Do you have a corporate web site? A product catalogue, brochure, or other informative website that you need help with to make it more interesting and compelling to readers? Or maybe you just want to try your hand at copywriting and need some training wheels?
Whoever you are, you’ve probably asked yourself the question, “Who wants to know about headline copywriting?” If you’re looking for informative answers that will guide you toward a better understanding of the subject, keep on reading.
The Goal Of Headline Copywriting
Headline copywriting is all about grabbing a person’s attention right at the start of their reading journey and keeping it throughout their visit. To do this, you must first understand the purpose of a good headline.
A good headline should:
- be intriguing,
- be catchy,
- be informative,
- be unique,
- be engaging,
- be somewhat accurate,
- be fresh,
- and
- be short.
Now, you may be thinking, “What about engaging stories? Photos? Videos?” While all of those are important, they aren’t the key to compelling readers to act, which is what you want from a good headline.
The Building Blocks Of Headline Copywriting
To write a good headline that will compel readers to action, you need to approach it from a semantic viewpoint. This means you must examine the words you choose to represent your thoughts, ideas, and opinions and how they affect your reader. There are five important things you must keep in mind while doing this.
First, choose words that your target audience would understand and relate to. For example, if you’re writing for an older audience, use words like “security” and “safe” instead of “cool” and “fresh” to get your point across. Second, don’t be afraid to experiment with different words and phrases. When you know what you’re looking for, unexpected words, phrases, and structures can help you achieve your goal of grabbing readers’ attention.
Third, use action words rather than descriptive words. Descriptive words, when used sparingly, can add color, life, and atmosphere to your writing. However, over-use of them can cripple your writing.
Fourth, keep your headlines concise. Your target audience doesn’t have the time to wade through a 300-word ocean of text to find the nuggets of information you want them to focus on. Concise and informative headlines get the point across in fewer words while maintaining a sense of mystery and intrigue.
Finally, mix up the word order. If you’ve ever read an ad or a headline that used the word “click” in it somewhere, they likely used this word order to grab your attention: “Click here to find out more.” If you look at it this way, it seems like a call to action with a bit more mystery and intrigue baked into the word “click.” What’s more, this type of word order isn’t as commonly used as you’d think, so you have the element of surprise should you decide to run with it.
With these five simple guidelines under your belt, you’re well on your way to becoming a headlining master. From here, the sky is the limit.