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HOW TO WRITE HEADLINES THAT GRAB READERS BY THE EYEBALLS AND SUCK THEM INTO YOUR MESSAGE

If you want to write copy that sells, this chapter focuses on one of the cornerstone skills you simply must master: headlines.

Think of the headline as the “ad for the rest of the ad.” To do its job, the headline must accomplish three tasks:

In this chapter I share a simple five-part framework that will make your headlines (and thus your blog post titles, social media posts, subheads, and email subject lines) more effective.

In my work as a marketing consultant and copywriter, I see this problem all the time: great content obscured by boring titles and headlines.

A brief story: Morgan is a client who runs an executive consulting business, and she recently started a blog as a way of marketing her services. She called me to ask what she was doing wrong.

“I post lots of content, and it’s helpful stuff. But nobody seems to read it. I get zero comments.”

I brought up her blog on my laptop, and the first post I saw was entitled The Dynamics of Organizational Change Management During Transitional Periods. I read the post. She was right, it was good content. But for some reason she had crowned it with a repulsive title.

Virtually all her posts shared this flaw.

“I think I see your problem,” I said. “Nobody’s interested in reading an article with that title. Your title makes the post sound like a doctoral dissertation. You need a more appealing headline.”

“Okay,” she said, “what would you suggest?”

I thought about the movie I had watched over the weekend.

“How about something like The Avengers Guide to Building Superhero Teams During Troubled Times?”

It took some convincing for Morgan to believe this wasn’t a bit over-the-top, but finally she took my suggestion. Is it a coincidence that later that day this particular blog post actually began to get comments from readers? I think not.

5 ESSENTIAL QUALITIES OF A COMPELLING HEADLINE

The headlines and subheads in your sales copy (and the post titles you choose for your blog and email subject lines) serve the same purpose as headlines in a newspaper or magazine. They either draw the reader in, or they push the reader away.

Here are five essential qualities of a compelling headline:

Incorporating these five principles into your headlines should bring you more traffic, and more sales. Using them on your blog will bring you more readers, and more engagement with your tribe.

5 HEADLINE TEMPLATES TO MAKE MORE SALES TODAY

How important are headlines? So important that some of the highest-paying work in the copywriting business is creating headlines for magazine covers and tabloids. Think about it. Aren’t you sometimes at least tempted to pick up those magazines in the grocery store line? That’s the power of a great headline at work.

That same power will attract readers to your ads and sale pages, putting more money in your bank account.

Effective headlines tend to follow a pattern. Here are five headline templates you can use that should have more people reading your blog posts, clicking your social media links, and buying your products.

1. The “How-To” Headline.

The key to making this particular headline work is that you need to tie it to a benefit your reader cares about (related to your content, of course). Examples:

How to Write a Blog Post Every Day

How to Land More Clients As a Freelancer

2. The “Transactional” Headline.

This headline is all about the promise. When you truly have “Wow!” level content, this headline will grab attention. Examples:

Give Me 30 Minutes And I’ll Give You More Blog Traffic

Try These 5 Tactics for a Week, And Be Twice As Productive

3. The “Reason-Why” Headline.

Robert Cialdini cites the power of the word “because” in his book Influence: The Psychology of Persuasion. His research showed that simply adding the word “because” to a request makes it more likely you’ll get what you’re asking for.

Advertising copywriters have known this secret for a long time. Decades earlier, John E. Kennedy wrote a modest little book called Reason Why Advertising, which has become a classic in the field.

Use the power of the “reason why” in your headlines. Examples:

Why Your Blog Posts Get Ignored, And How to Fix That

7 Reasons You Should Be Using Social Media In Your Marketing

4. The “Probing Question” Headline.

With this kind of headline, you ask a question that creates an intense desire to know the answer. Be careful with these headlines. If you ask a question like “Do You Want to Know My Blogging Secret?” You might get a discouraging answer, such as, “No.”

The kind of question you want to ask is one that really evokes strong curiosity, or taps into a problem you know your reader has. Examples:

Why Don’t Doctors Get Sick?

Do You Wish More People Bought Your Book?

5. The “If-Then” Headline.

With this headline, you contrast something that’s easy for your reader to do with the major benefit of your post. Examples:

If You Can Send and Receive E-mail, You Can Build a Platform

If You Can Follow a Recipe, You Can Write Better Headlines

One final piece of advice: I have found the ultimate secret to writing really good headlines ... is to write a lot of really bad ones. The point is not to stop with just one or two attempts; write lots of possible headlines for your sales copy, subject lines for your emails, and titles for your blog posts before you finally settle on one.

Using these five headline templates, you’ll create more effective copy faster than ever before.