Hot Text: Web Writing that Works [Paperback]

The book is divided into the following chapters:

Part 1 - Catch The Net Spirit - Who Am I Writing For, And Incidentally, Who Am I?; What Kind Of Thing Am I Creating?; What Will The Web Do To My Text?; Attention!

Part 2 - Write Like A Human Being - Idea #1: Shorten That Text; Idea #2 - Make Text Scannable; Idea #3: Cook Up Hot Links; Idea #4: Build Chunky Paragraphs; Idea #5 - Reduce Cognitive Burdens; Idea #6 - Write Menus That Mean Something

Part 3 - Fine-Tune Your Style For The Genres - Writing In A Genre; Creating Customer Assistance That Actually Helps; Persuading Niche Markets, Individuals, And The Press; Making News That Fits; Entertaining People Who Like To Read; Getting A Job

Part 4 - Become A Pro - So You Wannabe A Web Writer Or Editor

Part 5 - Backup - Writerly Sites; If You Like To Read

Review
On the surface, you may think that writing is writing, regardless of the medium. You may think that if you can write a 2500 word article for a magazine, that you can successfully use that same style for web sites. And unfortunately, you'd be wrong. The mindset of online writing is completely different than for print, and this book will help you to understand that.

People read books and magazines for many reasons, but often it's to be entertained or to learn about a subject in depth. But when people visit web sites, it's usually to find an answer quickly. The reader wants to find the chunk of information they seek and then move on. If they don't see what they think they want, it's off to another site. The authors do an excellent job in this book breaking down the content structure of web writing. To successfully write for the web, you need to organize your information in discrete chunks that can be quickly linked to or scanned for applicable information. They show you how to effectively structure your writing by the use of shorter paragraphs, lists, bullets, external links, and a number of other techniques that will allow your ideas to flourish in an online medium.

The tone of their writing is conversational and easy, without the academic lecturing that often shows up in books where opinion and fact can blur together. They also use a lot of "before/after" examples to show you how the techniques actually work. I was actually surprised that I liked the book as much as I did. Many books on web site design go off on "expert rants" in which the author presents his likes/dislikes as expert opinion. Although some of the information in this book could fall into the same category, there wasn't the strident tone that often happens in other books.

Conclusion
Writing for the web entails different skills than writing for print medium. This book will help you understand the issues involved and to make a successful transition to online authoring. Recommended.