Sales letters and newspaper articles need great headlines in order to capture the attention of readers, and this is equally if not more true of blog posts, where people are always just a click away from reading something else. In order to attract new readers and keep your current readers interested, you need to write titles that draw people in. Here’s how to do it.

Make It about Them

This is one of the most important rules of copywriting, yet many bloggers (myself included) don’t apply it consistently.

For example, “Woo hoo – my first e-book!” isn’t about your reader – it’s about you. It’s great that you’re showing enthusiasm about launching your new product, but you aren’t answering your reader’s #1 question: “What’s in it for me?”

Keep in mind that if your blog titles are about you, you’re probably going to lose readers, rather than gaining new ones. Your blog titles should always be about your reader, what reading the article could do for them, about the powerful benefit they might receive by clicking on the full article.

In the above example, you’ll likely get better results with something like “Learn to organize your pantry while you drink your morning coffee.”

Echo Their Inner Conversation

Your average audience tends to have a very similar internal conversation. For example:

Home owners: “I want to organize my house, but I don’t really know how to start.”

Office workers: “I know there’s something wrong with my time management system, I just don’t know what.”

Home-based business owners: “I know I need to separate my business and personal stuff, but I don’t know how to do it.”

And so on.

A very powerful principle in headline writing is to simply echo or address your reader’s internal dialogue. If you can show them that you understand their frustrations and that you can help, you will go a long, long way towards winning their trust.

Show Your Uniqueness

Let’s face it, lots of other organizers are blogging about similar topics. It’s therefore crucial that your titles are unique, so people don’t think it’s just more of the same old stuff.

To be frank, you’re just not going to get readers if people think they already know what you’re saying. Your blog title needs to imply that whatever you’re writing about, it’s nothing they’ve ever heard before.

It’s especially important to apply your unique spin when you’re writing about a topic that many others have written about in the past. In fact, if you can make your blog title sound controversial or counterintuitive, your post is sure to get noticed.

Writing attention-catching headlines isn’t always easy. Sometimes you might even find yourself stuck on just the headline for hours. That’s okay – it’s just part of the process.

Some people find that they write the best headlines after they’ve written the actual post. Others find that writing the headline first helps them. Some find they write the best headlines in the morning, while others write the best headlines at night.

It might take a while to figure out what works best for you, but once you learn to get into your reader’s head, you’ll have a very valuable skill.

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