OK, so last time around we were talking about what NOT to do with your headlines when you’re trying to drive readers to your site. Today, we’re going to give you some tools that WILL get those coveted customers over to your pages, loving the fabulous content you’re serving up!
You only have a precious few seconds to convince a reader that you’re clickable,
so don’t waste their time or yours with crappy headlines.
Here are some nuggets of headline wisdom that I have used to help my clients get eyeballs on their content:
Great Advice #1: Save the Best for Last
Even if you’re working from a content outline, sometimes brilliance overtakes you in the middle of writing content, and your copy ends up going in a somewhat different (and often much better) direction than you originally intended. Don’t fight the feelin’; use that spontaneity and passion while it’s flowing out of your fingers. Once you have your copy where you need it to be, THEN you can review it and build yourself a sweet little headline that distills that feeling down to the very tastiest level, and pop it up top!
Great Advice #2: Be Provocative
Here we go: Sex sells. And so does anything kind of edgy and provocative. I’m not saying that you have to incorporate an f-bomb into every headline, but the masterful use of allusion, double-entendre, and the like can go a long way toward getting a set of Web-weary eyes to sit up and take notice.
Great Advice #3: Know What Makes Your Reader Give a Damn
What does your customer REALLY care about? Saving money? Getting stuff done faster? Reducing their carbon footprint? Then DON’T WRITE ABOUT PUPPIES. Knowing what is killing your customer right now can help you serve up exactly what they need to read―and get them to it via a superb, well-oiled headline. OK, that sounds a bit dirty, but you know what I’m getting at.
And who the hell am I to tell you about headlines? Well, I’ll be honest: A while back, my Web traffic just wasn’t that great, and it was really bugging me (not to mention affecting my bottom line!). So I started doing some research into people and organizations that I knew were getting gobs and gobs of traffic, and I looked especially at the headlines they were using to drive readers to their pages. And get this:
When I started implementing what I learned on my own site,
my page hits increased 1,200%.
No, that’s not a typo. 1,200%. So I’ve been there, and yeah, I found a way to fix the problem. ‘Nuff said.
Got any headline horror stories (or big wins) to share? Seen any real headline hiccups in your travels around the Web? Let’s hear about ‘em in the comments!
