Killer headings and summaries

"Most people just look at the first couple of words and only read on if they are engaged by those words" according to Eyetrack III. It would appear that the first couple of words need to be real attention-grabbers if you want to capture eyes."

Your heading (headline, title) is the single most important thing you will write on the web. For the impatient scan-reader, your heading is your hook. It is the ultimate killer content, the first vital connexion with your reader so it must mean business.

1 Be compelling
- Use carewords
- Always lead with the need
- Never congratulate yourself, congratulate your reader; Don't say "It's our anniversary: 50% off." Instead say "50% off: It's our 50th anniversary." 
- Consider using the second person "you": "Do you want to learn..."
- Be positive, but occasionally, the negative can work: "Do you make these mistakes in Web Writting?" has been known to work.

2 Be clear
- Get to the point.

3 Be complete

4 Be concise
- It shoulf have impact, you can't achieve that with too many words.

5 Be correct

Killer headings make for bestsellers

Remember The psychology of everyday things, the people felt even more depressed. Tears began to flow and the book's sales were somewhat miserable too. When the next edition came out, the book was renamed The design of everyday things, much clearer. It became a best seller. One word made all the difference, and the world was a happier place.

Test to find your killer heading

One day : 22% chose the heading: Tons of tunes 
And 18%: Apple iTunes sells million-plus songs in a week 
The following heading didn't receive a single vote from anybody: Apple's music store breaks the mold and sells technology

Write killer summaries

If the heading is the hook, the summary is the line that pulls you in. The summary gives you in. The summary gives readers all the information they need to decide whether to read or not.

The summary should lead with the need

Keep the following in mind when writting summaries:

- Sell. The summary should answer the question "What's in it for me?"
- Focus on the Who, what, where, when and how.
- Include compelling carewords.
- The real sentence should have real punch.
- Keep your summaries to 30 words or fewer.

You are not the center of the universe

Don't write to flatter your own ego. it can be a fatal mistake to think that what you care about most is what you reader cares about most. You sell yourself, your product, your idea or your beliefs by first and foremost connecting with what your audience really cares about.

Test, test, test...

An executive in microsoft told me that Microsoft tested these two headings:

10 smart tips for using PowerPoint
10 key tips for using Powerpoint

and that second one had three times the click-through rate by a factor of three. One word.