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Tips for Headline Copywriting

Updated: 7 days ago

Headline copywriting is one of the most important aspects of copy. Headlines provide you with the chance to capture the attention of your target customer. Today, customers have grown tired of ads. According to one report, the average person in the US is exposed to about 4000 to10,000 ads per day


So that’s a lot of competition. Therefore, as a marketer, you should focus on capturing the attention of your audience as quickly as possible. According to Robert W. Bly in the Copywriters Handbook, a sales letter has only five seconds to catch the customer’s attention. 

Billboard selling ice cream. Headline copy: Charlie's Round The Corner Ice Cream

This means an undue amount of attention should be given to carefully crafting headline copy. In this article, we discuss the principles and importance of good headline writing to make sure that your copy performs as well as possible. 


What is headline copywriting?

Headline copywriting means writing copy for headlines. This includes email, billboards, website, and blog copy. Headline copywriting is an essential skill because its focus is capturing the attention of the customer. This is crucial in an environment oversaturated with ads competing with the attention of the average customer.


Many people see copywriting as an art before and above anything else. If SEO blogs are the prose of content marketing, they say, then short-form copy is the poetry. But this would be mistaken. It should always be remembered that the purpose of copy is to sell. This is literally the definition of copywriting — copy that sells. 


It is true that the point of copy is to get attention; however, that attention should be directed toward the goal of lead conversion. How many advertisements can you remember without even recalling what they had to sell? 


So always remember, although creativity and humor are tools that you should always keep sharpened in your toolbox, the point of copy is to sell. Even a less creative headline that captures a customer’s attention and motivates them to buy is preferable. It would be way better than something highly original and creative that does not do the job of selling. 


Many copywriters pride themselves in being creative and original. However, there is nothing wrong with relying on formulas that are proven to work. The aim should be to use an original or fresh angle that is appropriate for what you are trying to sell and who you are trying to sell to. 


The four  functions of headline copywriting

The main function of a headline is to grab the reader’s attention. However, it does not stop there. This is just the beginning of the process. Sometimes, even before gaining the attention of your consumer, a headline is supposed to select them. There are headlines written in such a manner that they don’t even register with the unintended audience. 


Also, you should not appreciate the value of the term “short and sweet” when it comes to how a headline is supposed to function. In its brevity, a headline is supposed to still deliver a complete message. This is true even if the point of that complete message is to draw the reader into the body of your copy.


Taking these things into account, it can be said that a headline has four main functions: 


  1. Getting attention

  2. Selecting the audience

  3. Delivering a complete message

  4. Pulling the reader into the body copy


We will discuss each of these things in turn. 


1. Getting attention

Considering the saturated ad market all over the world and how bombarded people are by ads, gaining your readers’ attention is simultaneously a priority and a challenge. You could write the most perfect copy. If the customer is not impressed by your headline, it won’t matter. 


So, you should focus on creating a powerful first impression on the reader. There are several strategies to creating a great first impression. 


i. Appealing to the reader’s self-interest. This means letting the reader know immediately that the information contained in the ad would be of interest and benefit to them. For example, take the Crest ad: Give Your Kids a Fighting Chance.” This would be of interest to any parent who wants their kids to grow up with a healthy smile or teeth. 


ii. Providing news. Providing new information is an effective way to gain your reader’s attention. This promises new information that would be of benefit to the reader. Words associated with news include announcing, at last, it’s here, and just arrived. Consider the type of ad a coffee seller would use: “Discover The Rich Fruity Taste of Our New Coffee Varietal”


iii Using the word free. Everybody wants free stuff. If you can include this world in your copy without being dishonest, then go ahead. For example, this would be an online editing company using it to promote its editing services: “Free Sample Edit.” 


2. Selecting the audience

A well-written headline should be self-selecting. If you are offering EHS (environment, health, and safety) compliance services to firms in California, it makes no sense to come up with a headline that pulls in businesses from all over the United States. Likewise, if you are selling traveling insurance, you should not come up with headlines that attract old folks looking for life insurance. 


A proper headline will preselect your audience and automatically screen out anyone who doesn’t qualify. Think of it as a dog whistle operating at a frequency that humans can’t hear, but which a dog can immediately recognize.


For example, here’s a headline for a travel insurance ad for Nomad Insurance: “Travel medical insurance. We cover people from all over the world, while outside their home country.”


3. Delivering a complete message

It has been reported that four out of five readers read headlines and skip the rest of the ad. This means your headline is now tasked with doing even more work to engage and pull in readers. You have to now ensure that your ad can get down to the business of selling to those readers who don’t get past the headline.


Here is one example of a complete message:


 Allstate — with accident insurance, they guarantee your car insurance rates won’t go up because of an accident. 


It is recommended that you include both the selling promise and brand name in your headline. You would want the name of your company to be associated with your offer. You do not want to be one of those ads that are remembered for their story or humor and not the product they sell. 


4. Draw the reader into the copy

There are certain products that are information-heavy. This means you can only convince readers to buy them by providing them with plenty of information. This is unlike popular products such as liquor, soft drinks, an clothing. These products typically require appealing images to sell.


Information-heavy products includes software as a service (or SaaS) products, cars, books, and online courses. With these products, the task of your headline is too draw customers in. The focus then should be arousing the curiosity of your reader. 


Take the example of SemRush. SemRush is an SEO tool that content marketers and entrepreneurs can use to improve their rankings on Google through content writing. This is what their headline looks like:  


SemRush — Online Marketing Can Be Easy


This is a promise to make marketing easier for thousands of entrepreneurs and business owners with online businesses or businesses that they wish to market online.  


It must be repeated. There is nothing wrong with using strategies or copying what works. The focus should be less on being original and “creative” and more on knowing what works and applying it to your business. As Francis Tighe, a talented copywriter, once said “We are not in the business of being original. We are in the business of reusing things that work.” 


The 4 Us formula for headline copywriting

The 4 Us copywriting formula can help you make your headline stand out to readers or the public badgered by ads. The 4 Us stands for urgent, unique, ultra-specific, and useful. It is a sure strategy to make sure you beat out the competition.


1. Urgency

With urgency, you give the reader a reason to act immediately instead of postponing the action to be taken. One of the most effective ways to do so is by putting a time bomb in the headline. By time bomb, I mean making the reader feel that the author might expire if they don’t jump at the chance. 


For example, “Become a qualified ESL teacher in three months” can be an ad for an online company offering teacher training courses and certification. The three-month qualification promises the attainment of qualifications that people typically associate with taking way longer than three months.


Another obvious “urgency” tactic is the limited-time offer. For example, “Free Shipping If You Complete Your Purchase Within 12 Hours.” This involves giving prospects a limited time — normally within twenty-four hours — to take advantage of a special offer or discount. 


2. Unique

This means saying something new or saying something old in a novel way. You might have your work cut out for you with this one. Customers have been bombarded and used to all types of ads and messages. This is where your creativity has to kick in. Here is a good one for example: 


Stop Paying Your Landlord’s Mortgage – Get Pre-Approved

This is an ad for a real estate company on FaceBook. The headline portrays rent as tenants paying for their landlord’s mortgage. This would immediately get a tenant thinking and re-evaluating their life choices in terms of their accommodation. They would be thinking — Why pay someone else’s mortgage when I could be paying my own?  


3. Ultra-Specific

This is a tactic where you draw in your readers by providing very specific information. For example, “Best time to file for a tax refund.” 


Such specific headlines will have the effect of automatically screening out prospects who don’t qualify while gaining the attention of those with a specific need, as the headline will be speaking directly to them. 


This means you should make sure that you hit just the right pitch in terms of specificity. You don’t want a headline so specific that it speaks to no one. 

 

Contact us for help in crafting short-form copy


 

4. Useful

A well-written subject line or heading will directly speak to the self-interest of the reader. For example, an academic editing website ad can say, “Submit Work You Can Take Pride In.” 


This is a promise that offers the benefit of editing students’ work to a high quality that will impress their professor or thesis committee. Also, a headline from a traveling agency that says “Travel & Save” offers the benefit of saving money. 


A properly written headline or subject line whether it be for an online ad or email should try to incorporate all four of these features as much as possible. Obviously, you can’t score highly for each of the four attributes in one headline. Some sacrifices or payoffs may have to be made. But as much as possible try to score a balance that optimizes for all four. 


References

Bly, R.W. (2020). The Copywriter's Handbook. St. Martin's Publishing Group.

 

Cite this EminentEdit article

Antoine, M. (2024, November 05). Tips for Headline Copywriting. https://www.eminentediting.com/post/tips-for-headline-copywriting











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