Marc's Blog

Content Writing and Marketing Services

how to write better headlines for blog posts

17 Ways To Write Attention-Grabbing Headlines

by 1 Comment

Attention Grabbing Headline

The most read blog posts are the ones with the best headlines. Your blog post could get more traffic just by making your blog post’s title something that grabs the reader’s attention. Most people who share blog posts on social networks use the headline to determine whether they should share a blog post on their social networks or not. These are the 17 ways to come up with attention-grabbing headlines.

  1. Use a different language in the title. You have to be Spanish to know what consejos means. In one of my popular blog posts, I used this word to grab the reader’s attention. This method drew in the reader’s curiosity, but do not get carried away with this option.
  2. Use action verbs in your title. Grab your reader’s attention right from the start by using action verbs in your headlines. You will probably not be able to do this for all of your blog posts, but when you can use action verbs, they help.
  3. Offer something special. Among my most popular blog posts are 100 Amazing Blogging Tips and 100 Amazing Pinterest Tips. Offering 100 tips stands out from the competition. Your headline needs to tell people what extra, above and beyond information you are giving them.
  4. Use better adjectives. Good is a boring, overused word. “5 Good Tips” is not the kind of headline that grabs attention. “5 Powerful Tips” is something that grabs your attention by emphasizing how valuable those tips are.
  5. Make your headline either really long or really short. A short headline will make the reader curious. In this scenario, readers will wonder why you decided to write a short headline. A long headline will give the reader information about your blog post before they read the first sentence.
  6. Have a strong topic sentence. The topic sentence is to further emphasize your headline and grab attention.
  7. Include the NSA in your headline. This one never fails. With Heartbleed and corruption on the loose, millions of people want to know what is going on with the NSA (the not so secure agency). You may win a Pulitzer Prize while you’re at it.
  8. Write a headline about a breaking news story. Everyone wants to know the news. That’s why there are trending topics on social networks.
  9. Write a headline with the name of a famous person and connect it to your blog post. A blog post called “How To Become As Dedicated As Mariano Rivera” would get more attention than a blog post called “How To Get More Dedication.” When you use this method, everything you say needs to be true (then again, that is always the case).
  10. Use words that have been hardwired to get people’s attention. MONEY, FOOD, and SEX. I’m sure those words popped right out of your screen.
  11. Look at the pros. The people who are making a living off of their blogs are the ones who typically master writing good headlines.
  12. Use bigger words. Effective is a bigger word than good.
  13. Occasionally use words people do not know the meanings of. Don’t go Shakespeare on us, but for 5-10% of your blog posts, you should use words that people do not know the definitions of. In order for this to work, you need to define the word within the first 5 sentences of your blog post.
  14. Be controversial. What are your thoughts about President Obama, The United Kingdom, and a Jesuit Pope? Although you may not talk about those three on your blog, you can be controversial in your niche. Is retweeting better than mentioning? Is stretching better than lifting weights? The possibilities are endless.
  15. Trial and error. As you write more blog posts, you will be able to see which headlines on your blog get the most traffic. Write headlines similar to the ones that get the most traffic.
  16. What headlines catch your attention? 2K To 10K is a book about writing more words every day. That headline caught my attention, and some of my headlines are modeled around that headline. Everyone does this. A classic example is 7 Habits Of Highly Effective People. Now there are blog posts about 7 habits of any highly effective person in any field.
  17. Have a 7 in the headline. It works in getting more conversions, so why not headlines?

Those are the 17 ways to write attention-grabbing headlines. By writing attention-grabbing headlines, more people will read and share your content. What are your thoughts on the list, and do you have any additional tips to add? Please share your thoughts and advice below.

 

Consejos For Writing Stronger Headlines

by 3 Comments

I’m sure the word consejos was the first one you saw. Consejos is a Spanish word which means tips. Strong headlines control whether or not visitors decide to read your content. I could have called this blog post, “Tips For Writing Stronger Headlines,” but that headline wouldn’t have been a strong one.

The first tip for writing stronger headlines is to write a headline that causes intrigue. You can’t wait for someone to read your entire blog post before they feel intrigued. Visitors need to be intrigued to read a blog post before they actually start to read it. I’m not telling you to mix every language you can think of into one title.

If you decide to use words from a language that you don’t normally use on your blog, tell your visitors what those words mean right away. When your visitors find out what those words mean, they should be inclined to read on.

The second tip for writing stronger headlines is to write a headline that tells the visitor to take action or use the word action. People are always looking for ways to take action, and if your blog post’s headline tells people to take action, they will read your blog post to learn how to take action.

The third tip for writing stronger headlines is to write headlines that answer your visitor’s questions. The only way you will be able to answer your visitor’s questions is by identifying why people visit your blog. Do people visit your blog for social media advice, sports tips, or something else? Find out why people visit your blog, and identify some of the questions they have that you might be able to answer.

The fourth tip for writing stronger headlines is to add the word mistakes to the headline. A good example would be, “Mistakes Made By Beginners.” Beginners will look at your blog post for your insight so they don’t make those mistakes.

The fifth tip for writing stronger headlines is to write headlines that make perfect sense and perfectly lead to the content. An example of this is my blog post 11 Ways To Get More Followers On Pinterest. This headline allows the visitor to know what the blog post is going to be about.

How did you like the tips? Did I leave out any? Share with us your insight.