Guidance for content designers

Writing accessible copy

When writing copy, there are a few simple ways to make it accessible for everyone - no matter what their specific needs.

Making content as easy to understand as possible makes it better for everybody.

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Headings and subheadings

Meaningful headings make your content more accessible, as they help users move around the page.

People read online copy differently to written copy; often skimming and skipping content to find what they're looking for.

Good headings and subheadings help people see what information a page contains and find what they want easier, and breaking up a page using headings and subheadings also makes it makes it easier to read than a wall of words.

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Keep sentences and paragraphs short

Long sentences aren't as easy to understand as shorter ones, so keeping sentences short helps with accessibility. As a guide, make your average sentence no more than 15 words long, splitting long sentences into two.

It's the same with paragraphs. Ideally, these should have no more than five sentences each.

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Bullet-points

Just like headings and subheadings, bullet-points help to break up a page and make information easier to find and understand.

Bullet-points can:

• make copy quicker to read
• break up the page so it's not a wall of words
• help highlight important information

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Front-load

Front-loading means putting the most important word(s) or information first. This makes it easier and quicker for readers to understand your content.

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Jargon

When describing insurance, there can be a lot of jargon; don't assume everyone knows what you're talking about.

If you need to introduce a new term or phrase, explain what it means the first time you use it.

For example: If your car is written-off, which means it can't be repaired, we'll replace it with a new one.

Cutting down on jargon makes it easier for everyone to find the information they need easily and be able to understand it.

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Plain English

At Abeille Assurances we write for a reading age of nine years old. Using simple, everyday English makes content more accessible and easier to understand for everybody.

We don't use formal or long words when easy or short ones will work. For example, 'buy' instead of 'purchase', 'help' instead of 'assist', and 'about' instead of 'approximately'.

We also write conversationally, as though talking one-to-one with a friend.

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Abbreviations and acronyms

Just like with jargon, there are a lot of abbreviations and acronyms in the insurance world that many people won't recognise.

You should always write these out in full the first time you use them and include the abbreviation or acronym in brackets. For example, No Claim Discount (NCD), or the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA). If you use them again, you can just use the abbreviation or acronym.

You don't need to explain acronyms that are well known and in common use, such as UK, EU or VAT.

At Abeille Assurances we don't use abbreviations such as eg, etc or ie. Instead we use more natural ways to talk around them:

• eg. - for example, such as, like
• etc - and any other
• ie. - in other words, which means

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Use descriptive links

Using descriptive links helps users know where a link will take them, or what they're about to download.

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Consistent content

Content should be consistent. For example, if a Call To Action (CTA) button at the bottom of a page is labelled 'Continue', then it should be labelled 'Continue' on other pages, and not something similar like 'Next'.

Consistent doesn't always mean identical. For example, if you have a link in a quote and buy journey that says 'Go to your details', then it would be fine to have 'Go to your quote' on the next page.