- Image by Horia Varlan via Flickr
The right headline will pull people into your post (or your ad).
Why bother?
If the headline (or the subject line) is dull, nobody will open your email, read your post, or look at your ad. Fewer readers leads to fewer sales (not what we want).
It can be hard to be brilliant every day though. For those times, try one of these never-fail formulas.
1. Contradictions
Eat More and Still Lose Weight
Heat Your Home (Without a Furnace)
Something that doesn’t seem to make sense will attract more attention. We think that if we eat more, we’ll gain weight, not lose it. Since most people want to eat more, they’ll read on to find out more.
2. Exclusive offers
Dinner with Michael Jordan (Diamond Card Exclusive)
Something that people can’t get elsewhere. Of course, a “diamond card” (which I just made up), also promises exclusivity. Not everyone can have one. Especially, if there are real diamonds in it.
Pick an offer that that your audience actually wants though. Don’t promise a free colonoscopy.
3. A big guarantee
Create Websites 5 Times Faster – or Your Money Back
This promises a big benefit (get more done in less time) and also reduces the perceived risk in buying the product. If you don’t like it or get the results you want, you get a refund.
4. Make something hard look easy
The Lazy Employer’s Guide to Hiring
Take something that’s difficult and promise to show readers how to do it, without a lot of hard work.
5. Offer lots of value
$300 in Free Gifts with Your Order
Not only do you get the actual item, you get an extra $300 worth of gifts. This is the thinking behind those informercials that make a double offer (not one, but two sets of ginzu knives). Pile on the value, so people would be crazy not to take you up on it.
6. Help the reader get something they want
Get a Dazzling Smile
Get the Best Price for Your Used Car
Show readers how they can be more attractive or earn more money, or save time.
7. Promise inside information
Little Known Ways to Lower Your Taxes
This offers both secret tips and a clear benefit. Nobody wants to pay more.
8. Curiosity
20 Tricks You Didn’t Know Your Dog Could Do
You can’t find out what the tricks are unless you keep reading.
9. Ask a question
Do You Make These Common Marketing Mistakes?
What’s Wrong With This Picture?
Make sure it’s a question that they can’t answer right away. Or, a question that poses a challenge. People may think they know what the common mistakes are, or they may have no idea. The only way to find out what the mistakes are, or the error in the picture, is to keep reading (sense a pattern here?).
10. Answer questions
7 Questions to Ask Before You Hire a Copywriter
If someone is hiring a copywriter, and isn’t sure how the process works, this headline promises to help sort that all out, and avoid making the wrong choice.
Oh, and a surprise gift coming tomorrow. Tune in then to find out what it is.
Email me privately for personal help.
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It’s like the title of a book. If it looks crappy, no one will pick up the book and even waste time trying to read the book.
Great post!
Very true. I was in a bookstore yesterday and saw a book that seemed to be intended to help break bad news to small children (a good idea), but the title actually repelled me. It was called “Grandma is Dead.”