How do you choose headlines?

[louhutt]

I just tend to put what the post is about! I didn't realise it could be so technical.

[rtsurvivor]

If you do articles for those that know where you are on the net then a well thought out headline is a must. However, if you want your articles found by the mass on the net the you should really start your 'Headline/title' with the articles subject keyword.

Cat Training is the keyword and subject of the article.

ie:
"Here are some tips on cat training"
This won't get you far in the search engines.

"Cat Training. 5 tips that work everytime."
The SEs will pickup on the KW and give your article more weight.

This is considered SEO. It gets a bit more envolved than that but for the SEs to put you where you can be found you have to sort of play by their urles.

Also, this plays a big part if you want to sell your article or have them distrubited by an article distribution service.

The net is a jungle and you can get eaten alive if you don't play by their rules.

RT...

[AlexH]

Well, I usually have a subject that I will write about and in the interests of ease and creating a theme running through my blog, I just title every blog post begining with The. For example, if I'm writing about when I had a fairly cringeworthy talk to someone, I'll just title it The Awkward Chat.

It's not the greatest style of title, but I think it does the job.

[mepis]

First time poster here. Come to learn some stuff.

Anyway, I've been writing for a while. Titles are a pain. but from my experience it all depends on the situation. My wife does most of the writing for a book review blog we do, "Hippies, Beauty, and Books. Oh My!", and has a straight forward title for everything. Ex- "Review- Name of books here by author". Our audience knows we are a book review blog so it works. It's straight to the point and they can find the information, or search the blog, easily.

I do also write some articles for it. If it's an opinion piece I try and be a little more edgy and controversial. Either way it will provoke a strong feeling that will cause the reader to click and read. Often times it will lead to comments as well.

If it's an information or how to piece I try and ask a question. A person looking for that how-to will read it either way because they are already looking for it. That question may draw in other readers though by posing an imaginary problem and they want to know the answer.

If it's a news piece, copy newspapers. Pretty plain and simple.

[rtsurvivor]

Actually Alex and mepis you both have valid ideas. However, ( I just love "However") The SEs have to use something to judge and catagorize a site. If articles are the main stay of the site then SEO comes into play with a system known as LSI, Latent Sematic Indexing; aslo called LSA, latent Sematic Analysis. The SEs love to make everything complicated.

So, if you want your articles found by the majority of the searchers then the SEO for the articles will play a big part. If you have an article that you think is the best every written by anyone about; toilet train a cat kit you will find that there are approx. 43.5 million sites with that term in Yahoo. Will your writting beat out the others? That's a toughie. I can't imagine why anyone would use such a term but they do do.

Anyhow, Getting found on the net has changed a lot which means that if you do not adept you will get lost in the shuffel. Is that fair? Not really but the SEs own the gold mines so they make the rules.

Luck with your articles
RT...

[Techmaker]

Headline should give a extract of your blog post. Once somebody read your headline he will be able to understand what is all inside the post. And also it should be written in simple English.