As a netrepreneur, you can't avoid being a publisher. You publish a website. You publish a mailing list or newsletter. And today, you need to publish an ebook to stay in the race. All these publications require good writing.
Doing this is a challenge because writing for the Internet is very different from all kinds of writing you may be accustomed to. You are writing for:
- a visitor, not a reader
- a busy person with several sites to visit, not someone
ready to hear your words
- someone sitting awkwardly in front of a screen, not an
individual relaxed in her easy chair
All the rules for writing a book no longer apply. You do not organize the whole presentation so it flows easily from the simple to the complex. No, you must subdivide the entire subject matter into short easily DIGESTIBLE MORSELS.
Here are a few DOs and DON'Ts.
DON'T:
- Use long paragraphs
- Use long sentences
- Exaggerate or boast
DO:
- Stay focused on one subject
- Be concise
- Use subheadings
- Use bulleted lists
- Use DOs and DON'Ts
- Highlight important terms
- Offer examples and references, with links
Jakob Nielsen, of Sun Microsystems, has done research on the subject. Visit his
Alertbox.
