What Lists Can Teach Us about Web Design and Blogging

Photo: Mike 23

Ever wonder why lists are so popular on the internet? Theres no shortage of them on the pages of social bookmarking sites like digg, reddit and even del.icio.us. Lists organize information at a glance, changing our perception and hooking us into reading more. The following article explains how manipulating the eye’s focus can improve our web designs as well as our blogs.

The Secret Power of Lists

We click on the links out of a combination of procrastination and nostalgia (who doesn’t want to remember the 1980’s top fashions). Okay, so maybe its mostly out of procrastination. But what keeps us there is something less obvious.

The human eye scans the page in a seemingly haphazard pattern, jumping from one item to the next. Although its a subconscious act occurring on a scale of milliseconds, it has a large role in determining whether we continue to read an article or move on.

So what makes lists special? Lists organize and highlight pertinent information at a glance. Okay, I admit that’s a no-brainer statement. But its the crucial component behind the popularity of lists. The scanning eye doesn’t have time to digest everything on the page. By organizing the information, lists have a greater chance of catching the eye (and further interest) than a long expanse of similar sized paragraphs.

What it Means for Bloggers: Organize and Highlight Key Points

Just because list posts are popular, it doesn’t mean your blog entries should all be lists. After all, there’s more than one way to skin a cat; the lesson here is to organize the information to make it most accessible to readers.

The sure fire path to a better post is taking the time to identify the important points and making sure they’re at the (scanning) forefront. Utilize sub headers, emphasized text, and avoid long expanses of endless paragraphs.

And of course, don’t be afraid to use lists. Lists have the added advantage of highlighting the important sentence in each paragraph; a surefire way to stack your page full of hooks to draw the viewers into reading more.

What it Means for Designers: Conveying the Right Message

Design in general, whether it be a oil painting or a flash website, is all about sending a message. Period. In some mediums this message is achieved with diagrams or abstract images, but in web design the message is conveyed through a balance of typography and imagery.

Although its easy to forget this when you’re three hours into a Photoshop session (which frequently happens to me), whats most important to the website isn’t the pretty web banner. Its how the combination of images and text come together to convey a message.

Spending time analyzing how the eye naturally scans the page is the first step in insuring the correct message is being sent. As lists have taught us, organizing the same exact content in different ways can effect how it is read, and subsequently the message of the page.

At its best, this optimizing can tip the scale from a good design to a great design. At its worst, it can create user confusion and mixed messages, a staple of bad design. Optimized focus is the je ne sais quoi, the intangible factor that makes a big difference in people’s perception of a website.

In practical terms, this means identifying the most important parts of the website (e.g. is the contact information, testimonials, or banner image most important?). Then making sure these are the places your eye gravitates to first. You may feel silly at first playing a one-sided game of peek-a-boo with the monitor (looking away, and then looking back), but it can make a world of difference. And of course, always take advantage of friends and coworkers, let them tell you their first impressions.

There you have it. No matter what you’re doing, designing, blogging, or contemporary art - learning how to convey this message effectively can be as important as the message itself. The hidden power of lists is their ability for organizing and easily highlighting the most important information. Learn from lists. They’re popular for a reason.