Your headline is the first step to entice your readers to read the rest of your content. It's out there waving its arms waiting for them to notice it. But sometimes what you think is a good headline will get looked over and kills your content.
Here's what you can do to become unstoppable
The reason why numbers do so well is because they make your headlines and content specific. You give a quantifiable promise so they know what to expect. (Heck, I even used this technique for today's newsletter title).
Unusual numbers are more attention-grabbing
The Content Marketing Institute reports that headlines with odd numbers have a 20% higher click rate. Odd numbers or very specific numbers make your readers take notice because they are unexpected.
Top Tip - Numbers can work in any position in your headline. If you’re worried that putting a number at the start of your headline makes you look like everyone else, try moving the number to the middle
2. Make your headline between 5 and 9 (or 16 and 18) words.
In a 1956 psychology report by George A. Miller of Princeton. “The Magical Number Seven, Plus or Minus Two: Some Limits on Our Capacity for Processing Informationfound that “the number of objects an average human can hold in working memory is 7 ± 2.
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3. Start with a negative
Yes, I'm normally all for being positive but here's something I've noticed while writing on X. My posts on bad copywriting seem to convert and outweigh my posts on good copywriting.
4. Give your headline 2 parts.
Headlines should have a beginning and an end, a thesis and an antithesis.
If your headline isn't completely clear add a subheading. It should re-affirm why your reader is on the page and act as a primer for your content.
You can try a simple hyphen to break your headline.
Or Top Tip: A quick simple fix is to swap your subheading for your headline and make it benefit-driven. The below example shows where the subheadline does a better job than the headline because it leads with the customer benefit.
5. Make your headline crystal clear.
Great headlines shouldn't confuse your reader. There's no room for ambiguity. Yes, you want them to ask questions to spark curiosity, but you don't want them to ask why they need to read.
Here's how to be clear The 3 Don'ts
1. Don’t put cleverness over clarity
We have already seen how important clarity is. A little cleverness may be ok, but not if you have to sacrifice clarity.
2. Don’t assume your customer understands the value you provide
As soon as they land on your page, visitors should know the answer to these two questions: “Where am I?” and “What can I do here?”
3. Don’t bury your value
Visitors need to know they are getting something in exchange for their time. Don’t be afraid to show how much value your product or service provides.
Your headline should be benefit-focused. If it's vague it'll have no meaning.
If you're not sure - start with a verb:
Instead of “We help you lower your payments by up to 40%,”
Try “Lower your payments by up to 40%.”
If you want to improve your writing and make your words have an impact, work on getting reallygood at writing headlines.
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