OK, we all know that content is king on the Web, and that content consists primarily of copy …copy that is interesting, relevant, and that follows best practices for Web writing, such as keyword usage, short sentences and paragraphs, bullets where possible, etc.
But there’s one element that’s too often overlooked in the primers on Web copy writing: the headline. And as Jennifer Horowitz sees it – posting on Search Engine Journal – that means overlooking the most critical element on your Web page. (Oh and by the way… this applies equally to email subject lines, headlines on ad copy, headlines on articles and blogposts – essentially, all of your marketing!)
Why is this the case? Because when your harried, hurried reader scans your page, (s)he will use primarily the headline to decide – usually in mere seconds – whether to stay and read any more of the page. Think of a bricks-&-mortar store: before deciding to actually enter your store and browse, passers-by will typically make a judgment based on your sign and window display. And that’s the heavy burden of your headline: if it doesn’t entice your visitor to stay around and read, you’ll mostly have a mere touch-&-go …not a real visit that’s likely to go anywhere, business-wise.
Mostly courtesy of the advertising and direct-mail worlds, an awful lot of time, energy and research/testing have gone into writing the perfect headline over the years. Based on all of that, Jennifer provides several guidelines and numerous examples to help you improve your headlines…
Match your headline to your product/service and your medium/audience.
What works for a blogpost or sell sheet might not be so good on the corporate website. But unless you’ve done some serious testing, you don’t really know what will work. Most people are afraid to get bolder in their marketing, for fear of offending their readers; but truth be told, bolder often works!
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The above samples are strong, effective, and arouse curiosity with minimal hype; but they’re not especially power-packed.
Try adding some more punch
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Note in these samples that we’ve introduced the fear of loss or missing out; because it turns out that people are more strongly motivated by missing out on something than they are by the thought of simply gaining that same thing.
Use action words …especially verbs
Verbs encourage readership and help push toward response. Try words like discover, find, get, learn, join, see, read…
Remember AIDA
This little acronym/mnemonic breaks out as… capture your reader’s attention, tap their interest, increase their desire and lead them to take some kind of action. What does it mean to increase their desire? …it really means to elicit an emotional response from them. People buy based on emotion.
Draft & revise to improve step by step …from basic to dazzling
Jennifer presents a captivating sequence of headlines resulting from successive revision; can you see the above principles being put to use here?
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There’s much more in Jennifer’s piece than we could fit in here, so do click on over. Oh… and if you think this advice is only for B2C types, you’d do well to reconsider: B2B buyers are people, too …acting on basically the same buyer psychology as consumers.
