Last Sunday was the third writing class on the Dynamic Steemians Discord channel. I’m so grateful to everyone that has attended or commented on how helpful it has been for them. I’m always looking for better ways to be of service, so please don’t hesitate to let me know if there is something you’d like to see in the class.
I’m also tremendously thankful to @dynamicgreentk and @dynamicrypto for giving me a place to share and teach. Below is a summary of what we discussed, edited for clarity and additional content.
And with that being said, let’s get started.
What’s in a headline?
A headline is the title of your post. Most people think of a title as something that lets a reader know what the post is about. And that's true.
But it also serves another, more important purpose. To make a reader WANT to read your post.
So, a headline needs to attract the attention of someone skimming the Trending/New page, or their feed, so they’ll stop and take the time to look at your post. Hopefully, that results in an upvote, comment or both.
Sometimes when I look at the New posts, I see them popping up almost every second, depending on the time of day. How can you get noticed with all those other ones there?
You need to write a really good headline. And this class is about two primary rules you can use to help you do just that, plus how tags relate to your headline and post content.
Rule #1: Wait to write the headline
My first rule of good headlines is:
Write the headline AFTER you've written the post.
Why?
Because when you begin writing, you probably have an idea of what you want to write. You may even have an outline. But since writing is a creative process, sometimes we end up in a slightly different - often better - place when we are done writing than where we thought we would go.
That sounds like such a confusing sentence when I read it back. Hopefully, I can clear it up in the next few sentences.
Basically, you have all the information you want to write about in your head, maybe some notes too. When you go to put them together into a post, your mind may think of better ways to convey your point. I think this is especially true if you're "in the zone" as they say, and the creative juices are flowing.
For example, you may start a post to share your story of a weekend adventure hiking on a picturesque mountain. You begin intending to tell the basics of where you went, share the pictures, how long it took, etc. But instead, as you write you find that you've focused more on the intense emotional experience you had when you reached the peak.
The story shifts from a "what I did today" post to an "I had an incredible experience" post.
Those two posts would have entirely different headlines because the POINT of it has changed. You might interest different types of people depending on how you write the headline. That’s because you set expectations with a headline. If someone wants to read about the hike you put in your headline but finds you getting all emotional instead, that reader will be disappointed (maybe, at least there’s a good possibility).
I hope that is making sense. If anyone is reading and is confused, please let me know by asking a question in the comments.
So, to recap: Rule #1 is to write the headline AFTER you've completed the post.
Now that you know your headline will match the content you publish, how do you actually write one?
Rule #2: Headlines should “grab” attention
In copywriting (those who write sales or marketing materials), we follow specific guidelines when crafting headlines (yes we craft them, we don’t write them). The main one is :
The headline needs to "grab" the attention of the reader. In this case, someone scanning through posts in their feed.
To do that there are four approaches:
- Make a promise
- Draw a picture (in words)
- State a fact
- Ask a question
I'll go over them each in order.
Making a promise
A headline that makes a promise gets attention because it immediately conveys the value of the post. For example, "Learn how to write a 500 word post in five minutes."
Someone reading that headline would say "Wow! If I read that I'll be able to write a post in five minutes! Imagine how much Steem I can make doing that."
Of course, you should only make promises that are real. Otherwise, the reader will not like your post and either downvote you or write a bad comment.
Drawing a Picture
This is probably the hardest of the four to do. You need to use words that provoke images in the head of the reader.
During class, I had misplaced my notes with examples, but here they are! Not all of them are Steemit related. But all of these are actual headlines that performed very well (I made small modifications for clarity in this context).
Example 1: It’s Raining Money on Steemit
That’s a pretty clear picture, right?
Example 2: The Health Disaster that Didn’t Happen
“Health Disaster” brings to mind images of sick people, hospitals, medicine…whatever your mind associates with the two words.
Example 3: Is Your Medicine is Sending You on A Death Spiral?
Sorry for another health-related example. The “Death Spiral” evokes images of a steady decline or fall into ill-health and death. Again, your mind will associate different pictures with the phrase depending on your background, but the vivid description gets people’s attention.
State a Fact
This one looks obvious but can be tricky.
The fact you choose should be something related to the content of your post, but also interesting (not saying your post isn’t interesting…keep reading).
In particular, interesting to the people who follow you or browse the tags you've posted in.
For example, if you post a headline with "Steemit Hits 1 Million Users - Is that a Good Thing?" in the poetry tag you probably won't get too many views. Or at least not as many as if you posted it with the Steemit tag.
If you've written a fact-filled post about your favorite subject, then you can probably pull out one of those facts that are either funny, exciting, or controversial and use that in your headline.
Ask a question
The last option is to ask a question. Again, it's obvious but also tricky.
The key is to use open-ended questions. You don't ever want a reader to be able to say "Yes" or "No" without reading the post first.
Though sometimes, "yes" answers will work. Something like "Do you want to get upvoted by a huge whale?"
The answer to that is undoubtedly yes so it will draw people in.
But a better headline would be "How to get upvoted by a huge whale" assuming, of course, the post tells how to do that.
"How to" headlines are some of the most popular on the web in general. People go search for answers to their problems, and oftentimes they begin a search with "how to..." Posts with that in the title will be found by the search engines. Plus, it makes a promise to the person that they should learn how to do something by reading the post.
But in hindsight, How-to posts are more of make a promise type headline since they promise to answer a question. Now, I’d rewrite the question to be, “What makes huge whales upvote newbies?”
That should get the attention of newbies and whales. The newbies want to know the answer so they can attract attention. And the whales will read it to see if the post is correct (i.e., they agree with it).
Another example question headline might be, "Why are hundreds of Steemians joining the Dynamic Steemians Discord Channel every day?"
Again, you have to post in front of the right people using the right tags.
Tags
Why do I keep harping about tags?
The tags are what people and the search engine use to determine what your post is generally about. They are also used for other things too - like the Dynamicsteemians tag is used to make sure you're in the running for upvotes from @thundercurator.
@dynamicgreentk asked me to discuss tags tonight too, and it fits right in. I don't claim to be a total expert on them for Steemit though. So, I'm open to anyone sharing or correcting anything I say here. These are my observations based on my limited experience and research on the platform.
Ideally, the tags will help determine the audience for your post. If you are writing poetry, you'll want to make sure you use the poetry tag. If you’re writing about cryptocurrency, then put it in cryptocurrency!
You can use up to 5 tags for each post.
The first one you use sets the default category your post is in. And from what I read it can never be changed later, even if you edit the post.
I think picking the first tag is the hardest because of that. And I honestly haven't figured out for myself how to do that consistently. I've played around a bit and created my own tags for some of my posts that I intend to make a series. For example, I started a Rules for Writers series, and I created the tag rulesforwriters to go with it.
I guess I'm hoping to start something. ; )
Try and pick your first tag to be a category that matches your content best. That's what I do anyway. Then use the remaining four to tag alternatives to your posts topic.
And, of course, to meet the requirements of any group you are in - like using the Dynamicsteemians tag to get on the curation trail and be eligible for upvotes.
I don't know from personal experience, but I've also read that you want to be careful using some tags as they are considered "exclusive" by the groups using them. Always read some of the posts on the one you want to use. If it is something super specific just make sure what you're writing fits into it.
You can always check the full list of possible tags from the home page of Steemit - or the trending page and see if there are some that fit your content better.
@DigitalMind verified that “It is quite true certain tags are exclusively for their members. If you use it, you will get a warning form the bot or their admin.”
One last thing on headlines
Super good headlines take time. For most people at least. I've met some that can whip them out quickly, but most copywriters I know (and I know a lot) set aside time specifically for a headline – maybe as much as 80% of the time it takes to write the entire post! But that’s when writing for marketing purposes and significant money is on the line.
For blogs or posts on Steemit you can, and probably should, spend much less time than that. How much will depend on several factors. The biggest being how much time you want to spend on it.
Do you have questions about writing posts on Steemit?
Don’t think you’re “good enough” for the big writing groups on Steemit or Discord?
Then come join me in my relaxed, simple and accepting classes on the Dynamic Steemians Discord channel. Just click the image below to join.
)Thank you to @dynamicgreentk, @dynamicrypto, and @thundercurator for creating and nurturing such a great community and inviting me to participate.
Title image licensed from Adobe Stock
Dynamic Steemians Gif used with permission from @dynamicgreentk
UPDATE: Fixed the title to be the correct one! Be careful of cut and paste