A couple of weeks ago, we blogged about how to create killer landing pages that convert visitors into new customers. We listed some tried-and-true elements that seasoned copywriters have used for decades (in sales letters and then later in landing pages) to drive engagement and boost sales. One of them was to use “liberal amounts of text formatting, esp. bold, italics and ALL CAPS.”

We’ll say it again: use liberal amounts of text formatting, esp. bold, italics and ALL CAPS.

Maybe you’re skeptical that something as simple as text formatting can make you more persuasive. Well, don’t take it from us. Take it from Science. In 1969, the psychologist Robert Zajonc published an article summarizing his experiments in how people react to the presentation of words. After showing his subjects an assortment of made-up words—kardirga, saricik, biwonjni, for example—Zajonc found that people attribute positive connotations to words that are repeated more frequently and set in boldfaced type. Zajonc dubbed this phenomenon the mere exposure effect.

Zajonc’s research has seen renewed popularity recently with the publication of Daniel Kahneman’s new book, Thinking, Fast and Slow. (Nobel-winner Kahneman was one of the first economists to look at economic phenomena through the lens of human psychology, creating the field known as behavioral economics.) Here’s an excerpt from Slate.com’s review of Kahneman’s new book:

Psychologists have devised other ways to make a message more persuasive. “You should first maximize legibility,” says Daniel Kahneman, who describes the Zajonc experiment in Thinking, Fast and Slow, a compendium of his thought and work. Faced with two false statements, side-by-side, he explains, readers are more likely to believe the one that’s typed out in boldface. More advice: “Do not use complex language where simpler language will do,” and “in addition to making your message simple, try to make it memorable.” These factors combine to produce a feeling of “cognitive ease” that lulls our vigilant, more rational selves into a stupor. It’s an old story, and one that’s been told many times before. It even has a name: Psychologists call it the illusion of truth.

Faced with two false statements, side-by-side, readers are more likely to believe the one that’s typed out in boldface. (See what I did there? I used repetition as a rhetorical device.)

Now look, I’m not suggesting that you pack your landing pages or whatever with false statements and baseless hyperbole. That would unethical. But I am suggesting that you use text formatting to reinforce your messaging and bolster your argument. That would be smart.

Read more: The Effect Effect | Slate.com

Mike Lacher recounts an epic tale ‘in which I fix my girlfriend’s grandparents’ wifi and am hailed as a conquering hero.’

Lo, in the twilight days of the second year of the second decade of the third millennium did a great darkness descend over the wireless internet connectivity of the people of 276 Ferndale Street in the North-Central lands of Iowa. For many years, the gentlefolk of these lands basked in a wireless network overflowing with speed and ample internet, flowing like a river into their Compaq Presario. Many happy days did the people spend checking Hotmail and reading USAToday.com.

But then one gray morning did Internet Explorer 6 no longer load The Google. Refresh was clicked, again and again, but still did Internet Explorer 6 not load The Google.

Continue reading at McSweeneys.net…

More analysis here.

Maybe you thought they were the same thing? Not so!

From MastersInIt.org (via Coudal.org)

Do you know what a meme is? According to Websters, a meme is “an idea, behavior or style that spreads from person to person within a culture.” Coined by the British evolutionary biologist Richard Dawkins, the word is a shortening of the Ancient Greek mimeme, ”something imitated.” Dawkins observed that memes act like genes—their success or failure dependent on the Darwinian processes of variation, mutation, competition and inheritance.

An Internet meme is a subcategory that includes all manner of silly, stupid, whimsical, bizarre, and cringeworthy things (videos, songs, phrases, words) that somehow float above the rest and become a part, however briefly, of the collective conscience. (Examples: planking, “winning,” lolcats, “fail.”) Check out the video above for an entertaining look back at the memes that metastasized in 2011.

See also:

• Know Your Meme: Internet phenomena: viral videos, image macros, catchphrases, web celebs and more.
• BuzzFeed: Breaking buzz and the kinds of things you’d want to pass along to your friends.

Thx, Liz