5 tips for writing a memorable headline

When writing online, you don’t have long to capture your reader’s attention. Some ‘research’ (note the singe quotation marks!) would have it at less than 4 seconds (or shorter than the attention span of the average goldfish), to make an impression.

What makes a great (or at least, memorable) headline? 

Look to the newspapers for inspiration – their headlines need to be short, pithy, and engaging.

Consider some famous examples below:

• Notorious (“Gotcha!” – The sinking of the General Belgrano))
• Political (“It’s Paddy Pantsdown” – Paddy Ashdown’s affair revelations)
• Celebrity-inspired (“Let me Go Go” – George Michael freed on bail)
• Absurd (“Freddie Starr ate my hamster” – say no more!)
• Funny (“Super Caley go ballistic – Celtic are atrocious” – Celtic lose to a lesser team, Inverness Caledonian, in a cup competition)

Now, there is no magic formula to great headline (or indeed sub-headline) writing but there are a few guidelines you can follow which should make it easier.

Five headline-writing hints

1. Use active verbs wherever possible

The active tense is more immediate than the passive tense. 

Also, the active tense calls for the subject (which personalises everything) whereas this can be ignored by the passive tense…all to the detriment of the headline:

• e.g.  “Trump updates US nuclear policy” is much better than “US nuclear policy updated”.

Remember to avoid using ‘impressive’ words for the sake of it. A tip here is to imagine that you are describing an event, in words, to real people, in a pub.

2. Remember, clarity at all costs

You want to keep your headlines short and to the point, but at the same time you don’t want to make it difficult for readers to understand the meaning.

So, don’t scrimp on prepositions like ‘and’, especially when it refers to two people; otherwise the reader is being asked to work too hard and guess what the sentence means:

• e.g. “Trump and Flynn…” rather than “Trump,Flynn…” 

3. Don’t try too hard to be funny

As a rule, avoid exclamation marks in headlines (unless for stylistic effect, such as the famous ‘Gotcha!’ headline)

4. Avoid clichés

Certain sayings have become rather clichéd, having been grossly overused for all manner of headlines:

• Mind the gap
• Size doesn’t matter
• To boldly go

Having said that, it is possible to turn subtly a well-known saying – “Where there’s muck there’s bras”, was a headline about a farmer’s wife who started a lingerie business from a barn which was voted headline of the year by Guardian journalists.

However, do be careful of the overly obvious or tired puns; e.g. “flushed with success” generally signposts that the story will be plumbing-related.

5. Avoid dated references

Popular culture can deliver catchy band names, lyrics, books…etc, which are fine in their specific time period and memorable to a specific generation…but not to everybody.

• “I should be so lucky, lucky, lucky, lucky” – how many millennial are familiar with Kylie’s greatest hit?
• “Don’t look back in anger” ditto

There is no hard and fast rule as to what becomes a ‘classic’ and will therefore stand the test of time; the older the reference and the longer it has been around the better, therefore with Shakespeare you’re generally on pretty solid ground.