About Jodi Kaplan

Headline Writing Secrets Your Readers Can’t Resist

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Photo compliments of: inju

I can’t read the text, but that newspaper must be pretty interesting if he wants to read it while swimming. If you’d like your readers to be as hooked as he is, you’ll need to write great headlines to start your sales copy.

Here are some secrets for writing attention-grabbling headlines for your posts, your ads, or your emails.

Make them curious

Curiosity is bad for cats, but good for people. Write something odd, or unexpected, and your readers will want to find out more about it.

One way to do this is to put two or three things together in a new way. Or, combine subjects that don’t seem to belong together at all.

The Yogi Berra Marketing Guide
The only way to find out what in the world Yogi Berra has to do with marketing is to read the post.

The Pajamas, The Lizard Brain, and the Employee Manual. Certainly a strange combination. The only way to find out what it’s about is to click the title.

Ask a question (without a clear answer)

Are You Reading These Blogs?
Do You Make This Common Marketing Mistake?
Why Are Clients Like Fish?

Asking a question that the reader can’t immediately answer arouses both interest and curiosity.

What are those common marketing mistakes anyway? If you don’t read the post, you’ll never know.

And what the heck do clients have in common with fish? There’s only one way to find out.

Make a big promise

The Number One Marketing Secret You Need to Know

What is this secret? And how will it help me earn more or grow my business? Tell people you’ve got secret, long-lost, or inside information about a topic of great interest. Appeal to their desire for knowledge that most people don’t have. This makes people curious, and they’ll click through to satisfy that curiosity.
Try This Timeless Copywriting Technique

This promises another secret. In this case, it’s a copywriting trick that you may not know, but that has been working for a long time. This lends credibility to the idea. If it’s timeless, it’s proven to work for others, and can work for you too.

Revealed: Why Clients Want to Make the Logo Big

Graphic designers and businesses have been fighting over logo size since the beginning of advertising. If you want your audience to read your article or post, use a headline that addresses something that really bothers them (and offer a solution).

The Truth About CAN-SPAM

Many marketers misunderstand the FTC CAN-SPAM rules. Getting it wrong can be an expensive mistake. This article has valuable information that will keep you from making those mistakes.

Appeal to self-interest

Earn More Money by Giving Free Gifts

This headline sets up what seems to be a big contradiction. How can giving something away for free lead to more money? The only way to find out is to click the link.
15 Tips for Writing Emails That Make Money

This one appeals to a strong, common desire. In this case, to earn more money from your marketing emails. Who wouldn’t want to earn more money, especially if it’s from something you’re already doing.

Get Record-Setting Results in a Recession

This headline appeals to the desire to beat the odds. We want to earn more, and we also want to know how we can do that when the economy is poor and it’s harder to get clients or sales.

Try these on your own posts. You’ll get headlines so good, your readers will want to take your work everywhere—even swimming.

Are You Reading These Blogs?

Posted on March 12, 2010 by Jodi Kaplan

A roundup of must-read blogs that will help your blogging, improve your sales strategies, and build a community online.

Blogussion

Alex is a teenager, but don’t let that stop you from reading his blog. He gets it. He understands how to build a community, monetize your blog, and become a better blogger. He also likes Macs (must be a good guy). Guest Posting Strategy

Bob Poole’s Water Cooler Hangout

Bob was a successful salesman for many years. Unlike other salesmen, Bob would listen first, and sell later (in fact that’s the title of his book) He’s now a business coach and speaker. Ten Secrets for Sales Failure.

Got any great blogs to recommend? Add them in the comments.

Photo: A tea but no e

(No cows were harmed in the writing of this post).

The Yogi Berra Marketing Guide

Posted on March 11, 2010 by Jodi Kaplan

Photo compliments of orlandk

Yogi Berra, Hall of Fame baseball catcher, was famous for saying things that didn’t seem to make much sense, at least at first.

It’s easy to laugh at some of his remarks because they sound nonsensical. How can it get late early? And whatever does “It ain’t over till it’s over” mean?

However, when you stop to think about them for a while, it turns out those silly sayings were really quite wise.

No, really they were.

“When you come to a fork in the road, take it”

Pick your path, don’t try to go down two roads at once. Find your niche, and your passion, and pursue it. Yogi was passionate about baseball, and had enough World Series championship rings for each finger on both hands. When you love what you do (and focus your energies on doing it), you will succeed.

“If you don’t know where you are going, you will wind up somewhere else.”

Make a marketing plan, and follow it. For example, write an ebook to build an audience, have them sign up for your newsletter, and then eventually purchase other products or services.

“It gets late early out there”

The Web has sped everything up. Wait too long to respond to a customer complaint or a service problem and the twitterers will let you know. If you don’t post on your blog for three weeks, or answer comments, readers will go elsewhere.

“That place is so popular, nobody goes there anymore”

When you lose your focus, you’ll lose your customers too. Starbucks built an image and a “tribe” by brewing coffee that was different from ordinary deli coffee, offering more ways to customize it, and a welcoming atmosphere. Then, they expanded too much, tried to overcome it with discounts, and now… well there are more interesting places to get coffee in New York (with beans that have been roasted in the last 10 days, or coffee ground to order).

What do you think? Was Yogi right? Am I?

Which Email Marketing Metrics Really Matter?

Posted on March 8, 2010 by Jodi Kaplan

Photo compliments of: lrargerich

The other day, Rob (at Robs web tips) asked which is more important: 3,000 blog subscribers with a 10% open rate? Or 300 active subscribers who all click on your emails? What email marketing metrics should you worry about and measure?

The total number of subscribers? Is a bigger list always better than a smaller one? Or is it something else that really counts?

There’s so many different stats to watch: list size, open rate, bounces, clicks,..Which email marketing metrics and which numbers really matter?

A little marketing secret

Here’s a secret that many web marketers don’t know. Internet marketing is really “old-fashioned” direct marketing. It’s just sped up really fast (and with less paper). When all we had was snail mail, we had a general sense of deliverability (how many letters reached their destination), based on whether any of them came back with wrong addresses.

There was no way to tell who looked at the envelope, who opened it, or who read the letter. All we had to go on to tell if the mailing was a success was the number of orders we got.

Now, we can not only get that information, we can measure and track it.

The marketing metrics that matter

What really matters is not the raw numbers of subscribers, but the percentage of people who are actively interested in what you’re saying: the opens, the click through rate, and if you’re selling something, the conversion rate (percentage of sales you get).

Monitor your open rates and clicks. If they’re low, find out why.

Are you covering topics of interest to your readers? Set up a quick poll (with surveymonkey) and find out.

Do your subject lines and headlines need work?

If you’re selling something, look at the copy. Is it focused on you, or what your readers will get?

Which numbers have you been tracking on your blog or newsletter? Which ones do you think are important? Not sure? Ask in the comments.

UPDATE: For another take on this, check out Bob Poole’s post: Wrong

Question Time

Posted on March 5, 2010 by Jodi Kaplan

Q&A (Photo credit: crossingeurope)

I’m not the prime minister (or even the president), but I thought it might be helpful to set aside a post now and then for questions.

If you have one about headlines, email marketing, your website design, niche marketing, or another marketing challenge you’re having, ask away.

The floor is yours.