Unless you’re a nationwide firm with a dedicated web development team, it’s likely you have to upload content to your website on your own. HTML is a standardized system used to tell computers how to display content. While it’s not necessary to completely know HTML inside and out, here are a few basic tags you’ll need to have under your belt if you want to have any chance of uploading content that’s user friendly and readable.

<p>

This is the simplest tag of all--<p>, or the paragraph tag. You use the paragraph tags when breaking up blocks of text. When creating content that’s user friendly, you’ll want to use the <p> tag often because shorter paragraphs are easier to read than one long piece of text.

<h>

The <h> tag is used when creating headers. Most sites have six sizes for headers, starting with the largest at <h1>, going to the smallest at <h6>.

Headers are particularly important for Social Security disability attorneys, as SSDI claimants are older than the average population and may have impaired vision. Opt for larger headers while uploading content related to Social Security law.

<em> / <i>

Both of these tags create italicized text, but HTML5 does state a difference between <em> and <i> tags. You want to use <em> when you’re putting emphasis on a word or phrase, and <i> is used when you’re using a foreign word or a quote. Here are a couple of examples showing the difference:

<em>: You should appeal a denied Social Security disability claim as soon as possible.

<i>: The Blue Book states that for most forms of breast cancer to qualify for disability benefits, you must have evidence showing:

• The cancer has spread beyond the regional lymph nodes, OR
• Has returned despite anticancer treatment, OR
• Is inoperable or untreatable

<br/>

<br/> stands for a break in the text. What’s nice about the <br/> tag is you don’t need to have an opening and a closing tag—you just insert it where you’d like to break apart a paragraph, a series of images, or more. You can use multiple breaks in a row if you’d like to create a particularly long break between sections of text.

<style>

The style tag is used to change the color, type, and size (and more) of your font or page background. The <style> tag is a great way to make visual changes on your website without help of a web developer. Here are some components you can use within the style tag:

• font-family: this is the type of font you’re using, such as veranda or courier
• font-size: how large you want your font, used as a percentage of what your site’s default font is. For example, font-size:200% would be twice as large as usual text within a paragraph
• text-align: center, left justify, or right justify your text on a page
• font-color: as you may have guessed, this allows you to set a specific font color within a tag

While it’s not necessary to master CSS or HTML to draw potential claimants to your site, knowing the basics is critical to maintaining a functional and user-friendly legal website, especially if a large proportion of your audience has vision impairments.