Using simpler text when labeling parts of your site helps readers

With so many websites being born every second, bloggers are doing their best to make their sites look unique in as many ways possible. If a reader visits your site and finds it visually different than the countless other sites on the internet, they might remember it and come back again. However, in the quest for a unique looking website, you might end up sacrificing reading usability and make readers go through extra obstacles to be able to understand different words and labels on your site that define different areas and functionalities around your site.

You should try to use simple words to label different things around your site, so the readers may spend more time getting information from your site than spending time trying to figure out how your site works. Using simpler words actually helps you appreciate your readers, since you are helping them think less about irrelevant things when they are on your site.

Using different words to label different sections may be good, but it may give headaches even to veteran readers

It might sometimes feel good to use different wording on your site. It might even make your blog appear more intelligent compared to others. However, making users relearn normal things will only result in less people coming to your site in the long run, since you will be making them go through extra steps to figure out how your site functions when you can otherwise focus on making your site functional and useful instead of just different. Even if you get a lot of people, upsetting a lot of innocent readers who came to your site to learn something but left with a huge headache because of your use of different wording for everything is not a nice thing.

If you can use new words effectively, go for it! However, I have yet to run into a site that makes it really easy for readers to understand everything new on the site right away, while not sacrificing the content quality or the amount of focus a user can spend on the actual content besides the design and the labeling.

Examples of good usability labeling

Following are some examples of how some words sound and explain things earier and quicker than their fancier alternatives.

• “Search” is easier to understand than “Archives” or “Seek” in a search box.
• “Comment” sounds clearer than “talk back.”
• “Archives” or even “Previous Posts” sounds better and clearer than “History” or “Seek the past” when used to label an area of your site where readers can find previously published content.
• “Register” is easier to understand than “Become a comrade!” or even “Join the fun!”
• “Other links” or even “Links” sounds better than “Neighbors” or even “Friends.“
• “Home” or “Main page” is easier to understand than “Back to basics” or just “Blog“, as many blogs are just blogs already. People will get confused.
• “Contact me” or “Email me” sounds better and clearer than “Stalk me.” Even though “Stalk me” sounds cool, it does make me think extra for at least a second or so. Maybe I have been and am being stalked way too much?

Sure, for each new word label you use around your site that people are not used to reading or hearing, you are making people think only for a second or two more than usual. However, the mere fact that you make users spend more time thinking on how to use your site means that you are failing compared to other sites which use normal words that everyone is used to.

Be fancy, but don’t make your users pay the price

Ask yourself this question: do you want users to spend time exploring the content you have, or do you want users to spend more time figuring our how to navigate your site and what different things on your site, besides your main and constantly updating content, mean? Your readers already know how to navigate a website, and they are already used to seeing some common elements on every site, like a search box labeled “Search“; use that knowledge to make their experience easier and better on your own site.

Make things so easy for your readers that when they come to your site, they can instantly know what each link and word means in order to navigate your site. Your readers will appreciate you for making them spend less time figuring out how to use your site. That will result in your readers spending more time appreciate your site and content more.