Improve the Web Search Engine Optimization, Usability and Design How Tos and Advice http://www.improvetheweb.com/node/164/atom/feed 2008-12-22T02:14:51-06:00 Learn How to Write Titles to Get Traffic and Links: The Ultimate Guide http://www.improvetheweb.com/learn-how-you-write-titles-get-traffic-links-ultimate-guide 2007-08-06T22:28:18-05:00 2008-12-22T02:14:51-06:00 Yuri You are destined to boost your traffic, links and profit by writing great articles and posts. However, one of the most important factors that influence the success of your content, becides content quality and promotion, is the post title (headline). That's why you need to write great headlines to motivate your readers to read, talk and link about you.

Use this 'how to write titles' list to build your readership:

    How to Write Mind-Blowing Titles like CopyBlogger

]]> You are destined to boost your traffic, links and profit by writing great articles and posts. However, one of the most important factors that influence the success of your content, becides content quality and promotion, is the post title (headline). That's why you need to write great headlines to motivate your readers to read, talk and link about you.

Use this 'how to write titles' list to build your readership:

    How to Write Mind-Blowing Titles like CopyBlogger

  1. How to Write a Killer "How To" Article That Gets Attention
    A great post on how to write a "How to" title and post, from the copywriting guru, Brian Clark of CopyBlogger.com.
  2. The Cheater's Guide to Writing Great Headlines
    Heed to advice from Brian, who suggests keeping a swipe file of the headlines that worked (like you can do from the examples below).
  3. 5 Simple Ways to Open Your Blog Post With a Bang
    Learn five essential ways to improve your headlines. Yup, from CopyBlogger.com.
  4. Why Some People Almost Always Write Great Post Titles
    Learn to write successful titles like a pro. CopyBlogger.com strikes again.
  5. 7 Reasons Why List Posts Will Always Work
    List titles (from CopyBlogger.com) always work, because they:
    • show expertise
    • communicate well
    • show a solution
    • help identify readers with you
    • are so powerful, when mixed with other types, that it is almost unfair
    • are ideal to promote free content
    • have large numbers of solutions that hypnotize
  6. Traffic Driving Blog Titles
    A concise guide on how to create titles, including tips, such as:
    • fear factor
    • list
    • call to action
    • myth
    • secret
    • gossip
    • bonus: linkbait titles/ideas for real estate
  7. Microcontent: How to Write Headlines, Page Titles, and Subject Lines
    Write titles with small nuances of reading online to get visitors to read your titles and stories. Advice from Jacob Nielsen.
  8. Web Publishing Tip: Write Clear Titles
    Read a concise, more palatable, than Jacob's, description on how to write clear headlines:
    • clean: use words your visitors use and plain language
    • short: shorter, than 10 words - the shorter, the better
    • meaningful: keep your title to the point
  9. How to Write eBay Auction Titles That Sell
    Understand what questions your customers have and provide a solution to their problem with the title.
  10. "If You Write Book Titles Like This, You'll Have a Bestseller"
    Use a couple of tips to write great book (and not only book) titles:
    • grab their attention with strong words
    • tap into their interest by communicating it in the title
    • create anticipation by listing the number of steps, promising results
    • overcome objections by making your book/post seem as a solution to all problems
  11. Titles that Tell a Whole Story
    Write titles that tell a story to instantly captivate the readers!
  12. The Cheater’s Guide to Writing Great Headlines
    Read why the swipe file is the best thing after sliced bread for headlines from Brian Clark.
  13. How to Write Eye-Popping Headlines While Exhausted
    Tired from writing your content and can't improve the headline? Use these tips to give your title a second chance:
    • from Top 10 to Top 5 (note: though Top 7 work better)
    • be braver
    • spend more time
    • use available tools
    • stick to the classics
  14. The Best Headlines Are Not Just Written for Search Engines or Digg
    Write titles for the people and you'll create titles for anything, including the social media and the search engines.
  15. Writing Effective Blog Post Titles
    Some write witty titles, but it makes more sense to write descriptive titles, which suit both humans and the search engines, because they have informative words there.

    16. How to Write Titles for Social Marketing like Lyndoman

  16. Linkbaiting a payday loan site
    Read a detailed how to guide on creating a link-worthy title. Provided by Lyndon Antcliff (Lyndoman) of CornwallSEO.com.
  17. Let a woman teach you the secrets of Linkbait
    Understand what drives people to click on the headlines from the womens' magazines:
    • solve a problem with your title
    • use a number in the headline
    • target the right audience precisely
    • write short and to the point titles
    • read womens' magazines for more headlines (just don't get caught)

    And while you are there, thank Lyndon for this great advice!

  18. Titles, Descriptions and Digg
    Title is the most important thing for your piece of content to share. Learn how to write them for Digg, thanks to Neil Patel of PronetAdvertising.
  19. How to Write the Right Title for Digg
    Learn the 25 most popular words on Digg and use them in your titles from Muhammad Saleem (of PronetAdvertising).
  20. Digg-a-meter (zip file)
    Measure the chances of your story appearing on the front page by feeding the title and the summary to this smart program. While not ideal (humans are better, so far), it will give you some data to start from. Thanks to PronetAdvertising for the tip.
  21. Writing Headlines for Regular Readers, Search Engines, and Social Media
    Use the six techniques from Muhammad Saleem to make your titles more attractive to the social media:
    1. Additional Information
    2. Simple word rearrangement
    3. Simple word omission
    4. Presentation as Fact
    5. Digg bait word addition
    6. Sensationalism

    22. Write Successful Titles with Headline Formulas like Brian Clark

  22. 10 Sure-Fire Headline Formulas That Work
    Excellent formulas, again, from Brian Clark.
  23. 7 More Sure-Fire Headline Templates That Work
    Seven more eye-catching title patterns from Brian Clark.
  24. 5 More Sure-Fire Headline Templates You Can Use at Your Own Risk
    Five more eye-catching title patterns from Brian Clark:
    • Warning: [blank]
    • How [blank] Made Me [blank]
    • Are You [blank]?
    • [Blank] Ways to [blank]
    • If You’re [blank], You Can [blank]
  25. 5 Sure-Fire Social Media Headline Formulas That Work
    Five headline formulas for social sites, such as Digg, from Neil Patel, of PronetAdvertising.com
  26. 10 headline formulas that work like magic
    10 formulas on how to create mind-blowing headlines from Miguel Alvarez of CopyWriting.com
  27. Eight Examples of Profitable Headlines Every Web Professional Must Memorize Today!
    Great eight formulas for successful headlines from Andrew Nietlich
  28. Secret Formulas for Writing Headlines That Sell
    Great tips on writing succesful titles from Shelley Lowery, including:
    • what you need to remember when writing titles
    • five human needs that need to be answered (physological, safety/security, affiliation, esteem and self-actualization)
    • kinds of titles to use (how to, question, command, news, testimonials)
    • a list of mind-grabbing words (including Breakthrough, Incredible, Love, Ultimate, etc)
    • a list of the most powerful words in the English language

    I'd personally use these two lists with all the most powerful headling formulas. Write titles like a wizard!

    A must read for anyone in writing, definitely.

  29. 8 Basic Headline Types
    Learn about eight headling formulas you can use. Quite useful to keep in mind some general patterns, on which all the headline formulas are built:
    • the direct headline
    • indirect headline
    • news
    • how to
    • question
    • command
    • "reasons why"
    • and testimonial headline
  30. 25 More Headline Formulas That Work
    Skellie has plenty of proven formulas to fast on, including:
    • The appeal to our fear of failure
    • The love it or hate it number + text combo
    • The number + assertion of superiority

    31. and many more.

    Learn From Headline Examples to Write Titles like Andy Hagans

  31. Get 200 Killer Headlines
    200 Killer headlines from the media to learn from. Lyndon scores again.
  32. 65 Headlines to Jump Start your Linkbait
    65 headline examples from the newspapers: learn from the pros. Again, from Lyndon Antcliff of CornwallSEO.com.
  33. Examples of a headline
    Examples of catchy headlines from Lyndon Antcliff, of CornwallSEO.com
  34. Example Headlines for Linkbait Campaign
    Check out the terrific examples of linkbait titles about chocolate from Lyndon.
  35. How Marty Weintraub got me to click
    A showcase of a catchy headline ("Drive 28,402 Extra Visitors by Blogging for 48 Minutes"), explained in simple terms. Numerous tips to use when writing headlines.
  36. Andy Hagans’ Ultimate Guide to Linkbaiting and SMM
    Reread the Ultimate Linkbaiting Guide to Social Marketing and see how Andy runs through the CopyBlogger headline formulas.
  37. How to Quickly and Easily Use the World's Easiest & Most Effective Headline Formula
    An example of "How To" titles that work great, such as:
    • How to Develop..
    • How to Improve Your..
    • How to Conquer..
    • How to Keep Your..
    • How to Enjoy..
  38. Headlines that work - 2 classics you can use
    Excellent headline examples (and two formulas) that may help you, when all the other variants don't help you. From Troy White.

    39. How to Write Titles for Traffic like Muhammad Saleem

  39. Writing Headlines for Regular Readers, Search Engines, and Social Media
    Use the advice from Muhammad Saleem (again) to write better titles for traffic:
    • write good titles
    • write good titles and subtitles
    • write short titles
    • use keywords in titles
    • use keywords at the beginning of the title
  40. Do Keywords in Post Titles Really Matter?
    Learn how titles for SEO and humans work hand in hand to get you traffic from Brian Clark of CopyBlogger.com
  41. Best Practices for Title Tags
    Read the 9 title best practices from SEOmoz.org to get more traffic:
    • brand your traffic
    • limit length to 65 characters (including spaces) or less
    • incorporate keyword phrases
    • target longer phrases if they're relevant
    • use a divider
    • focus on clickthrough & conversion rates
    • target searcher intent
    • be consistent
    • repeat in the headline
  42. SEO For Journalists: Headlines & Body Copy (Part 2 of 5)
    Read 10 more tips from SEOmoz to improve your titles. Especially useful for journalists and bloggers, it seems. Helps for really useful (non-linkbait) content.
  43. 7 Tips For Writing Optimized Title Tags
    Though basic title tips, Steve has included the tip that even Rand doesn't use: using page titles before company names in the title tag.
  44. Sure-Fire Headlines for SEO
    While there are plenty of posts on how to write titles for social marketing, writing titles for SEO is different.
  45. Titles and Search Engine Marketing
    Read about various cases of titles that help with search marketing from Shari Thurow.
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