Headline Writing 101: Taught by TechCrunch

When you write a headline for an online news story, follow three rules:

1. Length isn't (as much of) a constraint. In print, you have to make your headline fit a certain number of column inches. Online, you can add a word or two. Or three. Or even four. Don't keep a headline short and uninformative.
2. Make the headline descriptive. It should stand completely on its own. It's a micro-summary of the story. If written on a blank sheet of paper, it should tell the reader exactly what they're going to learn in the rest of the story. Your headline will show up everywhere: In links, in search, etc.. Make sure it works in all those places.
3. Remember the search engines. Make sure your headline includes the words that folks will use to find the story. You don't need to be an SEO pro to figure out that folks are more interested in 'bank bailout' than 'Paulson stock purchases' (keep reading for the full story on that example).

How to: NOT Write an Internet-Ready News Headline

Someone at my office sent me this beauty today, courtesy of Associated Press:

While I wholeheartedly agree that stocks should indeed make money, I know that's not what Paulson actually said. His message: Taxpayers should make money on stock the government buys from banks.

This is a perfect example of print-centric headline writing taken online. In a print publication, saying "Paulson says stock purchases should make money" might make sense - the stories around it, the copy right under the headline, etc. will all help the reader instantly figure out what the headline really means.

Online, though, the headline must stand on its own. If I write the headline on a whiteboard with no other information, the reader should immediately know what the story is about.

Otherwise, the mystery headline shows up in search results, where it makes even less sense. If I read the search listing below, I still don't know what's really going on:

And, it forces the visitor to start reading the story. Otherwise they can't figure out if they want to read it or not. Which is a bit silly. People don't like to read text online. They never have. So you need to make it easy for them to make that read/don't read decision quickly and easily, with the headline.

Finally, it's an SEO catastrophe. Associated Press probably wants this headline found if someone searches for 'bank stock bailout' not 'Paulson stock purchases'. But the current headline works for the latter, not the former. And it shows - the story is top ranking for 'Paulson stock purchases' but nowhere to be seen for 'bank stock bailout'. Ugh.

Doing it Write (heh - get it?)

Following the 3 rules, I'd re-write the Paulson headline like this:

Paulson: Bank stock bailout may benefit taxpayers

Or something similar. It's got the keyphrase, tells you what Sec. Paulson was really saying, and it's not even that much longer.

How would you rewrite the headline?

11 internet marketing skills you must always be learning

In spite of reading my blog, you want to go into internet marketing. Welcome to the asylum, my friend.

Time to start learning. This is a list necessary skills for an internet marketer. Warning: I do not necessarily know all these as well as I want to. I'm still learning:

• Writing. I've beaten this one to death. If you can't write, don't even put the word 'marketer' in your title. DON'T. I hear you starting - "mar..." BZZZZT. Stop right there.
• Statistics. You don't need to be an expert statistician. But understanding a rolling average, statistical significance and confidence interval is required.
• SEO. Yep. Search engine optimization. This of course leads to a whole new list of stuff. That's for another blog post.
• PPC. Pay per click marketing. See SEO, above.
• Information Retrieval. I separate this from SEO and PPC because it's central to a lot of stuff you may end up doing to dig through/mine/organize data when you do everything from social media monitoring to reading your client's last 3 years of sales brochures.
• HTML and CSS. Please. For the love of all that's good in the universe. You can't help people market on the internet if you can't even fathom how it's all built.
• Design. You don't have to be a professional designer. At least I hope not - I can't design to save my life. But you should understand some basic principles: The Golden Ratio, typography, use of color, how to do a layout using a grid. Don't be a native, but at least speak the language.
• Social media. Shudder. It pains me to use this stupid phrase. Still, you need to understand how people connect online. It's a (sarcasm here) teeny little aspect of online marketing (end sarcasm). Twitter, Facebook, StumbleUpon, Reddit, and a bunch of others.
• Math. Quick: What's .1 X $10,000? If you answered $100, then I've interviewed you before. Fail.
• Business sense. I can't easily categorize this. But you need to understand what makes a business 'tick'. Little stuff, like earning more money than you spend, can really make a difference.
• Diplomacy. Yeaaahhhhhhhhh I'm still working on this one. Learn to advocate, strongly, for controversial points that you know for certain are critical to your client. Without alienating every single person in the room. 'Diplomacy' is the ability to tell people they're totally wrong, and make them smile at the same time.