatever launches, check for typos again. I promise you, there still might be a few typos in there.

When I worked at UNC Chapel Hill on this project with 15 people. We launched a new website with all kinds of content. As soon as it launched, we spent the next hour just all combing the different areas of the website. We looked for little things that were funny — typos, weirdness, or something that didn't work well with the content management system. Proofreading was part of the process of launch. So we celebrated, but first we checked for typos!

So those are a few things that I do to make sure that my writing is polished. I don't want to have typos because I know that credibility is really important online. And while we all know that typos are part of life and certainly part of emails, we want to try to reduce them as much as possible. We want to give people total confidence and trust in what we're doing and what we're writing on our websites.

If you see a typo on here (likely), I beg you to tell me so I can fix it! Help out others by telling them about typos. It's appreciated.

Want to keep learning? Check out my online classes. More topics coming soon!