Somewhere out there is a credit union website with forty menu items, a homepage that scrolls for what feels like a full minute, and a “quick links” section that is neither quick nor a small number of links. And somewhere else is a credit union website with three pages total, no mention of what a HELOC actually is, and a phone number as the only path to information. Both of these are the same mistake wearing different outfits.

Content is king, but like most royalty, it can also be a nightmare houseguest if you let it overstay its welcome (ask me how I know). The trick isn’t adding more, and it isn’t cutting for cutting’s sake either. It’s figuring out how much your members actually need to make a decision and stopping right around there.

This isn’t a new problem. Many credit unions I’ve worked with have swung too far in one direction or the other at some point, usually right after a rebrand or a leadership change, when suddenly everyone has an opinion about what the website “needs.” We’ll look at how to tell if you’ve got too little, too much, or a realistic, reasonable amount, and how to strike that balance without turning content strategy into a full-time boardroom meeting.

Too millennial minimalist?

Too little content is the easier mistake to spot, and also the easier one to forgive, because it usually comes from a good instinct: nobody wants to bury the member in text. The problem is when “keep it simple” turns into “keep it vague,” and a member lands on your loans page to only learn that you do, in fact, offer loans.

There are signs you’re underserving your content as well: your services pages are mostly stock photos and a single paragraph, your rates require a phone call to actually understand (fees, terms, what qualifies), and your FAQ page answers the three questions nobody was asking while ignoring the ten questions people actually ask your call center every week.

This tends to happen for a reasonable-sounding reason. Someone on staff worried that too much text would scare visitors away, so every page got trimmed down to a headline and a button. The problem is that a button without context doesn’t build confidence; it just moves the question further down the line. A member who doesn’t understand your loan terms isn’t going to click “Apply Now.” They’re going to call, or worse, they’re going to leave and check your competitor’s site instead, where the terms happen to be spelled out clearly.

The good news here is the fix is simple. Go ask your member service team what people call in about, and put those answers on the page. If someone has to call to learn basic terms of your loans, that’s not minimalism; that’s just moving the workload from your website to your phone lines. Your website should be doing most of that lifting for you, especially outside business hours when someone might not be answering the phone.

The kitchen sink problem (don’t let that sink in)

Too much content is the trickier mistake, because it often comes from the opposite good instinct: being thorough. Every product gets every detail. Every page gets every disclosure, every related link, every “you might also be interested in.” Nothing gets cut because everything feels important to somebody, usually because somebody fought for it in a meeting six months ago and nobody’s revisited the decision since.

The result is a page that requires genuine effort to read. Walls of text with no hierarchy. Ten related links at the bottom of a page that was already answering the question. A navigation menu so deep that finding your checking account options requires the patience of a parent with 10 kids.

I’ve seen credit union sites where the mortgage page alone runs longer than a short story, covering every possible loan type, every possible scenario, and every possible disclosure in one unbroken scroll. Somewhere in there is the answer a member actually needs, but good luck finding it without a search function and a lot of patience.

Members are not reading your website the way you’d read a novel. Like a pool in the fall, they’re constantly skimming, looking for the one piece of information that answers their specific question, and they’re gone the moment that gets too hard to find. More words are not more helpful if the member gives up before reaching the useful ones.

This is worth repeating because it runs against a natural instinct in financial services, where more disclosure often feels safer. There’s a real difference between required disclosures, which absolutely need to be there, and optional elaboration that exists purely because someone thought it might be useful to somebody, someday.

Strike a balance

There’s no universal number, and anyone selling you one is selling you something else too. But there are a few practical ways to find your own answer.

• Match your content’s depth to page traffic. Your homepage gets the overwhelming majority of your visits, so it deserves a careful, deliberate design. That doesn’t mean more content; it means the right content, front and center. Your services pages, collectively, might account for a small slice of total traffic, so don’t sink a disproportionate amount of effort or word count there. Put your energy where your members actually are. Resist the temptation to give every page equal treatment just because it feels fair, or someone thinks it’s more important to visitors than it is. Let data drive your decisions.
• Answer the question, then stop. Every page should exist to answer a specific question a member has. Once you’ve answered it clearly, resist the urge to keep going “just in case.” If there’s more nuance a member might need, that’s what a linked FAQ or a phone number is for, not a fourth paragraph on the same page. Think of each page as having one job. If it’s doing three jobs, split it up or trim it down.
• Read it out loud, or better, have someone else read it. If you find yourself skimming your own content while reviewing it, your members are skimming it more. Anything that gets skipped in that read-through is a candidate for cutting. This is a pretty useful exercise and takes around a few minutes per page, which is a small price for catching the text nobody will ever finish reading.
• Let analytics be the tie-breaker. If a page has high bounce rates or low time-on-page, that’s data telling you something is off. Either the content isn’t answering what people came for, it’s taking too long to get there, or the page can be combined into another page. If members are scrolling deep and staying engaged, you’ve probably got the balance right for that page. Don’t guess when you can check. Again, let the data drive your decisions.

One vs many revisited

I’ve written before about the single-page-versus-multiple-pages debate for grouping related products or services, and it’s worth bringing up here because it’s really the same content-balance question wearing a different hat. Cramming five loan types onto one page with subheaders can feel efficient, but if each one has real detail worth reading, you’ve just built the kitchen sink problem with extra scrolling. Splitting one modest product into its own dedicated page, on the other hand, is the millennial minimalist problem with better navigation.

The right call for your credit union depends on how much there actually is to say. If a product actually needs three paragraphs, give it a page. If it needs one sentence, it can share space with its cousins. Let the content’s actual weight decide the structure, not a rule you read somewhere (including this one).

I’d also add that this isn’t a decision you make once and forget. As products change, as rates fluctuate, as new features get added, a page that used to be lean can quietly grow into the kitchen sink problem over a year or two without anyone noticing. Set a timeline for some periodic checks, not just a one-time audit.

Content should earn its place

A good filter for any piece of content on your site is simple: does this help a member do something, or is it here because someone was worried about what happens if we don’t include it? Compliance and required disclosures clearly earn their place regardless. Plenty of extra copy, though, that exists purely out of institutional fear rather than a member’s need, is the stuff worth trimming first.

Content that earns its place tells a member what a product costs, what they qualify for, how to get started, or where to go for help. On the other hand, content that doesn’t earn its place is often there because it always has been, and no one has gotten around to asking whether it should be there.

I recommend that you go through your analytics, find your top ten pages, and ask, for every paragraph and sentence, what specific action or goal it enables. If the honest answer is “nothing, really,” that paragraph or sentence has been coasting on “It’s always been there,” and that is not a winning strategy.

This applies to more than just the words on a page, too. Extra buttons, badges, and sidebar widgets all take up the same attention-grabbing space as extra words. A page can have a reasonable word count and still feel overwhelming if it’s crowded with elements competing for attention. Content balance is as much about visual weight as it is about the actual text.

Trim it, don’t torch it

None of this is an argument for minimalism as an aesthetic (though I am certainly biased towards a minimal approach). A credit union website that says almost nothing isn’t efficient; it’s just unhelpful, and it pushes the actual work of informing your members onto a phone call, contact form, or a branch visit instead.

The goal isn’t to shift the burden of where information is obtained. The goal isn’t fewer words for the sake of fewer words. The goal is the right words, positioned where a member will actually see and make use of them.

Go look at your own site with fresh eyes, or better yet, hand it to someone who’s never used it and watch where they get stuck or where they clearly stop reading. That’s usually where you’ll find your answer. Not in a word count, but in the moment a member either finds what they need or gives up looking for it. Use the data available to you via analytics frequently. Do this regularly, not just during a redesign, and you’ll catch the drift toward either extreme before it becomes a real problem for your members.