Most businesses try to sell with their headlines. They mistakenly believe that the job of the first few words on the page is to have people click on that big button. And buy.
Wrong.
Or better, it can be the case only when you have the perfect conditions.
Your customers know about your product category as a solution, they know about other similar products and they know about your product and brand specifically.
They just need to know the price and the offer. If they like it, they might buy right away.
But in most cases, your headline, subhead and CTA button have another purpose. It’s to match visitors’ expectations and to give them a reason to scroll down the page and read more.
How you do that (once you know what your customers want and expect) is you get their attention with a powerful headline, and then establish continuity with your subhead.
Using the wrong headline reminds me when a couple months ago I was walking in town and someone stopped me to ask if I wanted to do take a survey about ice cream. In January!
Who the hell eats ice cream in January (in England at least)?!
Wrong timing, wrong setting, poor results.
A good headline grabs you in because it’s what you want to see. And opens up a discussion that can be filled in by the subhead.
The important point here is the discussion. It’s a sort of continuum and if you break it, you risk losing readers.
For example, if you’re a non profit and in your headline you write about how you help the poor get back on their feet financially, but then transition into writing about how you are an award winning organization in your subhead – that’s when people start wondering whether you really care or not.
Instead, dig deeper into how specifically you help people. Use numbers, vivid details etc.
Keep the discussion going and don’t rush the sale or boast (there’s a time and place for that, too).
But as always, don’t trust me. Trust your market. And test this stuff.
In these cases I feel a bit like the trading gurus: “this is not financial advice, but you should deffo check this out”.
So I won’t do that.
But if you’re interested in learning and doing it yourself, get in touch.
Cheers,
Chris
