Web usability expert Jared Spool recommends that you make your hyperlinks 7 – 12 words long for optimum usability. Now, I would have thought links that long would be too hard for users to scan easily, but his research has shown that users are more likely to find what they want on your site if you have just a few more words within your links. Why?

Success Rates are best if Hyperlinks are between 7 - 12 words, Source: User Interface Engineering

Users will come to your site looking for something – let’s say it’s a woman looking for a shirt to wear on a beach vacation. She will have some term in mind for this item – maybe “beach wear” – and she’ll be looking for that word on your webpage. We refer to this as her “trigger” word.

What are the chances that you will happen to name your women’s shirt section “beachwear”? Well, if you are only using 1 – 6 words in your link, such as “Ladies Shirts” the chances are low! However, if you are naming things a little more specifically, such as “Women’s Wear for Beach, Lounging, and Casual Day at the Office” – there is a much bigger chance that any given user will spot their trigger word in that link.

However, my initial reaction (short links are more scannable) was not completely off-base – it turns out that links which contain 13 or more words tend to be overlooked, because they are now too long to be scanned quickly.