You Will Get More Readers If You Write Headlines This Way

19 Jun

My buddy Tim Burquin says that, after years of being a cop, when started marketing online he had to re-train himself to write. He spends a lot of time getting his headlines right.

If there is one thing over the past two years I’ve learned about email writing is that strong language wins every time. Weak words (I call them “loophole words” like “probably,” “might” and “usually” are death for email subject lines and should be avoided at all times.

Words such as “you will,” “always,” and “important” work well. Words like “shocking,” “disaster” and “disturbing” work too, but the trouble with those words is that they wear out your reader very quickly and when you use language like that all the time, it loses it’s punch.

If you click over to his blog, you’ll get the rest of the story — and you’ll find out which of these two headlines got him more viewers:

A) Your trading strategy on steroids
B) Steps to improve your trading by 25%

via From Police Reports to Email Subject Lines | Lessons, Tips and Tricks for Selling Online Content.

3 Responses to “You Will Get More Readers If You Write Headlines This Way”

  1. Riyad Kalla 19. Jun, 2010 at 6:54 pm #

    I wish this weren’t the case because it always makes me feel dirty to try and write “markety” headers, but you do see this a lot.

    It does seem to scale proportional to the A.D.D levels in the audience though; on Digg I see a lot of sensational titles getting into top 10, but on Hacker News I rarely see sensational stuff stay on the front page for long.

    I’m convinced that if you stick to your guns and write good content, someone will notice… at some point… before you die.

    … god I hope so :)

    • Tan Yew-Wei 19. Jun, 2010 at 9:13 pm #

      By definition, sensationalism is short-lived, but only because there is so much of it.

      Good content is important, but it needs to be found. And as readers, we’re too “lazy” to search around for the good stuff. Love it or hate it, we need strong headlines.

    • Tim Bourquin - MemberCon.com 20. Jun, 2010 at 3:51 pm #

      Hi Riyad,

      I wish it were the case that simply having high-quality content will naturally find it’s audience and attract it to read more.

      But the reality is that is needs some help from good old marketing.

      It’s not about sensationalism, though, as Tan mentions in her comment. It’s about making sure the content gets the attention it deserves by grabbing the attention of your readers quickly and efficiently.

      It’s a balance that every content creator must decide where the line is that they will not cross in order to get that attention.

      Tim