In short, many newspaper Web sites could stand to experiment a bit more with how they place banners throughout their sites. As long as they are clearly labeled as advertisements, you might even put them within content. That can be a tough decision, though, because while the ads will get noticed more, they also may annoy the reader and thus backfire. In my first item of this column, I fretted about boring design. Perhaps even worse is boring verbiage, and that I found a lot of during my surfing trip.
Many home pages contain headlines and blurbs that are too bland.
There's nothing to encourage site visitors to click on a link, unless the topic specifically interests them. By contrast, a minority of sites craft every headline and article blurb with care. The sites I liked best made me want to read stories I otherwise didn't know I wanted to read. If your site suffers from bland writing, it might be worthwhile finding a really good headline writer and adding him or her to the staff. That's part of the reason that they've had trouble in recent years attracting younger readers.