Zillions of headlines have been written over the years, but they all fall into one of two categories.
Teaser headlines or benefit headlines.
Teaser headlines are meant to stop you in your tracks because of their cleverness. They don't really communicate anything important in themselves but are meant to intrigue you so that your curiosity draws you into the body copy.
Here are five teaser headlines from ads that appeared in a recent issue of Forbes.
We give you the confidence to dream
How do you efficiently deliver feed to a farmer who knows all his animals by name?
Big?
The retirement sonata
In other words, the copywriters of these lines are betting that you'll try to solve these headline puzzles and keep reading.
But not me. I'd rather bet on a sure thing and stop the reader cold with a benefit, not a conundrum.
Benefit headlines do mean something all by themselves. They do not depend on wittiness or the reader's curiosity. Instead, they try to clearly communicate a solution to the reader's problem. Here are five benefit headlines from ads that also appeared in the same Forbes issue.
More delivery options to and from China
Our indispensable guide to building wealth in the stock market
Life insurance prices drop to all-time lows
Back pain? There IS an answer
Humidifier and purifier. Two in one.
If you are tempted to use a teaser headline and play it cute in an email, on a Web page, or in an ad, I urge you to think again. As John Caples, the father of direct-marketing advertising, advised many years ago:
"Avoid the 'hard-to-grasp' headline -- the headline that requires thought and is not clear at first glance. Remember that the reader's attention is yours for only a single involuntary instant. People will not use up their valuable time trying to figure out what you mean. They will simply turn the page."
