You get only 2 seconds to convince your visitors about your relevance. If you fail, the visitor clicks the back button and leave your site for good. Here’s how you can stop it.
Any article writer worth their salt would agree on the impact an appealing headline has on the target audience. When you’re writing for the web, it is particularly important to use catchy headline that stands out and grabs the attention of the audience right away.
An eye-catching headline become almost inevitable when your target readers are based across social media platforms. This is because your headline competes for the attention against a large number of other headlines. When each and every headline appears fairly appealing to the target readers, the likelihood of your article getting a decent number of hits becomes average.
Therefore, it is vital that you should tailor your headlines depending on the type of audience you’re targeting your articles at. So, let’s take a look at the various types of article headlines and their potential influences on the response from your target readers.
Types of Article Headlines and Their Impact
Although there is no specific set of rules that works effectively in writing fool-proof article headlines each and every time, the following are some critical analysis of the behavioral patterns with regards to your target audiences.
Type#1: How-to Article Headline
How-to article headlines are probably one of the most popular among the article writers. Essentially, these headlines tend to grab the attention of a specific target audience segment.
For example, article carrying “How to write an appealing headline for articles” would entice the fancy of those who are particularly looking for tips or ideas on writing better headlines for their articles. Other readers may or may not read it based on their level of interests for the particular area of subject matter.
If you’re writing about a subject that has to offer information in the form of tips or ideas, you build a potential how-to headline that triggers unique attention from your readers.
Type#2: Question Article Headline
Looking at the headline of this very post, you would imagine what impact it could leave on your readers. A question headline typically encourages the readers to seek an answer and tempts them into reading at the last the introduction of the article. If they find the first few lines addressing the question, they will most likely read the rest of the article.
When you’re offering answer or a solution for a specific problem situation, an interrogative headline can do the trick for you. Just make sure the body of your article reasonably justifies the headline.
Type#3: Inquisitive Article Headline
An example of this type could be an article headline that begins with “Why”. Research indicates that article headlines beginning with a “Why” tend to raise reader’s anticipation for an answer. There is a persuasive concept called “the reason for the request”, where the user is influenced by the power of the word “because”. In other words, when users see “why” in a title headline, they scan for the word ‘because’ to gain quick insight on the value of the content.
Inquisitive article headlines work best when you are willing to present tips in a unique manner to attract eyeballs. For example, instead of saying “5 Tips to Write a Killer Headline”, you could say “5 Reasons Why Your Article Never Gets Any Internet Hits”. Remember, this sort of articles click only when the article writer is able to play with the words well and the article should sustain meaningful co-ordination with the title headline.
Type#4: Command Article Headline
Command article headlines are a writer’s favorite when an article boasts benefits for its audience. “Triple Your Traffic with These Killers Headlines” is a typical example of how a command article headline might look like.
If you have a lot of confidence on the information you’re offering to your audience, or if you’re writing on a tried and tested formula that will most likely benefit the readers, you can use the command article headlines to your benefits.
Type#5: Negative Article Headline
When you want to provider your readers with some tips or information on topics that can trigger a specific action on the part of the reader, a negative article headline can be a great ideal for grabbing quick attention.
For example: Don’t Buy A Car Until You Know These Features
The above article headline strongly suggests the buyers read the features before they take a specific action. Although the writer can say the same thing using a how-to, interrogative or inquisitive headline, he may choose this headline to make it sound different so it gets noticed.
Negative article headlines can be used as a pitch-perfect tool to generate considerable interest from a target audience segment.
Appealing headline of a article grabs the attention.
After reading those tips, I’m also thinking on which type of article generally I provide emphasis more. Really, most of them are on the basis of your points.