People Don’t Read Your Content: Here Is Why, And How To Fix It

People don’t read, they scan

People behave differently online than offline. This is something we have been told for decades, but it seems that nobody listens to it. Nielsen Norman Group has been telling us this since 1997: How Users Read On The Web

Why People Don’t Read Your Content

It is funny that Medium calls it “average reading time”, when in fact it should be called “average scanning time” because that is what we do, you and I, we just scan articles. We are lazy individuals and we didn’t come online to read but to find information or entertainment, that help or entertain us in our daily life.

Occasionally we do actually read articles while zipping to our fresh brewed morning coffee, but not often. We like to just glance at an article and pick out the information we find valuable, and then we leave.

To catch attention, the first 3 seconds are fundamental, but in those three seconds, you might not even get your viewer’s full attention, because a notification just ticked in on their phone at the same time they clicked on your article. Maybe they are multi-tasking, especially if they are on their phone. The post-modern connected world makes it more difficult to grab the attention of the readers than ever before.

What People Want

Nobody comes to your article or your blog just to visit it, they are here to do a task, or maybe seek help to do the task offline.

Even if they just want knowledge, they want it as fast as possible. If they could just click a button, and then it would be stored in their brains, they would do it.

Don’t Create Reading Content, But Scannable Content

Viewers are looking for words. They look for words connected to the task they want to complete. They scroll down the left of your page reading headings and a little text in a F-shaped pattern.

The less content on your page, and the better you structured your post with headings, the easier it is for people to scan.

Get The Content Right

Great content is created when the writer thinks like a detective, not the user.

• Find the words your “scanners” are looking for
• Do your research
• Use Google Trends
• Test the content, and make adjustments

Design, Don’t Write

So you’ve done your research, you know what tasks people want to solve, you know what words they look for, and you are ready to go.

But wait a second, and pause.

Designing is not only writing, half of it is actually thinking, and that what you should do now.

Thinking: Ask yourself, what would be the best way to present this information. How do I structure it in the simplest and easiest way to help people.

Structure: When structuring you need guides, feature boxes, bullet points, and they need to be designed well. After that, all you need is a great, clear, and concise heading.

Sketching: Sketch the article for yourself, and maybe show your ideas to someone in order to do some early-on user testing.

Writing

You can now start writing.

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