rolled up newspaper showing funny ad for car dealer

We remember an ad for a strip club that stated "20 Gorgeous Strippers, and 1 Butt Ugly One." It caught our attention, and we didn't even know they used 2 of the 10 key elements used in the psychology of headline writing: numbers and surprise. Just like the ad for a car dealer above.

As a Columbus web design firm, we know we're all members of the Short Attention Span Society. With all the things we have on our list, who has time to read ads, articles or blogs? So we scan. If a headline or image catches our interest, we'll stop long enough to give it a few minutes of our valuable time.

This 3-part blog post gives you 6 tips to write blog posts for your audience who only scans the web or print. But done right, you can turn scanners into readers.

Here's part one:

Six critical words for a headline

While most people will read your headlines, only 2 out of 20 might scan your blog post. An article in copyblogger says that half of the time you spend on your blog should be spent on the headline. We never do that, but if you have a really important post or trade article, you should labor over the title. (We did change our title 4 times during the course of writing this blog!)

How long should your headline be?

Research from a company called KISSmetrics shows we also scan headlines: specifically, the first three words of a headline and the last three words.

You can imagine it's tough to write headlines with just six words, but if you can, try to make the first three, and the last three, words be key to describing your post.

Words to use in your headline

There's been a ridiculous amount of time and energy spent analyzing the right keywords to use in your headlines. We admit, we believe it, hence  we used with a number (6 ways to...) in our headline.

There's a whole psychology behind calculating the right words to use to get someone's attention. For example, the whole "numbers" thing, which we used.

  1. Numbers – “5 Tips for the Perfect Blog and 1 Really Awful Tip”
  2. The Surprise Factor – “The perfect blog post (but nothing in life is perfect)”
  3. Asking Questions – “If you're better than your competitors, shouldn't your website be better than theirs?"
  4. Curiosity gap – “10 ways to write a perfect blog post, but number 9 Is ridiculous!”
  5. Be Negative – “Why write a blog if no one will read it?”
  6. How to – “How to write the perfect article for your business”
  7. Relating to you Audience – “For people who really need to write the perfect blog now!”

Don't believe these? That is what clickbait is all about!

photo of cat with headlineIs Your Cat Racist? as an example of clickbaitTell a personal story

Everyone likes stories. But only if they have a point, or are funny, or insightful and can help people solve a problem they're experiencing. Research from buffersocial says you can get 300% more readers to your blog in you tell a good story.

They explain how good advice in your blog can be considered a vitamin: if you could get someone to take it, they’d solve a problem they may be experiencing. But as we all know, it's not easy to convince people to take their vitamins.

So while we know we need vitamins, candy gets people's attention more quickly. How can you work around that? Makes you posts look like gummy-bear vitamins. It's a combination of what your audience wants, and what they need.

And make no mistake, eye candy (your images) is also a good way to attract your audience. Good visuals are critical, but that's another line item!

We're sure every Columbus web design firm has a story their readers could relate to.

Actually, we started off this blog with a bit of a personal story about the ad for a strip club.

As an example, one blog we wrote was called:

"We're often asked how long till we show google."

You can see the entire blog about SEO here.

We essentially go on to ask: Where are you with your current website’s SEO?

Then break it down into a series of questions:

  • Do you know if they have the right keywords on your site currently?
  • Do you update your site often?
  • How good are you at driving people to your website?
  • How good is your content?

So it gets people thinking about their current situation and prepares them for the questions to come.

Next week we continue this series with two more valuable points about writing the perfect blog post or article.

But if you want to talk and see how we can help  with your marketing, drop us an email here.