2 Free Tools to Guarantee You Always Write a Great Headline

Headlines are the most important part of your article.

They’re the flare that you shoot up into the sky to alert the surrounding populace. No flare gun and all you have is an audience wandering around in the dark. They’ll never know of the great content you produce.

Granted, if by the time your audience gathers and they find you have nothing important to say — they will leave and probably never come back.

But without that initial curiosity — that burst of fire incited by a great headline or cover image, you’ll never have the chance to capture them in the first place.

In fact, the average internet surfer will read 80% of headlines, but only 20% will actually read the article.

So while you should study other successful blog articles and their subsequent headlines, you should also use these two free tools to guarantee your headlines are awesome.

1. A High-Quality Headline Analyzer

Here are two example headlines from Tim Ferriss’ blog:

• “How German Techno Can Make You a Better Agile Programmer”
• “5 Principles of Flying Trapeze for Better Hiring Decisions”

Unfortunately, there isn’t any story behind either of these headlines as they’re only examples (sorry to all the German techno programmer fanatics). What we can learn, however, is that these are two near-perfect headlines according to isitWP, a popular online analyzing tool.

isitWP is a fundamental utility for bloggers, web developers, and SEO managers. It offers hard data on the best tools out there for the aforementioned jobs. Additionally, they give free expert advice on how to grow your following through their informative blog.

However, what I love about isitWP most is their headline analyzer tool. With this tool, any headline you think of can be run through and reviewed instantly free of charge.

Moreover, you get high-quality data about your headline such as how balanced your headline is, how many uncommon words you used, the overall sentiment (happy, angry, or sad), and how many power words you used.

Whenever I doubt the quality of this tool (which is extremely rare) I run a headline that I know is great — such as one from Ferris’ blog or Tim Dennings. Always I’m reassured when I see the tool light up green based on the author’s excellent use of language and marketing.

2. A Complete List of Power Words

Sure, this tool is a lot less automated than the analyzer but no less important.

Power words tickle our brains more than others trite verbiage. Professional writers and marketers know this and use this to their advantage.

Here are some examples of power words:

• Simple
• Exciting
• Bold
• Complete (People really like that one)
• Little-known
• Free

Unless you’re writing something very unconventional, every headline you write should implement power words. Conversely, you do need to find a good balance of using them.

People hate feeling like you’re selling them something, so a headline like “5 Simple Exciting Ways to Make Lots of Money Fast” may be a bit hyperbolic for your audience. Additionally, you better deliver on a headline like that or your readers will feel burnt.

The popular blogging site “Sumo” offers my favorite list of power words and organizes their list by emotion. They offer power words for headlines targeting happiness, pride, simplicity, lust, and even greed.

Final Thoughts

Through using both of these tools my confidence as a headline writer has soared. However, I still use these two tools to guarantee I write the best headline possible.

I also follow advice from David Ogilvy, known as “The Father of Advertising”,  who once revised a headline 104 times before deciding on the final draft.

Never settle on your first idea of a headline. Even if it is your best, make sure you pull it apart and try other ideas before you settle.

Shoot that flare into the sky, attract more readers, and finally grow as a writer with kick-ass headlines.