Your headline is what draws the attention of your audience. It either sparks the curiosity to read your writeup or listen to what you have to say, if it is a video content. Your headline serves as a hook that captures the sight and feelings of your audience. When the heading doesn’t create Curiosity and emotions.
It reduces the possibility for one to dive into the full details. The content you are about to create has diverse words in one message, think about what will grab their attention, create suspense and tension that will keep them glued till the end.
In this context, we are looking at a guide that one can use to create engaging headlines.
1. The use of active voice:
The use of active voice makes a content more engaging, by giving a sense of urgency and a clear picture of what is being talked about in the writeup.
Active voice tends to be more direct, thereby drawing the attention of the audience. When you use the active voice, you lay emphasis on what the reader should expect.
For example: “five great techniques for writing effective content – active
The techniques used for writing effective content. – passive.
The word “use” makes it seem like a regular and common thing. But the active sentence makes it look urgent, with answers to the questions the reader has been looking for.
While crafting your headline, try to keep the verb close to the subject. By doing this you help your readers get a clue of who and what is performing the action, therefore reducing ambiguity.
2. Use Power Words:
Power words are words that signify urgency, create emotions, inspire. It can also create an image of what is being said. Never underrate the use of power words. Use it to spice up your written or verbal content headline. Have you thought of a word in your headline that can hit your audience when they come across it?
If you haven’t thought of that, begin today. Whenever you are crafting a headline, choose which are of power words you would like to use. It could be action-oriented, emotional triggers, Curiosity, benefit oriented, etc.
Some power words under these categories include; Get ready!, Explore!, Surprise!, Love, improve, boost, tips, revealed, secrets, etc.
3. Make use of numbers:
If you observe most video content, especially when it concerns Top people in a particular industry, they are discussed or listed based on numbers. “Five best Ladies in the Fashion Industry.” Watching the video, you see that these ladies are talked about individually.
A viewer or a reader may not be interested in the five best, but just two or three of her favorites. It will be easy for the reader/viewer to scan through and read about their favorites, instead of going through the garden of texts. It also helps improve the SEO, making your headline more descriptive.
Examples; 10 Essential Tools to step up in your content creation game.
3 Things you should know before getting married
The 4 C’s of content creation.
The list is endless. You can create yours!
4. Know your audience:
This is one of the necessary things you should understand before going into content creation. If you have a message, without an audience to acknowledge it, you may be wasting your time.
Your audience helps you acknowledge the message. Once you get to know them and how they receive and perceive your message, you will know which strategy works best for you when creating your headlines.
When crafting a headline or writing, do it for them, and not for yourself. Know their needs and try to provide solutions that can help them overcome or curb the issues.
If they see something like this, “Improve your vocabulary with these apps.” In this case, you have been able to answer the question, “Which app can I use to improve my vocabulary?”
The formula is simple – Know the audience + Their questions = Give answers.
Use this to create a headline.
5. Have a Working Title:
A working title is the first topic you have in mind before writing the body of the content or script for the video.
A working title serves as a guide that will help you to stay on track while writing so you don’t divert from the message you want to send. It doesn’t have to be a complete headline.
Are you finding it difficult to wrap your head round the right headline before writing, don’t stress. You can start with the major keywords.
Aside from the use of keywords, a clear visual will help. Visuals has its own way of speaking and giving its inspiration.
Use visuals or keywords to create the body of your content first, before the headlines. it can also be used while creating the headlines.
6. Use relevant keywords:
Picking the accurate keywords from your content is one of the best ways to craft a headline. It also helps in search engine optimization, (SEO). Keywords help the SEO understand the content and display it in relevant search engines.
The choice of keywords in your content helps your audience to identify with your content, relate it to their interest and needs. Relevant keywords in your headline can improve the content ranking positions in Search engine results pages, (SERPs)
7. A little bit of humor:
Your headline must not have a strict and professional tone, always. Sometimes, spice it up with some exciting words, explore other patterns. Spice it up with a little humor to make it appealing and entertaining to the readers.
Your headline doesn’t have to be extremely formal, before it is recognized as one worthy of a flip or scan. Break the blocks a bit, by adding a chunk of joke or excitement to get the attention of people.
Keep your headline simple and clear. It doesn’t need big grammars but a few catchy words of 5-7
With a good headline, you could signify your reader that the solution to their problem is finally here.
A headline is a hook, even the most profound content goes unread because of a lackluster headline.
By following these guidelines, you will be able to craft engaging headlines.
