How to Reconcile SEO Title Tags and Clickworthy Headlines
Understanding how to write effective SEO title tags and headlines can be confusing these days. See you’re not the only one! Many struggle over making it SEO optimized and at the same time enticing enough to draw in the clicks, which is the main job of a headline, right?
While at first blush the symbiotic relationship between title tags and headlines can seem at odds, but you have to be able to find a happy medium. Recognize first that one without the other leads to failure is a good first step.
Let’s examine each, and find out if there’s way to satisfy the needs of both sufficiently.
What goes into a good SEO title tag?
With a title tag limited to around 64 characters, you are space-challenged right from the get-go. This is the number of characters that will appear in the search results, so you need to make it count.
What’s also important to Google at present is the intent of the search query. What’s the searcher actually looking for? Google is getting better and better at reading this, and you need to write with this in mind.
It’s fine if you can squeeze in another keyword without it becomming unreadable, but your words will need to reflect what the searcher has in mind.
So what makes a good page headline?
Conversely, your page headline has to entice the reader to read on, to yearn for more information. A lot of great headlines will invoke curiosity, promise solutions, and inject emotions.
“How to write a novel in 30 days and stay married.” This title make a bold promise, has a time element and gets a smile. (From those of us who are married)
Making the Two become One
Many times it’s a decision you have to make: is this piece designed to rank well for the ages, or is it something that you may be using socially, or driving paid traffic to. It’s not that you can’t have both, but sometimes the intersect between SEO and enticing titles is quite small. Understanding your purpose for the piece can help you choose which route to take.