What is lorem ipsum, and when did publishers begin using it?
Past lorem ipsum served the same purpose for written content as stock photos do now. The original lorem ipsum used a section of a book called “De Finibus Bonorum et Dolorem,” written by the Ancient Roman author Cicero. Old-style printing presses required tedious hand-setting of each letter and punctuation mark. So instead, workers would create type specimen books using preset words and paragraphs from Cicero’s treatise to save time.
Why use a lorem ipsum generator?
If everyone used the identical lorem ipsum copy, search engines would flag it for plagiarism and downgrade the site for its lack of helpful content for the reader. However, when you send sample layouts filled with fun lorem ipsum to your customers, they will focus on the look and feel of the page instead of digging into and arguing about the content. Nevertheless, lorem ipsum generators do not spew a random bank of words and paragraphs.
“We kijken ernaar uit om verder te groeien binnen de muren van Floor”
A/B testing copy
Dummy text sections filled with fun lorem ipsum make it easier to swap out one web page, letter, or email version with another. For example, in a Mailchimp bulk email campaign, send these multiple versions during A/B testing to discover which call to action garners the desired response.
In addition, placeholder text stands out when eyeballed, ensuring that you overwrite the correct paragraphs before updating and reissuing past appeals. Your lorem ipsum generator can also provide multiple versions of a section of text on a single page surrounding the real test message.
Wireframes, mockups, and prototypes
When your page includes dedicated advertising and editorial slots that do not vary from issue to issue, using dummy copy allows you to preserve the total possible letter or word count. Blocking out that space in your Mailchimp wireframe or mockup ahead of time will enable you to create banners, buttons, and headers to help announce and maintain your brand and highlight the page or email’s flavor or “voice.”
Seasonal and recurring themes
Dummy text generators may contain seasonal words instead of scrambled Latin for your web page designs. Picture the Christmas favorite, “All I Want for Christmas Is You,” translated into Latin and scrambled before you pepper it into the spaces on your favorite web page design theme. Then, print those Latin lyrics onto card stock to create business cards, gift tags, and paper ornaments. Think of it as sampling, the way rap artists use the hooks that repeat throughout their work.
Imagine that you translate Lizzo’s “Good as Hell” into Latin. Then, print the lyrics, chop them into single words, toss them in the air, and use them in the order they landed on the floor to create placeholder text for your single people’s Valentine’s Day blog. You just completed your first randomized lorem ipsum copy. Any Lizzo fans who also know ancient languages will appreciate the nod to their favorite artist. Of course, printing the lyrics to toss them in the air would be ridiculous. Precisely for this reason, randomized text generators exist.
Avoiding offensive lorem ipsum content
Tossing your favorite band or singer’s song lyrics into a translator to generate lorem ipsum may sometimes produce offensive content. Avoid this by removing vulgar or explicit words from the original, uncensored lyrics before running them through the translator to create your word bank. Use the “find and replace” feature in your favorite online word processing program to make this easier. Then, load your cleaned-up sample text into a generic random text generator and set the number of words or lines of necessary placeholder text for your layout.
