How to write blog post titles
A question was asked in the LinkedIn bloggers group, "Do you have a system for creating blog post titles? If so, what is it?"
I responded with this...
My philosophy is that we speak to two audiences with our blog, one human and one machine (i.e., search engines). As such, the post titles have to make sense to both. Creating titles that do the job well is both art and science. And, of course, it depends on whether we really care about reaching either audience, or both as the case may be.
My procedure is normally to incorporate a keyword or keyword phrase into the post title and to frontload it if at all possible. I then repeat those keywords in the post itself a couple of times, depending on the length of the post. Obviously, that's in an effort to appeal to Google. As you are aware, the post title is turned into an HTML title tag, at least in the most popularly used blog platforms. That's important from an SEO perspective.
The art then is to wrap a sentence or phrase around those keywords that make sense to the human reader. I've almost completely abandoned writing "catchy" titles in favor of ones that are more descriptive of the topic at hand. I'll leave the catchy titles to the likes of Seth Godin. He already has plenty of traffic. Me, I need pagerank.
Now, let's suppose one of my posts returns well for someone searching a particular keyword. It increases the likelyhood that one they're looking for and what I'm talking about are going to be a better match. What I don't need is a majority of my traffic hitting the site, then quickly leaving. Not only that, but using a more descriptive title will help the reader vet whether the post is worth their time to begin with.
For example, in this post, , I opted for descriptive and use of frontloaded keywords. I'd like to think the last phrase is descriptive enough for human readers to see where I'm going with it.
Conversely, in this post, A list of things to do before I die , I went for catchy. The former was intended to be more polemic and informative. The latter was a bit more personal.
Anyway, long answer, which I hope made sense.
- Two audiences, humans and machines
- Have to appeal to both
- Use fron-tloaded keywords in combination with descriptive titles
- Leave the catchy stuff to bloggers who can afford the luxury
That was followed by a question from group moderator Dennis McDonald:
"Do you think it necessary or useful to take into account use of RSS feeds by users and the fact that people who already know you may be inclined to be more accommodating of weird or clever titles? For those people who know you and subscribe, how important is the title? For those people who see a title of yours buried in a Google search output, won't a catchy title make yours stand out?"
My response...
As to RSS feed subscribers I still think it's an issue, though not as poignant a one. You know they're predisposed to reading your stuff or they wouldn't have subscribed. However, they may also be predisposed to read the other 200 people they've subscribed to.
I do think, in that setting, a catchy title might work better. However, you can't have one title for RSS feed subscribers and one for everyone else. So, back to the search engines...
Why do people search? For any number of reasons, but most often it's to get an answer to a question. The Eisenberg brothers, Jeff and Brian, who make a living dealing with that I refer to as "conversion rate optimization," used an interesting metaphor in their book Call to Action. They said the searchers are not unlike a dog on a hunt. Both are on a "scent trail." They've typed a keyword term and that's what they're sniffing for. Your use of keywords in the blog post will keep them on that trail.
It's the same methodology that PPC marketers use, the good ones anyway. They incorporate the search term in the Adwords title and in the body content, the same as I suggested bloggers do.
So, the first order of business is to keyword optimize your post, both title and content. Then, you can get creative and catchy. However, as I indicated earlier, I opt for descriptive.
Keep in mind, my focus is using blogs as marketing tools. I believe blogging is its own form of search engine optimization. I know Chris Baggott, founder of Compendium Blogware, would agree with me.
That's not to suggest that, on occasion, you throw all that out the door and just come up with a cool, creative, catchy title. Sure, why not. It really all goes back to the reason you're blogging in the first place.
