When it comes to web heads, focus on the front.

That is, place your topic words at the beginning of your headline. That approach:

• Signals to Google what your page is about, improving your place on search engine results pages (SERPs)
• Helps readers decide to click your link on SERPS, indexes and other lists

How important is this? It’s the No. 1 thing you can do to improve the ROI of your website, says Jakob Nielsen, “king of usability.”

“Selecting the first 2 words for your page titles is probably the highest-impact ROI-boosting design decision you make in a web project, he says. “Front-loading important keywords trumps most other design considerations.”

How readers read indexes and lists online.

When viewing a list of articles on SERPs, index pages or other story lists, web visitors spend less than one second looking at headlines. That’s according to Eyetrack III, a study of online behavior by The Poynter Institute.

The same thing’s true of the summary blurbs or decks in the index listing.

“The first couple of words need to be real attention-getters if you want to capture eyes,” the researchers say.

What can you tell skimmers in the first 11 characters of your web head?
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Not so fast, says usability guru Jakob Nielsen. He estimates that visitors really scan more like the first 11 characters. What do the first 11 characters of your headlines tell potential readers?

• Use drop-down menus sparingly
• Beyond the Inverted Pyramid
• Drake University campus life
• Introducing Chase Exclusives Special Benefits for Checking Customers
• Don’t let your head get cut off
• How to Write the News Release 2.0
• Your Company Name announces

Make sure the first couple of words tell and sell — tell readers what your story is about and sell them on clicking. Here are 14 ways to do that:

1. Lead with the topic word.

Nielsen suggests that instead of:

Use drop-down menus sparingly

You try:

Drop-down menus: Use sparingly

2. Use the simple sentence structure.

Write subject, verb, object. That forces the subject — aka the topic — to the top. Instead of:

Beyond the Inverted Pyramid

Make it:

Feature stories boost readership

3. Move your organization’s name to the end.

Instead of:

Drake University campus life

Make it:

Campus life at Drake University

4. Make it a label head.

I know. This one makes me feel squeamish, too. It probably works better on a basic web content page than on a story or release:

Social media writing webinar

Nope, I still hate it.

5. Try the passive voice.

I hate this idea, too. But passive voice can help you front-load key words, Nielsen says. For instance:

Passive Voice Is Redeemed For Web Headings

Still hate that one, too.

6. Use plain language and specific terms.

In a test Nielsen ran of what visitors could learn from the first 11 letters of an index listing, this web head scored best:

Gift cards & E-Gift Certificates

7. Avoid marketing fluff.

In Nielsen’s 11-character test, this headline proved to be the least effective:

Introducing Chase Exclusives Special Benefits for Checking Customers

8. Use numerals.

Say more with fewer characters by using numerals, instead of spelling out numbers. Nielsen suggests that instead of:

First two words: A signal for the scanning eye

You make it:

First 2 words: A signal for the scanning eye

Note: AP Style supports this approach.

9. Skip leading articles.

Drop the “a,” “an” or “the.” Instead of:

The approval process syndrome …

Make it:

Approval process syndrome …

10. Consider promoting popular story forms up front.

Got a list or infographic? Consider investing some of your 11 characters in that:

Flowchart: Are you a troll or thought leader?

11. Use your deck in metatags.

At Wylie Communications, we like feature heads almost as much as we like Twix bars:

Don’t let your head get cut off

Web headlines must fit on mobile apps and more

So we’re experimenting with using our descriptive, front-loaded decks in metatags instead:

Web headlines must fit on mobile apps and more

12. Meet readers out front in page titles.

Using that approach, we cause the deck to show up on indexes and SERPs:

Web headlines must fit on mobile apps and more

Both feature head and descriptive deck both show up on content pages:

Don’t let your head get cut off

Web headlines must fit on mobile apps and more

13. Make the topic phrase a kicker.

Move the topic to the top as an additional layer of headline. Instead of:

How to Write the News Release 2.0

Make it:

News release 2.0 — Help Google find your site

14. Check your index pages.

How does your headline show up in SERPs, index pages and other story lists?

When you scan the list of headlines and links, what’s the first word in each item? Is it the topic word? Is it clear, specific and interesting?

For a “how not to” example of making copy list-ready, check out your organization’s index of press release headlines. Most bury the topic word behind:

Your Company Name announces …

How does yours stack up?
_____

Sources: Andy Bechtel, “Writing Headlines for Digital and Mobile Media,” Poynter News University, Dec. 5, 2013

Jakob Nielsen, “Company Name First in Microcontent? Sometimes!” Alertbox, March 3, 2008

Jakob Nielsen, “Passive Voice Is Redeemed For Web Headings,” Alertbox, Oct. 22, 2007

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There’s a lot of sniveling and squawking going on in the web writing community these days. Consider the headlines:

• “This Boring Headline Is Written for Google,” grumble journalists.
• “Google doesn’t laugh,” moan headline writers.
• “Witty headlines: Black and white and dead all over,” kvetch communicators.

What’s all the bellyaching about? The fact that feature headlines don’t work so well online. Sad, but true: When it comes to web heads, it’s more important to optimize for search engines — and optimize for real people — than it is to be clever.

“Part of the craft of journalism for more than a century has been to think up clever titles and headlines,” writes Ed Canale, vice president for strategy and new media at The Sacramento Bee. “And Google comes along and says, ‘The heck with that.’”

“If there is a choice between boring and useless, I suggest going for boring.”

— Steffen Fjaervik, contributing writer for Poynter Online

Or, as Steffen Fjaervik, contributing writer for Poynter Online, suggests:

“If there is a choice between boring and useless, I suggest going for boring.”

But maybe those aren’t the only options.

Four ways to write creative headlines for the web

Here are three ways to work around the SEO and scanning restrictions of web heads:

1. Use your title tag and URL.

Your title tag gets more Google juice than your web headline. So put your literal headline in the title tag and put the feature headline on the content page. The New York Times, for instance, sometimes packs keywords into its title tags, but not into the page headline.

2. Use the deck.

You could also use the headline for the literal story, the deck for the creative or benefits-focused one.

• Literal headline: [Topic word] does what
• Benefits-oriented deck: You benefit how
• Creative deck: Clever wordplay or twist of phrase

3. Be witty and clear.

You’re brilliant, right? Why not write a headline that’s both creative and telling? The pros are pulling it off by writing:

a. A literal kicker with a clever headline. Corporate communicator Kevin Allen writes:

“Witty headlines: Black and white and dead all over”

b. A clever kicker with a literal headline. “a book review headline in The Guardian was topped with this headline:

And some smart editor at NPR wrote:

c. A topic word subject with a clever verb phrase. “A Wired copyeditor writes:

And a Kansas City Business Journal writer comes up with

4. A reversed mullet.

Put the business in the front, party in the back with headlines like this one, from CNN:

No, there’s no danger that readers will injure themselves in a laughing fit, but these writers do manage to make their headlines both literal and creative.

How to manage all of these headlines

So how do you handle content management with all of these headline options?

Ask the writers to provide headlines and other display copy or microntent and metadata with the stories. Writers understand the story best, after all, and this approach keeps the webmaster from frantically repurposing everything and the end of the process.

And if you are publishing and posting, include the print headline in the web metadata. Print readers will look up the story using the headline they saw in the publication.

Even if it’s not the headline you post on the content or index pages, they should be able to find what they’re looking for.
___

Sources: Andy Bechtel, “Writing Headlines for Digital and Mobile Media,” Poynter News University, Dec. 5, 2013

Kevin Allen, “Witty headlines: Black and white and dead all over (because of SEO),” Ragan’s PR Daily, May 13, 2011

Amy Gahran, “Smart Headlines: Beyond Shovelware,” PoynterOnline, March 3, 2011

Arthur S. Brisbane, “Glimpses of Online Journalism, From Inside and Out,” The New York Times, Dec. 25, 2010

“Writing Online Headlines: SEO and Beyond,” Poynter News University

Eric Ulken, “Writing Headlines for the web 2010,” Poynter University NewsU web course

Eric Ulken, “This headline not written for Google,” OJR: The Online Journalism Review, Oct. 20, 2009

The post How to write killer headlines for web content appeared first on Wylie Communications, Inc..

If Google can’t find it, to paraphrase Jeff Foxworthy, can’t nobody find it.

Indeed, one key role of web heads is to help Google find your page.

“If the story is about the dangers of salmonella in tomatoes in California, by golly, the headline probably needs to have ‘California,’ ‘bacteria’ and ‘tomatoes’ in it,” says Sara Dickenson Quinn, visual journalism teacher at The Poynter Institute. “Maybe ‘salmonella,’ too.”

How search has changed

But this ain’t your daddy’s Google. Back in the day, keyword stuffing and inbound linking — from anywhere! And in any way! — were the best paths to finding readers, or at least to helping them find you.

Those were the bad old days, when optimized web pages read like … well, like optimized web pages: There are many wedding rings on the market. If you want to have a wedding, you will have to pick the best ring. You will also need to buy flowers and a wedding dress.

But all that has changed — thank goodness — with the 20-year evolution of Google algorithms.

• PageRank, 1998. Inbound links: 75% of SEO success; keyword stuffing: 25% of SEO success
• Panda, 2011. Inbound links: not affected; keyword stuffing: quality more important
• Penguin, 2012. Inbound linking schemes punished; keyword stuffing: punished
• Hummingbird, 2013. Inbound links: still punished; keyword stuffing: still punished. Semantic & long-tail search supported

Plus, with semantic search, Google can now intuit (I believe that’s the technical term) what you’re writing about even without specific search terms. If you’re selling cheap tacos in Tucson, for instance, Google can help searchers find you, even if you don’t use the words cheap, tacos and Tucson.

Finally, there’s long-tail search. These days, web visitors don’t search for simple terms like “LAX flight delays.” Instead, they’re more likely to ask a longer, more conversational and more precise question: “Will Delta Airlines flight 457 be delayed out of LAX today?” That’s especially true of mobile voice search: When we dictate rather than type our searches, apparently, we tend to be more free with words.

All of which means that now, your best path to SEO success is to write a good piece that people read and share.

Here’s what hasn’t changed: Your headline still gets a header (h1) tag on the portal, which means it can deliver huge SEO benefits.

“It’s an endorsement of headline writers by Google,” jokes Andy Bechtel, associate professor, School of Journalism and Mass Communication at UNC-Chapel Hill.

Include these elements in web heads.

To optimize your headline for search engines, consider including:

• Keywords. These are the common words and phrases visitors would use to describe the subject of your web page — “social media jobs,” “communication measurement” or “executive communications,” maybe. Learn to find keywords for your headline.
• Proper names. The Washington Post’s Gene Weingarten once called a column about headline SEO, “Gene Weingarten column mentions Lady Gaga.” Names of people, places, organizations and things are common search queries. To match those searches, include commonly used names in your headline.
• Full personal names. I know, I know. Your style guide calls for using your CEO’s last name only in headlines. But people are more likely to search for first and last names. Want folks to find your page? Use both.
• Unique elements. Better to be found by the right searchers than by all searchers — or by none at all. So include elements that are unique to your web page.
• Geographic references. “Epilepsy treatment in Portland, Oregon,” for instance, will compete with only 399,000 Google results. But “epilepsy treatment” without the location will compete with 29.8 million.

“Strive for relevance to likely search queries,” advises Eric Ulken, assistant managing editor of digital at The Seattle Times, “not just popular ones.”

Leave these elements out of web heads.

To make the most of your headline, don’t include:

• Extra words. Keep headlines short — about 55 characters or less, Ulken advises. Longer than that, and they can get truncated in search results.
• Gobbledygook. Nobody searches for words like “world-class,” “cutting-edge” and “next-generation.” Gobbledygook not only clutters up your copy for real readers, it also dilutes your keywords for search engines, as well.
• Obscure words. Back away from that thesaurus. Web headlines are no place to show off your vocabulary. Reach for the common word, not for the clever one. “There’s no reason to use ‘temblor’ when ‘earthquake’ will do,” Ulken says.
• Journalese. Trust me: Your readers aren’t searching for “area man” or “local festival.”
• Punny phrases. Feature heads work great in print. Online, they confuse search engines and readers looking at indexes of stories. So make web heads clear and explanatory. Think of it as “the pursuit of the literal,” Ulken says.

“Google has no sense of humor,” Bechtel says.

Make your headline your page title.

Multiply your Google juice by making your web head your page title. Google gives bonus points (yes, technical terms again) to web pages with the same headline and page title.

But — and as PeeWee Herman says, there’s always a big but — here’s a workaround that allows you to use creative headlines online. Put the creative headline on the content page; use your page title for SEO.

Or, steal this trick from the BBC: Create a short headline for readers that you use in indexes and at the top of your content page, for readers. Then add a longer headline underneath — aka a deck — and pack that puppy with search terms. Here’s how it works:

US dog food recall after euthanasia drug found

A US pet food company says traces of a drug used to euthanise animals have been found in some of its products, leading to a large recall

Practice ‘proactive SEO.’

As you learn more about popular queries on your topic, you might also be able to develop stories and web pages to match those trending topics.

“Done right, this isn’t shameless hit-chasing,” Ulken says. “It’s finding out what your audience wants to know and giving it to them.”

Optimize for people, too.

“When things get tough, remember … You’re not writing for Google; you’re writing for people, with Google in mind,” Ulken says. “Sometimes headline writers get carried away with SEO. It’s counterproductive to put these goals ahead of clarity and common sense.”

Amen.
____

Sources: Andy Bechtel, “Writing Headlines for Digital and Mobile Media,” Poynter News University, Dec. 5, 2013

David Wheeler, “‘Google Doesn’t Laugh’: Saving Witty Headlines in the Age of SEO,” The Atlantic, May 11, 2011

Kevin Allen, “Witty headlines: Black and white and dead all over (because of SEO),” Ragan’s PR Daily, May 13, 2011

“Writing Online Headlines: SEO and Beyond,” Poynter News University

Eric Ulken, “Writing Headlines for the web 2010,” Poynter News University

Gene Weingarten, “Gene Weingarten column mentions Lady Gaga,” The Washington Post, July 18, 2010

Eric Ulken, “This headline not written for Google,” OJR: The Online Journalism Review, Oct. 20, 2009

Steve Lohr, “This Boring Headline Is Written for Google,” The New York Times, April 9, 2006

Steffen Fjaervik, “Headlines: Boring Is Better than Useless,” PoynterOnline, April 10, 2006

Steffen Fjaervik, “Please, Please, Please Write Informative Headlines,” PoynterOnline, Jan. 21, 2005

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