Plain language is search-engine friendly

Yet another reason to use plain language: People are more likely to find you and your information on the web. Think about the last time you were looking for information on the internet: What did you turn to first? I’m willing to bet you went to Google, Yahoo, or some other search engine and typed in a few key words. You’re not alone. Web usability guru Jakob Nielsen says “Search is how people discover new websites and find individual pages within websites and intranets.” Furthermore, he says that people are more likely to use old, familiar words when searching for information.

Old words rule because people know them intimately. Familiar words spring to mind unbidden. Thus, users are likely to employ old words when they boil down their problem to a search query, which is typically only 2-3 words long.

Nielsen offers some specific guidelines for writing for searchability (the fancy term is “search engine optimization,” or SEO), including this:

Call a spade a spade, not a digging implement. Certainly not an excavation solution. Many marketers like to embellish products to make them seem grander than traditional fare. But customers define their needs in known terms, so be sure to use them, even if you don’t think they’re exciting. The very fact that a word is unexciting indicates that it’s frequently used. People search for terms like “cheap airline tickets,” not “value-priced travel experience.” Often, a boring keyword is a known keyword.

He doesn’t use the term, but it sounds to me like plain language; that is, “communication that your audience can understand the first time they read or hear it.” If you don’t know the key terms your audience is most comfortable using, if you don’t write your web pages in that language, they’re a lot less likely to find you through search engines. And if they can’t find you, as far as they’re concerned, you don’t exist.