What is the most importantpiece of real estate in your article or blog post? Is it the introduction paragraph where you let your audience know what they are in for? What about the body of the article where they have their problems solved or the bio box where you put your call to action?
The critical part of your article is your title. Get this wrong and you lose your hard earned readers in 3 seconds flat. Stop for a moment and consider how a reader will read through the material you have created for them. First, they will read your title. If they find it interesting enough or has the potential to solve their problems, they will follow the link to read the full article.
Next, they will read the introduction paragraph. This might take 30 seconds depending on how fast they read or the length of text. The third test is the body of the article. Is it teaching them what you promised?
In total, there are three gates for your audience to pass through before they get to where you want them to be. And that is the resources box at the end with your self-serving links. If a reader chooses not to pass through any of these gates, then the article fails to meet that end goal.
For you as the author, the most important test is the title. This is what creates the all important first impression. You have just 100 characters to generate interest and get that all important click. With this in mind, I am astounded as a site publisher how often people get this wrong. I get several requests to be a guest author on my sites with titles such as -
Pre-Menstrual Syndrome (PMS)? Are You Really Taking Care Of It Or Just Putting A Bandaid On It? Real Natural Solutions! Read This!
Core Value Eating
Muscle building
These are real titles I just pulled from my review list. It does not matter how good the article is, I simply wont bother reading it if it has a title like these. The PMS title is too long and wastes valuable real estate with junk words. Putting 'read this' into a title is a quick way to turn off your audience.
The next two titles are not descriptive enough. The writer has only mentioned the general market the article is describing. What benefit am I going to get by investing my time in reading this article? An article title is not a classic 'who dunnit' where you keep everyone guessing.
If you are really bad at writing (and I think we all agree that we just reviewed three poor examples), here is a simple template to help you write better openers. It won't create brilliant titles for you, but if you go from a poor writer to an average or even good writer, then your results will increase significantly.
Think about what you are writing about and then answer three questions -
1. What is your micro niche? Get as detailed as possible.
2. What is reader going to get?
3. What is the benefit to them for reading your article?
Lets apply this simple template to the PMS title we read earlier.
1. What is the micro niche – PMS pain
2. What is the reader going to get – natural solutions
3. What is the benefit to the reader – put an end to premenstrual pain
Put it all together we get –
PMS Pain – 3 Natural Solutions To Reduce Premenstrual Pain
Now you have a starting point, play around with it a little if you want -
PMS Pain – How To Naturally Put An End Premenstrual Pain In Just A Few Days
PMS Pain – How To Naturally Put An End Premenstrual Pain With Minimal Side Effects
These are good titles. They are not great titles, but this simple template will give you far better results than trying to pack half of your word count into the heading.
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Do you need to get back to basics with your writing? Become a persuasive article writer by following some simple steps. The Persuasive Essay Guide is a resource for all writers wanting to pick up some pointers and lift their game.
