One of the trickiest yet most important aspects of creating content is crafting a headline that makes people want to keep reading. If you want to learn how to write a headline like a pro, follow our five steps below.
5 Tips on How to Write a Headline That Keeps People Reading
1. Match Your Headline to Your Content
Have you ever read a headline that seemed interesting, only to find out the article content did not match what the title promised? Your goal should always be to create intrigue with your headlines, but not without purpose. A quick way to lose credibility and trust with your visitors is to use enticing titles and then deliver unrelated content.
2. Use Your Keyword
In addition to being a good SEO practice, using your target keyword in your headline informs the reader exactly what type of content they can expect to find when they click through.
3. Keep It Short
Google recently updated the width of the main search results column. This means you now have up to 70 characters before Google cuts off the title and adds the ellipses. Keeping your headline length within this parameter ensures people will see the whole title when searching for your topic and it allows readers to digest the information quicker.
4. Use Emotional Language
People tend to respond quicker to emotional prompting than intellectual. Consider the following example:
- How People Can Improve Their Livelihood
- Feeling Stuck? Here Are 5 Tips You Can Use to Get Out of That Rut
Significantly different titles, but both could point to the same article. While the first informs the reader what the article is about, the second speaks directly to the feeling of being stuck in a rut. The appeal to emotion feels more personal and makes people more likely to see what five tips can help them break out of their rut.
5. Write Multiple Iterations
CoSchedule recommends creating 25 different headlines before deciding which one works best. While you might not need to create that many different versions, you should follow the basic idea—create multiple headlines for your content and choose the best one. By continuing to come up with different variations of your headline, you will start to think of ideas you wouldn’t have otherwise.
Bonus: A Headline Analyzer Tool
Want to find out how your headline might perform? Give CoSchedule’s Headline Analyzer a try. When you enter your title into the tool, you receive a score from 0-100 based on the type of words you use, the length, and the sentiment. Any score over 70 is considered a good headline.
