In a crowded market, it’s so difficult to find ways of driving people to your website.
We’ve all been fooled with the questionable ethics of clickbait headlines and, as The Who so succinctly put it, we “won’t get fooled again”! This leaves us with the interesting question, how do you drive people to your website in a way that is ethical, but at the same time enticing, and is catchy enough to get attention, but not so catchy it looks like clickbait?
You’ve firstly got to remember that in terms of readers, you want quality over quantity. When your aim is to sell your products or services, there’s no point in writing headlines that appeal to huge numbers of people, because most of them simply aren’t interested. What they’ll do is realise they’re not interested and click away, slightly annoyed that what the headline promised is not what was delivered. This is not good for positive brand awareness. So much better to appeal to your target customer, even if it means fewer people visit your website.
Your company is there to solve a problem or make life better, and easier, for your customers and clients. By addressing what their pain points are, you’ll definitely get their attention. If they happen to be scratching their heads about, for example, why they’re not on the first page of Google search results for their best-selling product, and they see a headline along the lines of ‘How to get your product to number one on Google searches’, you’ve just generated a potentially useful lead.
Another way of framing a headline is to pose it as a question – but if you do this, make sure you do answer the question in the article. (Still waiting for the 50 headlines? Don’t worry, they’re coming!) Headlines in question format are good for Google searches because they reflect what people are actually searching for. If we post a blog that’s headlined ‘How does PPC advertising help get results’ and someone is typing that into a search engine or asking Alexa that question, it’s more likely that our blog will be seen by that particular person than if the headline is less descriptive, e.g. ‘Cariad Marketing can help boost your PPC’.
Life hacks are extremely popular – after all, who doesn’t want to make their life easier? So why not share a few business tips with potential clients – it’s all part of building trust in your brand, so don’t be afraid to share a few trade ‘secrets’ (which are probably available somewhere on the internet anyway). By being happy to give people tips, you’re showing that you want to help your customers, and you’re also making your company appear trustworthy and transparent, all of which are desirable traits that are likely to gain you fans.
So, it’s time to put our money where our Cariad mouth is. In the headline we promised 50 catchy, ethical headlines, and here they are. They’re clearly aimed at digital marketing topics – because these are real headlines and that’s what we do! – but please feel free to adapt them to your own sector’s needs.