Ask Yourself These 3 Simple Questions to Craft Better Headlines

Last week, when I wrote about how to become a writer, I forgot to mention something about why you’d want to be a writer.

Writers are communicators. If you’re proud of your ideas, you want to be able to communicate them clearly and precisely.

Headlines are your first opportunity to present your message to the audience you want to reach. The language you use should appeal to those people and make them want to find out more.

To review the next headline you write from the perspective of an editor who is focused on audience engagement, here are three simple questions you can ask yourself.

A guide to finding the right words

Once you’ve written a draft of your headline and article (or you’ve recorded a podcast episode or video), use the questions below to ensure your headline is the most effective it can be:

1. Who will benefit from this content?
2. How do I help them?
3. What makes this content special?

The answers to these questions most likely won’t produce the exact headline you’ll use. Rather, they’ll help mold your headline draft into a persuasive message that reaches and connects with the people you want to attract to your content.

To keep the process of infusing your headline with meaning and fascination simple, I recommend answering each question in one to two sentences.

If you need to write more, recognize your opportunity to fine-tune your goal for the content before revisiting these headline questions.

Let’s look at the important information each question will help you cultivate and how the answers will transform your headline.

1. Who will benefit from this content?

As Brian wrote yesterday:

“The point is to bond strongly with someone rather than boring everyone.”

When you define your audience, you can review your headline to make sure you use language that intrigues those individuals.

For example, your target audience may be marine biologists who have a tendency to procrastinate.

If your headline only says, “10 Tips to Beat Procrastination,” you can look for ways to add words that will attract marine biologists. And you don’t have to explicitly announce, “Hey marine biologists who have a tendency to procrastinate, this content is for you!”

You could try:

10 Tips to Beat Procrastination Faster than a Black Marlin

(A black marlin is one of the fastest fish.)

2. How do I help them?

People don’t necessarily wake up in the morning excited to read content.

The promises that certain pieces of content make to expand people’s understanding or knowledge of a topic persuade them to read content throughout the day. The content may even change their lives.

Your tips might help marine biologists accomplish tasks faster, and if they can accomplish tasks faster, they’re less likely to put them off.

Here, you can add another benefit to the headline:

10 Time-saving Tips to Beat Procrastination Faster than a Black Marlin

3. What makes this content special?

You may now realize that while a lot of other articles focus on “beating procrastination,” your content is special because it shows how to simplify and organize your daily marine biology to-do list so that each task is manageable.

Now you’ll want to revise a few words from your original headline:

10 Time-saving Tips to Zip Through Your Work Day Faster than a Black Marlin

Custom-tailored headlines for your content

We started this exercise with the headline:

10 Tips to Beat Procrastination

The final result is:

10 Time-saving Tips to Zip Through Your Work Day Faster than a Black Marlin

If you’re a marine biologist with a tendency to procrastinate, which headline would you click on?

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Is the Novel Dead? Part One

In this special edition of the show, two writers joined me to opine the death of one of the most influential forms in the history of the written word. I posed the question that many great writers have pondered stretching across the last two centuries …

Is the novel dead? And maybe a more up-to-date version of that question is, did the internet kill books?

Of course these are famous — almost cliché — theoretical discussions that writers often chew on over stiff drinks, and they raise hackles for those of us who adore them.

What you won’t find here is a highbrow literary dissertation, or even a very strict definition as to what the novel is or isn’t. But you will find a lively discussion between friends who care about the writing life and its future.

Robert Bruce is a writer, voice actor, and copywriter, as well as the Vice President of Rainmaker Digital and the guy who runs the Rainmaker FM podcast network.

Adam Skolnick is an award-winning journalist, author, and a returning guest on the show. His first book, One Breath, was published by Crown last January, and his work has appeared in publications including Playboy, The New York Times, and many others.

If you’re a fan of The Writer Files, please click subscribe to automatically see new interviews as soon as they’re published.

In Part One of the file Robert, Adam, and I discuss:

• How longer works of writing have been forced to compete with disposable culture
• Why Herman Melville died penniless
• How the novel has stood the test of time
• The role of podcasting for modern writers
• Author Hugh Howey’s “Rock, Paper, Scissors” model of book retail

Listen to this Episode Now

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7 Powerful Content Strategies Borrowed from Advertising Masters

The Copyblogger blog was founded on a simple but powerful idea — that our content (blogs, podcasts, videos) can be strengthened by adapting techniques from the world of direct response copywriting.

Today, Sonia drills into some specific techniques and approaches that we can profitably swipe from our direct response brothers and sisters.

In this 24-minute episode, Sonia Simone talks about:

• The crucial difference between subscribers and an audience
• How to develop a “big idea” that tells the world who you are
• The boring-sounding secret of the really great copywriters (this is especially powerful today)
• The fascinating world of recommendation algorithms
• Working toward business goals without sounding like an infomercial
• 9 quick ideas to make your content more interesting

Listen to this Episode Now

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The Non-Gimme-Gimme Guide to Writing Lead Generation Pages

2 Essential Elements of Irresistible Content

I once asked on social media:

What’s your biggest challenge when creating compelling content?

I didn’t treat it as a poll with various challenges. I wanted pure, unfiltered responses.

And the number one answer was:

Keeping it original and interesting.

So, let’s talk about that today.

Meaning + fascination

The two elements that lead to reader engagement, social media sharing, and the “gotta have it now” impulse are meaning and fascination. But you knew that from the subhead.

Let’s unpack each a bit.

Meaning: This is the informational aspect of your content that your regular readers, listeners, or viewers expect from you. This is also a topic that matters to the prospective audience you’re trying to reach through social media sharing.

Another way to think of this important aspect of your content is relevance. Content must be highly relevant to your existing and prospective audience, but I prefer meaning, as it implies an extra level of value that makes people treasure you.

Fascination: The fascinating element of your content is where your creativity shines. It’s the fun, shocking, or entertaining aspect of your content that makes people pay attention and share with their friends and colleagues.

Often you’re using an analogy, metaphor, or simile to make an associated connection between something cool and an important topic that might otherwise be pretty boring.

Not only does this attract and hold attention, it also aids in comprehension and retention for your audience, which in turn increases your subject-matter authority with them (because they actually learn something).

Here are two examples from Copyblogger (meaning in italics, fascination in bold):

How I Became a Better Writer Thanks to Distracted, Hungover College Kids

This article took a highly improbable source of fascination to deliver the meaning readers of Copyblogger seek — how to write better.

5 Things a Bad Dog Can Teach You About Writing Good Copy

It’s pretty easy to spot the meaningful and fascinating elements in that one, right?

(Don’t fear) fascination

Many people, especially in professional services or conservative industries, are afraid to go out on a limb and throw in that fascinating aspect. I’d argue that these are the types who have the most to gain from breaking out of stodgy convention and shaking that moneymaker a bit.

You can get a lot of mileage out of industry inside jokes and references that are completely obscure to outsiders. Remember, you don’t care what anyone else thinks other than your target audience.

And from post to post, you may only bond strongly with a small segment of the people you talk to. One article speaks strongly to some, the next to others.

The point is to bond strongly with someone rather than boring everyone.

Bonus points if you got that the subhead for this section is a terribly clever Blue Öyster Cult and Human League reference: (Don’t Fear) the Reaper + (Keep Feeling) Fascination.

Also, if you have to explain your terribly clever reference, it’s too obscure. Clarity matters more, no matter how cool the author thinks it is.

Ultra-meaning can be fascinating

It’s true that you can intrigue people with an overwhelming amount of relevant meaning, to the point that it becomes fascinating in and of itself. This is the realm of list and how-to articles that go viral on sheer value alone.

The key to this type of engaging content is specificity. The more specific the value you promise and provide, the more fascinating people deem it.

Check out these examples:

• 109 Ways to Make Your Business Irresistible to the Media
• 5 Remarkable Qualities of Effective Online Content
• The 4 Words That Will Get Your Email Opened

Hopefully you feel the same way about this article.

Yep, this is also how you write great headlines

In each example I’ve given, you can spot the intersection of meaning and fascination from the headline alone.

That’s why meaning + fascination = the secret to engaging content and great headlines.

Remember, the title of your article is simply a compelling promise of what your content offers. When I say write your headline first, I mean come up with an intersection of meaning and fascination, reduce it to a working title, then deliver on the promise by crafting the content.

If you find you can’t deliver on the promise, you’ve got to scrap that idea and find another.

Don’t strain to make a bad analogy work; simply look for another pairing of meaning and fascination — they’re everywhere once you understand what you’re looking for.

Editor’s note: The original version of this post was published on April 7, 2011.

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The Upside of Setting Outrageous Goals

This week’s guest on The Digital Entrepreneur is determined. His goal is to help five billion people with their efforts to grow their businesses. How?

He’s doing so by sharing as much content as he possibly can and by providing valuable services to purpose-driven companies.

He strives to be wealthy, not just in material things, but also with connections to make the world a better place …

In this 46-minute episode, Brandon Lewin and I discuss:

• The biggest benefit he derives from being a digital entrepreneur
• Why he finds it imperative to “give away” all the information he possibly can
• His story on how he got the taste for entrepreneurship at a young age
• What led him to the realization that he never wanted to work for anybody else
• The milestone that he’s most proud of as a digital entrepreneur
• How he consciously chooses the right people to work with to create his “A-Team”
• How marketing automation has benefited his business

And much more.

Plus, Brandon answers my patented rapid-fire questions at the end of the episode, which unveiled a couple common interests that we share. Don’t miss it.

Listen to this Episode Now

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How to Ruthlessly Cut Worthless Words from Your Sales Copy

When you’re writing sales copy for your business, showing a little personality is a good thing.

It’s also a good idea to use natural language whenever possible, so people know you’re a real person who is genuinely interested in helping your prospects and customers.

I write conversationally when I write copy, and so do a lot of other folks I trust and admire.

However, there are limits to how far you should take that advice.

Are you taking a risk when you use slang?

Unless you have proof that your audience uses slang — and wants to see it in sales copy — you should avoid using it in your persuasive emails, sales pages, and other types of “selling” collateral.

And when I say “slang,” I’m also including alternative spellings, slang abbreviations, and hyperbole.

I know there’s a high probability I sound like an old grandmother shouting at kids to stay off her lawn — but lately I’m seeing this trend more and more frequently in sales copywriting. And I suspect it’s radically decreasing conversions.

Types of slang to avoid in copy

Want to see some examples? These are all words and phrases I’ve recently noticed on sales pages and in emails that were designed to sell me something:

• BOOM!
• Pleez (or worse yet, pleeeeeeeeez)
• OMG
• FREAKING ROCKED
• LOL

Chances are, you’ve got your own list of words that annoy you when you see them in professional writing. My list could go on for a while, but I’ve chosen some of my biggest pet peeves. I wince every time I see those words in an email from a business.

Why you want to avoid them

There’s a compelling reason to avoid slang and abbreviations like the ones on the list above: they often don’t add value to your copy — and can actually distract your prospects.

When your prospective buyers read your sales page and decide whether or not your product is a good fit for them, you don’t want to distract them for a single moment. You want every line of your copy to flow seamlessly into the next, without interruption.

If you sprinkle your sales page with slang and nonsense words, there’s a good chance you’re going to interrupt that flow.

Keep prospects focused on the action you want them to take

You might innocently include “OMG” in your copy in attempt to sound conversational, but prospects could be distracted by that choice and think, “Wait, why does he say ‘OMG’ in the middle of this paragraph?”

If you’re trying to reach people who aren’t native English speakers (or who come from older generations), they might also ask, “What does ‘OMG’ mean?”

At best, the “OMG” is only a temporary distraction that slows down prospects’ decision-making processes as they read. At worst, the slang and misspelled words will turn off readers so much that they abandon your sales page forever — and you’ve just lost them as customers.

Slang words and abbreviations that belong in text messages also don’t add any value to your copy. As sales copywriters, we must choose every word carefully. Every word and phrase on the page needs to pull its weight — slang and overused exclamations like “OMG” just don’t cut it.

Think I’m wrong?

Perhaps in certain circumstances you’re correct — there are exceptions to this rule, of course.

If you performed extensive research and know for certain your prospects use this type of language — and want to see it in sales copy that promotes your product or service — you might be able to get away with using it.

You should test out these words and phrases to see if including them increases your conversion rate.

If they don’t, I recommend cutting them. Even if your prospect tolerates these words and phrases, they’re probably not contributing anything to your copy.

Get more copywriting tips

If you’re looking for more tips on how to make your copy tighter, more readable, and more persuasive, check out Copyblogger’s free ebook Copywriting 101: How to Craft Compelling Copy.

The 90-page ebook is packed full of helpful advice, including more thoughts on audience research and using your prospect’s preferred language.

Do certain words irritate you when you see them in professional copywriting? Or are there any you’re guilty of using (or overusing) yourself? Tell us about it in the comments below.

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