news releases headline Archives - Wylie Communications, Inc. https://www.wyliecomm.com/tag/news-releases-headline/ Writing workshops, communication consulting and writing services Wed, 17 Jan 2024 14:55:40 +0000 en-US hourly 1 https://wordpress.org/?v=6.6.2 https://www.wyliecomm.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/10/cropped-wci-favico-1-32x32.gif news releases headline Archives - Wylie Communications, Inc. https://www.wyliecomm.com/tag/news-releases-headline/ 32 32 65624304 What’s the best press release headline length? https://www.wyliecomm.com/2023/09/press-release-headline-length/ https://www.wyliecomm.com/2023/09/press-release-headline-length/#respond Tue, 19 Sep 2023 12:57:49 +0000 https://www.wyliecomm.com/?p=27034 Don’t let your head get cut off

How short should your press release headline be?

1. Don’t let your head get cut off by Google.

Best practice: Keep release headlines to 55 characters or fewer.… Read the full article

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]]> Don’t let your head get cut off

How short should your press release headline be?

Press release headline length
What’s the right size? The most effective news release headlines weigh in at 40 characters or less. Image by TaniaKitura

1. Don’t let your head get cut off by Google.

Best practice: Keep release headlines to 55 characters or fewer.

Why: Google’s search results display only the first 63 characters of your headline. Longer, and your headline will be truncated on search engine results pages. To avoid getting your head cut off on Google, keep headlines to 55 characters or fewer.

How are we doing? According to an analysis of more than 11,000 releases issued over BusinessWire wire service in a 31-day period:

  • The average press release headline weighs in at 120 characters.
  • Some 79% of releases have headlines longer than 65 characters.
  • 2% of releases have headlines longer than 300 characters.
  • The longest headline was 2,141 characters long. That’s a story, not a headline!
Big headed Readers get irritated when you make them play ‘What’s the last word in this headline?’

2. Don’t let your head get cut off by social.

How will your headline look when it shows up on Facebook, Twitter and other social sharing sites?

Best practice: To avoid getting your head cut off on social media, aim for 55 characters or less.

In over your head At 31 words and 254 characters, this head is 137 characters too long for Twitter and gets cut off by Facebook. But, really, who’d want to read it anyway? Might as well put a stamp on it: This headline’s written for Google, not for humans.

3. Don’t let your head get cut off by mobile.

Best practice: Limit headlines to fewer than 40 characters

Mobile apps and websites often truncate long headlines. To avoid getting your head cut off on mobile apps, follow the Associated Press’s guideline: Keep your headline to 40 characters or less.

Head count These headlines are too long to be seen on Apple’s News app.

4. Don’t get your head cut off by humans.

You have only a few seconds to reach mobile audiences before they swipe left or leave for another site. They want to scan at a glance, not study for a minute.

Plus, long headlines get lost below the fold or take up too much valuable real estate on mobile screens.

Best practice: To avoid getting your head cut off, keep your web head to 8 words or fewer, according to research by The American Press Institute.

But online, shorter’s better. My personal preference is web heads of 6 words or less, or about 30 characters.

Off the top of your head Long headlines (left) take up too much valuable real estate on your mobile content page. Shorter headlines (right) leave room to give readers more information — in this case, a full image and two lines of the lead. A deck under the headline and caption under the image would also help — and be more valuable than the date stamp, byline, sharing buttons and all of that extra leading.
Get your head examined Some headlines are simply too long for humans. So you might get found by Google, but you’re making it hard for people to read and understand at a glance.

Off with your head

Hey, all those extra words aren’t worth losing your head over. So when writing for mobile audiences, write headlines to go. Keep your head short.

But not too short. Google “prefers” headlines of at least 5 words. The shortest headline in Schwartz’s review: 18 characters. That’s not enough room for long-tail keywords or phrases — or to satisfy Google.

And … what’s the right press release length?
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Sources: Andy Bechtel, “Writing Headlines for Digital and Mobile Media,” Poynter News University, Dec. 5, 2013

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

Eric Ulken, “Writing Headlines for the web 2010,” Poynter News University, July 29, 2010

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