Thanks Mo, Hi Brian. We thought long and hard about this, but basically we think it's an improvement.
For example, this headline may be short, but what is the article really about? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/7390109.stm "Great tits cope well with warming" As an example, I think for this story: http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/8369764.stm "Procter & Gamble recalls 120,000 Vicks nasal sprays" ...is much clearer than... "Thousands of Vicks spray recalled" Especially if you don't know what Vicks is. John O'Donovan Chief Technical Architect BBC Future Media & Technology (Journalism) BC3 C1, Broadcast Centre, 201 Wood Lane, London http://news.bbc.co.uk/ http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport/ http://news.bbc.co.uk/weather/ -----Original Message----- From: [email protected] [mailto:[email protected]] On Behalf Of Mo McRoberts Sent: 20 November 2009 11:57 To: [email protected] Subject: Re: [backstage] BBC News - Googlejuice vs Usability On 20-Nov-2009, at 11:45, Brian Butterworth wrote: > Here's a nice little dillemma. > > http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/theeditors/2009/11/changing_headlines.html > > BBC News headlines go from 33 characters (because of Ceefax) to 66 > > One the one hand, king of usability Jacob Neilson has said the BBC News headlines are the "world's best" > > http://www.useit.com/alertbox/headlines-bbc.html > > On the other, Google likes lots of relevant keywords, the higher the "reading score" the better in fact. > > It's not like BBC News comes bottom of any Google search, is it? > > My question - which is more important, SEO or usability? Given the context: short headlines on the linking pages, longer headlines on the pages themselves, I'd suggest it strikes a good balance. However, I can't stand the short headlines. Everything's phrased as though it's a lie. Yes, I know the reasons, it still reads terribly, no matter what Neilson reckons. So in fact, I'd actually prefer to see the longer headlines all of the time (which does SEO no harm at all). BBC headlines 'lengthened'. M. -- mo mcroberts http://nevali.net iChat: [email protected] Jabber/GTalk: [email protected] Twitter: @nevali Run Leopard or Snow Leopard? Set Quick Look free with DropLook - http://labs.jazzio.com/DropLook/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/ - Sent via the backstage.bbc.co.uk discussion group. To unsubscribe, please visit http://backstage.bbc.co.uk/archives/2005/01/mailing_list.html. Unofficial list archive: http://www.mail-archive.com/[email protected]/
