Your headlines are the strongest weapons in the arsenal of your copywriting

On an average your headlines are read five times more than your copy. It’s not just me who is saying that, even David Ogilvy said it once, or maybe many times. Another statistic says that 8 out of 10 people read the headlines but only 2 out of 10 read the main copy.

It’s like making the first impression. The point is your headlines highlight the fundamental message that you want to convey through your copy. If your headline is poor people are not going to read the remaining text. So whenever you are creating copy for a website spend lots of time formulating the headlines because they are the backbone of your entire copywriting endeavor.

Creating a compelling headline does not mean that you need to mislead your readers into believing something that you do not intend to say in the fine print of your copy. The headline is there to highlight the main point in the most possibly attractive manner. If you are unable to create a strong headline it definitely means that you have got nothing to say in your copy and this is where perhaps you must rethink whether you should write it at all. Create a lousy headline and you have lost a reader and worst, a customer, forever. Studies show that almost 80% online sales are made on the basis of the headlines.

As soon as they arrive at your website hit them with a strong, compelling headline. What is the strongest benefit you have got to offer to your visitors? What have they been looking for that you can instantly provide? Can you ask the most pressing question they have in their minds and can you provide an answer? What desire or drive has brought them to your website? You can use all this information to create an effective headline. Grab their attention in the least possible time.

Headlines are useful for people who quickly scan through your webpage. By just going through your headlines they can quickly make out whether they want to read the rest of the page or not. It is not well established that Internet surfers have a very short attention span. You constantly need to engage them, entice them, nudge them and keep them glued to your webpage. Long streams of text will bore them and consequently, sent them away.

Your headlines help you divide your long copy into shorter chunks that can be easily read. In fact your readers can jump from one portion to another by simply reading the headline. Having good headlines means that you want to make it easier for your readers to go through your copy.

Headlines also help the search engine crawlers to make better sense of the content on your page. While going through your content the search engine crawlers pay more attention to your headlines because through your headlines they can easily make out what information your webpage can provide to search engine users and for what keywords. Many as you experts use headlines to great SEO advantage. That’s why it is recommended that while formulating your headlines make sure that your keywords and other important phrases appear in your headlines.

To pack a punch into your copy, begin with a powerful headline, and then end with a powerful statement.