Typography Is How Citizens Find the One Thing They Came For

Most people land on a public service page stressed, on a phone, mid-task — renewing a license, checking a benefit, filing something before a deadline. As a PM, your conversion metric is really comprehension: did they find and complete the one action they came for? Typography and visual hierarchy are the levers that decide that, far more than copy length. I design around a single, unmistakable primary path. The core task sits at the top of the hierarchy with generous size and weight; everything else — eligibility caveats, edge cases, legal detail — recedes into a calmer, optional layer. That's Layered Complexity expressed in type: a simple surface, with depth available to those who need it. This also serves accessibility directly. Real heading structures, not just big bold text, let screen-reader users navigate by hierarchy, and dynamic type scaling means low-vision users aren't punished with broken layouts. The practical PM win is call-center load. When the next step is visually obvious, fewer citizens give up and phone in. Clear hierarchy is cheaper than a support queue — and it's the most measurable thing typography buys you.