Headline Writing Tips: How To Write Headlines Effectively
By karenwinton at 5 August, 2010, 12:00 am
Keyword optimizing your copy, following SEO rules, and so on, are, not the only things you should accomplish when you’re a website copy writer. To attract people to your site and entice them to really check out your products, content, etc, you need to learn how to write headlines that are powerful. It is not really very hard to make a headline that will make your visitors stay for as long as you make use of the following headline writing tips:
Tip Number One: Place your main keyword in your headline.
Most visitors are normally sceptical about staying on your web site for browsing and ‘researching’ purposes. This is because there are a lot of nonsense sites over the Internet that you need to reassure people that they’ve come to the right place. A good website copy writer will definitely include the main keyword in the headline, not only for people to find his or her site easily, but also to convince visitors that the content and the products found in the website are valuable, and not pieces of junk. For instance, if your site sells healthy dog food, and your key phrase is ‘healthy dog food’, make a headline like this: ‘Affordable and Healthy Dog Food for Your Best Friends’.
Tip Number Two: Don’t create headlines that sound more like advertisements.
Part of essential headline writing tips is to write head lines that are subtle in terms of advertising. This is because so many people are tired of ads, and, once they feel that your head line is just an ad for a product or a service, you can expect those people to immediately leave your site. A technique on how to write headlines is to write one which makes you sound helpful and friendly instead of sounding like a sales person. For example, instead of using this head-line: ‘The Best Acne Reducer Ever’, why not stick to this: ‘Effective Techniques Of Reducing Those Irritating Acne’?
Tip Number Three: Focus on the benefits of a product instead of its features.
An excellent website copy writer also knows the importance of giving people ideas on the benefits of his or her product, rather than enumerating features. For example:
‘Start saying goodbye to Eczema
Get rid of that itchy and ugly skin problem quickly without any side effects.’
is much better than this head-line:
‘Use Eczema-Free Lotion: A Safe and Natural Topical Medication For Your Eczema’
Remember that people love to know how a product can solve their problems, thus, mentioning benefits is recommended instead of mentioning features when you make a headline.
Tip Number Four: Use subheads.
Another advice on how to write headlines is for a website copywriter to make use of subheadings, as shown in the first eczema headline above. By using subheadings, you’ll be able to give more information about your service/product without making your headline seem too long, too boring, and so on.
Without knowing and applying headline writing tips, you won’t be able to make a headline that’s catchy and attention grabbing.
Karen Winton gives good copywriting advice. For the best collection of sales-generating headlines, check out: http://www.dp-db.com/giant-headline-swipe-file. To write effective sales letters, see: http://www.dp-db.com/the-copywriting-crash-course.
No comments yet.