10. Noun phrase – without a verb
Godzilla!
Obama on the Middle East
The stars of „DWTS‟
11. Headlines are often elliptical
Some words are left out: the or a(n)
[The]Stillness of [the]night shattered by gunfire
The verb to be [is/are] are left out
Amy Bishop [is] found guilty of murder
12. Grammar
Headlines often follow different grammatical rules
Not always complete sentences
More earthquake deaths
Headlines often contain strings of nouns
iPhonefactory riot
Articles and the verb to be are often left out
Samford football rising, says coach
13. Grammar
Special tense-system
Unusual to find complex forms like is coming or has
produced
Generally the simple present (comes, produces) is used
Radio stations sends food to tsunami victims
Students fight for curriculum updates
Rich babies eat less, says researcher
14. Grammar
Sometimes present progressive tense is used, but auxiliary
verb is usually left out.
Global bacon shortage „unavoidable‟ next year
US getting warmer, say researchers
15. Grammar
To refer to the future, headlines often use the infinitive
Vice president to visit Austal
President to announce foreign policy Tuesday
Passive sentences use no auxiliary verb, just the past
participle
Updyke arrested on terrorizing charge
Teen hurt in fall
16. Grammar
Quotation marks used to show comment
Not necessarily that they are true
Question marks are used when something is not certain
Recession over by spring?
17. Comma
And: Income, spending up sharply
Separating a list or phrases
iPhone‟s larger, thinner design
19 months after graduation, finally a job
18. Colon
A colon is used to separate main point and comment
VT shooting: Death toll rises
Explain
Washington prediction: growth evaporates, almost recession
Name, not direct quote
Senator: Give me polygraph
24. Magazine headlines
How and Why
Trigger words to enable or persuade
Numbers
Five new foods that will burn fat
10 ways to lower your golf score
The five things great parents know about their kids
Make a promise
Promise your reader something
Deliver on it
25. Magazine tips
Read the article, list main words and phrases
Be friends with your thesaurus
Avoid clichés and the hackneyed turn of phrase
Study other publications
Practice writing for already published stories
26. Magazine headlines
Say it simply and directly
State the big benefit
Bark a command
Offer useful information
27. Magazine headlines
Simple formula
Number or trigger word + Adjective +Keyword + Promise
“Bathing elephants”
You could write an article entitled, “How to Bath an
Elephant” or “Why I Love Bathing Elephants.”
“18 Unbelievable Ways You Can Bathe an Elephant Indoors”
“Selling your house in a day”
“How You Can Effortlessly Sell Your Home in Less than 24
Hours”
28. Magazine headlines
Catchy
Curiosity
Controversy
Specifics
Be useful
The best headline tells the reader what he‟s getting.
The more useful, the better.
29. Online headlines
Search Engine Optimization
The process of improving the visibility of a website in a
search engine‟s results.
SEO targets different kinds of search, including images,
locale, video, news and industry-specific searches.
SEO considers how search engines work, what people
search for, the actual search terms used and which search
engines the targeted audience prefers.
30. Online headlines
Originally: straight from the print version
First evolution: search engines – keyword heavy
Second evolution: RSS feeds – eye-catching
31. Online headlines
Now: eye-catching, clever and includes keywords
Includes some of the same principles used in magazines
36. Online headlines
SEO primacy
URL
Headline, title of article
First paragraph
Keyword heavy
Inbound links
Links from elsewhere
Social bookmarking/blogging
Keywords in text
Meta keywords
37. Online headlines
Google
Content freshness
Diversity of content – different angles
Rich textual content – keywords
Indexes quickly, so beware of mistakes
Bing
Quality content
Relevant ingoing/outgoing
Relevant title tags
Don‟t overkill the keywords
38. Online headlines
Influence begets influence
Page rank
Links
Link text is associated with your site
Title
<title>Most important part of the page</title>
41. Online headlines
Often isolated with little or no context
Appear in many places on the site
Pop up on external sites
Can‟t depend on text size for impact
Must get the point across
Change from print, or changed/updated as
circumstances warrant
43. Online headlines
„Kate Middleton playing World of Warcraft on beach‟
won‟t generate a lot of clicks
What will my reader respond to?
What will they search?
Squeeze that into 68 characters (ie What makes people
click?)
44. Online headlines
Specificity
Tell as much of the story as possible
More precise than clever or funny
Don‟t oversimplify or patronize
45. Online headlines
Your top angle
Does it reflect the article?
Plan your headline
Which words hold the most importance? Include the top two.
Be clever, witty, make sure it stands out
Who are you writing for
Keywords are king
What will people search for?
Be clear and concise
46. Online headlines
Don‟t worry about being boring
If the story is boring headline magic won‟t help much
Great story you can‟t explain in the headline = poor story
47. Online headlines
Spend 20 minutes
Research
Work until you have a killer headline
Tell the story to others; note the reaction
