The main body of your article should provide more detailed analysis or information on the trends or changes summarised in the Main points or Main changes section. 

You can either create a new section for each bullet point in the Main points or Main changes section, or group the information into topics of interest and create a new section for each topic.

Keep your sections short; avoid putting all the information under one section as users will not be able to find what they are looking for in the table of contents.

Use clear section headings

Use clearly labelled section headings so that users can find what they need quickly. They should be short and concise with the most important information first, and reflect the topics users are interested in. 

These section headings will appear in the table of contents and will help users find what they are looking for.

1. Knife crime
2. Deaths by local area
3. Use of administrative data
4. Challenges of data collection

There are standard section headings that you can use to structure your content. Some section headings should be avoided to meet best practice for web writing.

The content design team can help you structure your content and choose the most suitable section headings – email content.design@ons.gov.uk.

Use subheadings to break up your text

Use a new subheading within your section every time you discuss a new subject, trend or change. Put the most important point at the start. Subheadings should be a maximum of 75 characters, including spaces, to prevent the text wrapping over too many lines, particularly on mobile devices.

Avoid numbering subheadings (for example, 3.1 or 3.1.2) as these cannot be linked to in the text. They also slow down online users who often use subheadings and scan the left side of a page to find the topic they are looking for (see the F pattern). A short and clear subheading is more useful and will help users navigate by headings.