The copy on a business website has a range of purposes: it needs to bring potential customers to your website via the search engines, it needs to keep them reading past the first few words and, ultimately, it needs to convert them into paying clients or customers.
Jargon, or any kind of industry slang, usually doesn’t help with any of these objectives. There are a few exceptions, which I’ll come to after this: my top three reasons to avoid jargon.
1. Search Engines
Search engines work by sending out robots to read your web pages. If a user searches for a term that appears on one of your site’s pages, you stand a chance of ranking in the results. (Of course, Google’s algorithm is a LOT more complex than this and takes loads of other factors into account, but copy is one of the most important). If, therefore, you don’t use the language that your customers are using to search for you, your search engine traffic will suffer dramatically. The way to combat this is to conduct keyphrase research to check you and your customers are using the same kinds of words to describe your services.
2. Jargon is Boring.
If you land on a webpage and can’t understand half the words or need to keep hovering over acronyms to see what they stand for, chances are you’ll hit that back button and get on out of there. Effective copy doesn’t just bring customers in, it keeps them there.
3. Jargon doesn’t convert.
If you want a customer to click that ‘Sign Up’ or ‘Buy’ button, you need to make them feel confident and in control. If all your copy refers to products or services in language that doesn’t make much sense outside of your office bubble, you’ll alienate rather than reassure and that potential customer will go elsewhere.
When Jargon Works
Of course, the exception to the no-jargon rule comes when you’re expecting to deal with expert customers; people who will search using specific industry terms, become more interested when they see lots of them on a page and finally convert when they feel the business is expert enough to deserve their custom. The number one lesson is to understand your audience and always talk in their language.