Have you ever read a title on the Internet and found yourself clicking through to the actual post or website just because the title grabbed your attention? Of course you have! Even if you find the website or post isn’t of interest when you arrive at the site, you were still drawn to checking it out. And who knows? Maybe you would have been interested. But bloggers need to remember that when they make a title for a blog or even just a post on their blog, they need to do so with audience in mind.
The title is the first thing a reader will see when he comes to your site, and often sees even earlier than that. A good title will draw readers in and intrigue them so much they need to look at your blog. It’s easy to dismiss the importance of a title because the content in the body of a post should be more important than the heading—but it’s crucial to remember that without a great title, no one will take the time to get to the body of a post.
I used to run a psychology blog, back when I was studying Psych in college. I was trying to stay professional, to not sound to Pop-Psychology—I wanted to be taken seriously. Yet I quickly learned that it was only a very niche community that wanted to read about “Modern Methods of Psychoanalytic Techniques—A Survey of the Past Century’s Progress.” That was a fine title for my professors, sure, but it just didn’t fit a Tumblr or Blogspot account. We are forever judging books by their covers, but blogs don’t have that kind of PR. You won’t know what a blog looks like until you’re on the actual site, and before anyone goes on a website they have to click on a link. I found that for that same college paper, I could change the title around to something like “Where Are We Now?: Psychology Since Freud” will get significantly more web traffic.
Always stick with something short and catchy, and never convoluted, to get the attention of more readers. It’s those readers who stumble onto your blog and find that it’s just exactly what they were looking who will become your loyal audience. Bloggers need to remember this at all times and create blog post titles which draw people in, even those who may not have a deep interest in the blog as a whole. How do you go about creating great titles when blogging, ones which will lead to more hits?
When creating a title, stop and think about your audience and what they are most likely to search for. This can help you come up with a title. Of course you should also take the content of the post into consideration. What came first, the title or the body? Some bloggers find it more helpful to write the post first while others create a title and then write the post to fit the title they came up with. This remains a matter of personal preference. Either way, don’t be afraid to tweak it—a title isn’t permanent until the post is published on your blog.
Make sure your posts contain one or two keywords that resonate with your audience. You want them to connect on a personal level with what you are writing so they will come back again. You’ll find that these keywords can be of great help in creating a title also. Make use of free tools available on the web when choosing your keywords for the post. If you have already written the post, you may want to go back and see if these keywords can be naturally inserted anywhere if they aren’t already included. Type your proposed title into these tools also as this will tell you if others are going to be interested in the post based on the title alone. If not, you can still change it. The key word here is “naturally”—you don’t want your blog to sound robotic or forced, make the process feel as organic as possible.
When choosing your keywords, look for those with low competition, high searches or longtail keywords. If possible, include these words in your title. If you can find a keyword that meets all three requirements, you have a title that is really going to attract attention. If you can’t find one that meets all three, aim for two. Make sure the title remains both relevant and concise though. Once you have the title, go back and read your post again. Make sure the two go together. If not, you may need to redo your post.
When you craft a great title, people will be attracted to your site and if they like what they see there they’ll keep coming back for more. Once you start gaining an audience, more people will keep coming back. The importance of a great title should never be discounted.
Author Bio
Tara is an avid blogger—she has two Blogspot pages and a Twitter, but her heart truly lies in the Tumblr community. She usually posts about books and blogging, but has recently taken an interest in medical issues, especially relating to mesothelioma treatments. She lives in Park Slope with her basset hound, Watson.
