Word Press is a very helpful tool we use in creating our web pages. However, under Readability, there are two items that are constantly a problem – Passive Voice and Transition Words.
I can’t give you an easy fix for either one, but two things that I’ve sort of figured out to get the green is this. Both are based upon a percentage. Passive Voice wants you down around 10{0cdeda01f3f3bfc56e7a77b9bf298b3f7d32c3660f53c61fbe1a94dd1c6575f6} – that is less than 10{0cdeda01f3f3bfc56e7a77b9bf298b3f7d32c3660f53c61fbe1a94dd1c6575f6} of your page has sentences that are in Passive Voice. That’s not many.
With Transition Words, WP wants 20{0cdeda01f3f3bfc56e7a77b9bf298b3f7d32c3660f53c61fbe1a94dd1c6575f6} or more – that is 20{0cdeda01f3f3bfc56e7a77b9bf298b3f7d32c3660f53c61fbe1a94dd1c6575f6} of your sentences have to start with a transition word. That’s a lot! WP offers you a Help page with some suggestions.
Word Press Passive Voice
Ok so what I’ve sort of figured out is that to fix the Passive Voice, you can sometimes fix it, if you add a couple of paragraphs at the end of the page that do not have any passive voice in them. Some really generic words that are short declarative sentences. I use things like:
“Come to our Wednesday Wine and Dine show. It is at 8:30 EDT. It is always a lot of fun. Bring your own glass of wine.”
Also, use the eyeball to highlight the sentences that have passive voice in them. I have discovered that what they really mean is present tense rather than past or future tense. Therefore, look for words that have endings such as “ed” and “ing”. Rewrite the sentence without those endings. Also, there are some little words that we tend to put into sentences that can easily be removed. One of them is “will” (future). I noticed on the Vya page there was a lot of “will need” to do this or that. I took out the word “will” and got rid of the passive in that sentence.
Some other examples:
- it is designed for – passive – past tense
- The design is for – non-passive present tense
- you will get the best rates, (passive – future)
- get the best rates – drop you will
- you are protected. (passive)
- change to – you get protection (non-passive)
- You will be contacted with a No-Obligation Consultation (passive) future
- A No-Obligation Consultant will contact you (present)
By the way, until I put those examples in this page, I did not have a passive warning, now I do. So far I have no warning for Transition Words. So, per above, for Passive Voice by adding to the length of the page with no passive errors, the percentage is reduced and you can get it to go away. Or change the wording.
Word Press Transition Words
Transition words aren’t as easy because you have to decrease the size of the page to get the percentage to increase. Sometimes, after I’ve exhausted my attempts at putting words at the beginning of sentences, I will go thru and delete extra words or extra sentences to decrease the size of the page. It is amazing that sometimes it doesn’t take that much.
BEST ADVICE
TA-DAH
The best advice I can give you is to write simple sentences to avoid being passive. And string them together with the word ‘and’, ‘although’, ‘also’ ‘therefore’ but you have to alternate the beginning word in the sentences so you don’t get flagged with the Consecutive Sentence starting with the same word flag.
Isn’t it fun to fool mother nature and Word Press too?