Crafting Killer Headlines: Strategies to Grab Your Audience's Attention

If you are struggling with open rates, kick rates, social media engagement, or all of the above, you may need to rethink the way you approach headlines. Did he just say headlines?

You might be surprised to hear that only 20% of readers get beyond the headline of an article or social post before quickly heading off into never-neverland. That means your headline has the single biggest impact on whether or not someone reads the rest of your copy – much less converts.

The fact of the matter is that not everyone is great at writing catchy headlines, but it is a skill that can be learned with a little practice.

3 Tips For Crafting Great Headlines

For those that made it this far into the article, clearly our headline worked. A jest for sure, but it proves a point that simply cannot be overlooked. The more engaging your headline is the more likely readers will give you that coveted click.

As you are crafting your headline keep these three things in mind.

Size Matters

I will let you in on a little secret – people have incredibly short attention spans. While that might not be a massive revelation, the first thing that you should think about when writing a headline is how to make it shorter.

Keeping your headlines as lean and mean as possible is the first step in grabbing your reader’s attention. We tend to gloss over longer text, especially when viewing something on a smaller device, like a smartphone. One of the easiest ways to do this is to remove specific types of words from the equation.

These words should be used sparingly, if at all:

• Articles → the, a, an 
• Conjunctions → for, and, nor, but, or, yet, so

These words bring little value and take up valuable real estate. Think of them as fillers and nothing more. If you can get away without using them, you are better off.

Add Keywords

If articles and conjunctions are filler words, where is the meat and potatoes? Keywords should comprise a good chunk of the headline. As you strategize your content, think about which words the audience will be searching for and how that can be tied into your article.

If you are writing a blog about DIY plumbing, you should probably include that in the headline. If you have access to tools like SemRush, where you can quickly search key terms and see what people are actually searching for it will make it easier.

For those just getting started, or with a smaller budget, go to Google and start searching for you specific topic. People tend to search in the same way, it is why “near me” is so popular when you plug something into a search engine.

Create Interest and Action

Now that we have fillers out the way, and the main course all ironed out, we need to throw in a little dessert in the form of interest and action. From a technical standpoint, this is where verbs, adverbs, and adjectives shine.

While you want to stay away from something like Alexander and the Terrible, Horrible, No Good, Very Bad Day, these words draw the reader in and leave them wanting more. Thematic action words are a great way to go, for example we used the word “Crafting” in this article’s title because it is associated with writing, building, and a refined product.

Headlines Are Only The Beginning

As you work through the process of perfecting your headlines, you will inevitably see that these pieces can also be applied to general copywriting. Like the Wonder Twins, when these powers combine, you can create something amazing that readers will enjoy.

In the event you struggle with the recipe that we have outlined above, the Hire-a-Writer team is here to help. We share weekly content on copywriting, and we have a full team of writers that can jump into the fray should you need an expert on staff. Take a look at our other content, and connect with our team for more information.