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Blog Titles to Tell “The Truth”

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Late last year, journalists at National Geographic Magazine teamed up with AARP to explore “how Americans perceive aging as we emerge from the COVID pandemic”. There were a number of great articles in the AARP Bulletin issue, but what was so interesting to me as a blog content writer was the way the word “truth” kept appearing in some of the titles: “The New Truth About Aging”,”The New Truth About Voting Laws.”

“Your blog headline is the first impression a reader will have with your content. It can be their reason for clicking or their reason for brushing your post aside.,” observes the createmytherapist website.com. “A catchy headline could cause someone to pause, pique their interest and make them hungry for more of the content they’ll find in your blog post. It’s also one of the most important factors for your search engine optimization (SEO)”.

For me as a blog content writer, Truth-Abouts make for compelling titles. There’s a hint of mystery, a promise an expose, perhaps – as a reader, I feel as if I am going to be given the “real scoop” There’s something enticing about a title promising to “bare the truth”, especially when it concerns a topic on which we didn’t expect there to be any secrets to speak of.

At Say It For You, we use “Truth-About’ blog posts with three basic purposes in mind:

1. To de-mystify a subject.
2. To myth-bust, addressing misunderstandings about a product or service
3. To offer actionable steps readers can take

Helping readers sort truth from myth is one important use for business blogs.  In the natural order of business, many misunderstandings about a product or service present themselves, and shining the light of day on misinformation shines light on your own expertise in your field.

Even when there is no final answer, blog content writers can summarize the different schools of thought and recap the research that is being done in the field. That in itself can go a long way towards making your blog a “go-to” place for readers seeking information relating to your industry or profession.

Blog titles “to tell the truth” can be a very useful content writing idea!

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Should Blog Titles Tell All?

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Besides being an absolutely fascinating read, Popular Science Magazine‘s special collector’s edition “Journey to the Future” offers a course in creating interesting titles (a topic of extreme interest, as you may imagine, to any blog content writer).

Of course, when it comes to blogs, the very first piece of information readers are going to receive is the title of the post. We want the searcher to click on the link, and of course we want search engines to offer our content as a match for readers seeking information and guidance on our topic. More than that, though, a blog post title in itself constitutes a set of implied promises to visitors. In essence, you’re saying, “If you click here, you’ll be led to a post that in fact discussing the topic mentioned in the title.

Here are some very straightforward titles from Popular Science Magazine:

  • Quantum Computing: the Future of AI
  • Will Robots Help or Harm? That’s Up to Humans
  • The Future of Transplants
  • Boosting Memory

    In blogs, as we teach at Say It For You, even the tone of the title constitutes a promise of sorts, telling the searcher whether the content is going to be humorous, satirical, controversial, cautionary, or simply informative. Then, for SEO (Search Engine Optimization) purposes, the title needs to contain keyword phrases, which each of these titles does. At the same time, an important purpose of marketing blogs is inducing searchers to read the post, and for that, the title must arouse curiosity and interest.

Curiosity-piquing titles in this Popular Science issue include:

  • Get Ready to Sniff Disease
  • Engineered for Ethics
  • Running on Reckless
  • Eyes on the Earth
  • Re-defining Meat
  • Always on Duty

(Fascinating, curious titles, but you don’t really know what sort of content to expect in the article to come.)

One compromise is what I call the “Huh?-Oh!” two-part title, in which the first part is an attention-getter, with more of an explanation in the second part.

Examples of two-part titles from Popular Science:

  • All Together Now – Human Societies are the Technologies of the Future and Cooperation is the Fuel
  • The Extra-Dimensional Artist – When Visual Art and Augmented reality Merge

One popular misconception I run into as a business blogging trainer is that blog titles need to be what I would call “cutesy”, meaning they must have an enticing “ring” to them that arouses attention. My opinion – Cutesy belongs in baby clothes. Yes, blog post titles need to capture attention, but when readers click on a link, they need to find material that is congruent with what the title promised would be there.

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In Blogging for Business, Clarity is Better Than Originality

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We never want to alienate readers “just for the sake of it”, cautions Moriah Richard, editor of Writer’s Digest. Readers want to be surprised, but they don’t want to be tricked, she explains.

Camilla Allegrucci agrees. She has good news and bad news for writers all wrapped into one: “New ideas are not a thing”. Rather than original ideas, she says, you need an original voice. Sure, you might need some work to refine your “voice”, but you can express yourself in the best way your voice allows. When it comes to content writing, it’s all about answering your audience’s queries, so why reinvent the wheel when people are already telling us what they want to read about? Write from your own perspective and

An audio course for book authors, Brainstorming a Better Book Title, emphasizes the same concept. “The number one requirement for your book title is, does it clearly indicate what the book is about? If you can come up with a title that’s both clear and clever, all the better, Marci Yudkin says. But if you must choose between clarity and cleverness, clarity is more important for success.

“Cutesy is for dolls, not blog post titles,” is my own Say It For You motto. Yes, titles are important, very important. In fact, titles represent crucial elements in capturing the interest of both search engines and online searchers. But, aside from Search Engine Optimization considerations, the title of a blog post constitutes a set of implied promises to visitors: The main promise is simply this: lf you choose to click on this title, it will lead you to a blog post with information on the topic named in the title.

It helps to bring in less well-known facts about familiar things and processes, and even more when you suggest new ways of thinking about things readers already know. New ideas may not be “a thing”, but new insights and opinions can be. At Say It For You, our advice to business owners and their content writers is that you must offer an opinion, a slant, on the information you’re serving up to readers. No, it’s not “new information”, and you’re not re-inventing the proverbial wheel. What’s “new is the clarity of your views on the subject.

In blogging for business, clarity is better than originality – every time.

 

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Blogging Your Pull Quote

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In graphic design, a key phrase or sentence is sometimes “pulled” from an article and placed in a larger print in a box on the page. The “pull quote” is used to draw interest, but also gives readers a a “preview” of the thesis to be proven or at least discussed in the article.

In a recent issue of Health Magazine, the article “The Digital-Era Brain” (a discussion of whether the Internet is eroding our memory) features the following pull-quote, printed in bold: “In one study, a group of students said they spent 20 percent of class time texting, playing games, and checking social media”. A second article discussing the USA Memory Championship, titled “Battle of the Big Brains”, features the following pull quote: “Though the brain accounts for only 2 percent of the body’s mass, it uses up a fifth of all the oxygen we breathe and burns a quarter of our glucose.”

In blog posts, both titles and images can serve as “pull quotes”.

“Pull quote” titles

When it comes to blogging for business, titles matter, and for two basic reasons: a) Keywords and phrases help search engines make the match between online searchers’ needs and what your business or professional practice has to offer. b) Exactly like the pull quote on the magazine page, the idea is to “pull” in readers by engaging their interest.

If the title is phrased as a question, asking readers if they’re grappling with an issue or a need that you not only know about, but which you’re accustomed to helping solve – that’s perfect as a pull quote tactic.

“Pull quote” images

Adding images to blog posts has been shown to increase readership. In fact, consumers have been shown to be more likely to consider or contact a business when an image appears in search results. What we’ve found at Say It For You, interestingly, is that commercial images, or “clip art”, which don’t depict the actual products, customers, or colleagues of that business or practice, work particularly well as interest “pullers”, capturing the main concept that will be articulated in the post.

In a very basic sense, blog posts themselves function as “pull quotes”. In fact, one of the most important reasons blogs have a distinct advantage over the more static website copy is that each post draws visitors’ focus to just one story, one aspect of the business, practice, or product, precisely in the manner that a pull quote draws attention to just one main concept embodied in the full article.

Use blogging as a set of pull quotes for your website offerings!

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In Blogging, Use Numbered Lists; Don’t Forget the Subscript

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A subscript is a character that is set slightly below the normal line of type, respectively. It is usually smaller than the rest of the text. The National Geographic’ magazine issue “100 Places That will Change Your Life” is a great example of the way content writers can use subscripts in the titles of blog posts..

Under the name of each place the National Geographic authors recommend you visit, they’ve described a specific experience you can enjoy:

  • In Qutu, China, you can learn Shaolin kug fu, the martial art developed by monks in the 15th century.
  • In Oaxaca, Mexico, you can learn to prepare tamales using chocolate, grasshoppers, and corn fungus.
  • In Jamaica, make sure to meet the Maroons, descendants of enslaved Africans who fought for freedom from the British.
  • At Ellis Island, you can discover parts of your own family history.
  • In Vietnam, you can wander the spice forests.
  • In Bali, Indonesia, look for stunning penjor, bamboo poles adorned with frit, flowers, ad coconut leaves that display Hindu offerings during the festival of Galungan.

The way this wonderful magazine issue is set out serves as a reminder of several blog writing tactics we emphasize at Say it For You:

  1. Present information in numbered lists – Lists spatially organize information, helping create an easy reading experience, working well for scanning and skimming online searchers.
  2. Use “huh-oh” titles – “Huh?s” arouse curiosity; the “ohs” make clear what the article is about and use the keyword phrases.
  3. Offer specific advice and tips, thereby demonstrating that we understand our target readers’ needs.
  4. Include startling statistics – “Only an estimated one in 1,000 to 10,000 survives to adulthood” (describing why readers might be interested in rescuing sea turtles in Costa Rica). Opening your post with a startling statistic can be a way to grab visitors’ attention. If there’s some false impression people seem to have relating to your industry, or to a product or service you provide, statistics can serve as myth-busters.

In blogging, use numbered lists, and don’t forget the subscripts!

 

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