KEEP A CLEAR HEAD
For press releases, case studies and articles, the first piece of copy that customers will usually see will be the headline you have chosen. It therefore needs to be strong enough to attract and hold their attention. But what is the best way of achieving maximum impact?
Obviously, that will depend partly upon your subject matter. Ideally, you will want to get a very concise summary of the subject within your headline – unless you are using hunour or shock tactics to gain the reader’s attention.
Practise distilling the main topic down to just six or seven words (this is a good discipline anyway, as it will focus your mind on the message you are really trying to get across).
A good headline will usually be:
- Precise – Remember KISS (‘keep it simple, stupid’)? This also applies to headlines. If yours is more than ten words long, try reducing it. Six or seven words is ideal!
- Punchy – Use puns, humour and ‘power words’ to increase its impact.
- Personal – i.e. if it’s about your company, try and work your company’s name (or the product name) into the heading, so that even if someone is just scanning the magazine that contains your item, your organisation’s name may still register with them.
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