How to Write a Good Headline
A good headline draws people to the information it heads. A bad headline either confuses them or simply doesn't get their attention at all. A headline is the start of a conversation. You need to open the conversation with a clear aim. That aim must always be to solve the need of your customer.
This subject can be a bit hard to get your head around and put into practice because initially it seems to go against everything that you want to do. You want to get everything that you know and do in the first part of your web site. Of course space is limited so you have a dilemma. You could do what many others have and:
- Put lots and lots and lots of navigation items down the left of the page trying to cover every variation of your products
- Put lots of buttons and links everywhere on your page to cram everything in
- Make your text small so you can write more
- Make a really, really long page with everything you do in a big list
Sadly you will find that over time these seeming solutions will not work very well for you at all. The information becomes confusing and increasingly hard to digest. What you need to do is create an overview that simply says what you do and leads users to the next step - no more.
| A fast food store never puts it's whole menu as a sign on the street. They may have some signs that say "Fast Food" or "Hamburgers", "Fish & Chips", "Cold Drinks" but generally this information is kept pretty broad so that it answers the main question for the hungry person. I sell food. Once inside you will tend to look at the headlines on the menu for the type of food you want: Sandwiches, Hamburgers, Fish, Roasts. Once one of those headings takes your fancy you will then read the entries in ever increasing detail. Your web site needs the same flow. |
It is common knowledge that web users are prone to panning and scanning content looking for what interests them and bypassing the rest. Sad but true (don't let that be an excuse to get lazy and skimp on content or you'll pay a whole other price). Once your headline has attention, a user will delve deeper if the "hook" offers a decent hope of a solution to their need. Consider this:
You are very hungry. There are hundreds of signs around you for all manner of things you could buy.
What are you looking for? You might answer, 'a sign that says food'. Well yes but that is not what you are really looking for. The second piece of information tends to throw you off the scent. You are looking for a solution to being hungry - food. You will indeed search the signs for mention of food but 'absence of hunger' is your goal and food the means. At that point, all you need is a course of action that gives you better hope of finding food than standing where you are. Once you get that sign you are off.
Headlines need to say very broadly how you can answer the need. What follows is the detail that supports and fleshes out the headline. Remember that the information flow should be, a simple, broad overview at the top of the site and increasingly detailed information the further the user travels into the site. You will get to put all the details of your offerings on these later pages.
A common web site intro headline reads something like:
Welcome to our site
Paper clips are our lives. We will look after your needs really well. We have red ones, blue ones, green ones, silver ones and of course purple ones! Please look around some to find what you want as we have it all from thin wire to thick plastic models.
How well does this really answer the question of "how can these guys make my life better" in 2 seconds? Not very well at all. What if we re-wrote the heading to be:
The leading supplier of collectable paper clips in Brisbane since 1905
We have every style of paper clip ever made right here in our store. Our knowledgeable staff will help you find exactly the paper clip you desire for your collection.
This is immediately more informative and engaging. But if we wanted to follow the "less is more" rule we could probably refine it some more:
Specialist paper clip collector supplies
Every style of paper clip in stock at all times. Our staff are passionate collectors too. Let us help you find your next collectable.
We can question which of the later two headlines are better suited to the business in question but they both clearly out-gun the first shambling attempt. What you can see is that in the first version the desire to say everything resulted in saying very little. The second version is shorter and says much more at the same time. The third version is sparse and to the point in a way that says a lot and opens up a lot of hope. This style creates a very modern kind of punchiness that gets the main point across in seconds. The secret here is to understand the real desire of the customer and serve a probable solution in a few lines.
The details can now be developed inside the site on individual pages that give the space to develop each product's sell fully. The user will be happy to be given a simple path to follow through this information and will travel as far as they feel that the promise of a solution outweighs the cost of clicking and reading.
Tips
Again, I admit that developing this skill takes a bit of understanding and trust but once you see the results then you will realise that the effort of creating better headlines is worth it. A method that I use is to look at the overview of what the business/web site offers and then to condense it to a line or two as an overview. I aim to understand the underlying need in the customer and aim for words and phrases that are clear of jargon. In the case of paper clip collectors I assume that:
- collectors are relatively traditional
- collectors collect because they like order and understanding with a dash of discovery (Indiana Jones in a tweed coat and slippers)
| Headlines should be an answer not another question.
No one likes having their question answered with a question. Your web site is there to answer questions, not leave your customer with more questions. A web site that answers questions will almost always result in a sale. A web site that answers no questions, or even worse causes confusion, is destroying sales. |
Even though a business often sells several things that seem radically different to each other in the mind of the seller, there is always something that they have in-common to the buyer. It is expressing this commonality that needs to be aimed for whilst answering the deep need of the buyer.
I will then write one heading after another, letting each one sink in. I study each to see if the words convey the right meaning (avoiding cliche and words with 'wrong meaning') and look for that feeling of magic the right balance has. After a few attempts I will have most or all of the needed words and information. Then I simply finesse till... Bing! There it is - a good heading. I enjoy doing this with another person as the second person introduces new ideas and slants that can shed a lot of light and somehow that synergy makes the magic stronger. You look at each other and just know you got it.
Happy headline writing
If you want me to work with your business then please visit BRM Web Consulting
