Posted by: Michel Fortin
August 25, 2009
Issue #744

The Truth About Mega-Headlines

There’s an interesting debate going on in my copywriting forum, about copy cosmetics and specifically the formatting of headlines and sub-headlines.

My post here is not to discuss those issues directly. I’ll reserve that for another article.

However, I do want to add my thoughts on one issue that seems to keep coming back in the forum — the issue of using long-winded, excessively wordy headlines that are prevalent on websites nowadays.

One extremely talented member, JayKay, is a graphic designer with a flair for direct response. His thoughtful—and often thought-provoking (and sometimes controversial) — posts are a wonder to read. And, a breath of fresh air.

Here’s why.

He’s a solid proponent of clean, pithy headlines. An Ogilvy and direct response enthusiast, he often makes sarcastic remarks about (and often creates parodical graphic caricatures of) these long mega-headlines, in an effort to ridicule the already ridiculous nature of these chapter-sized headlines.

(And he does so while many others argue that long, mega-headlines are the way to go. “They’re proven,” they say, “because they’re taught to be so according to the ‘guru du jour’.”)

So JayKay often refers to Ogilvy, in which he states that headlines should be no more than a few words only. He also added this timely (and brilliant, I might add) comment:

It’s interesting to note what is considered a short headline and what is considered a long headline. Less than two decades after Ogilvy On Advertising some (Internet?) “guru” who read his book comes up with the idea that if long headlines (six-twelve words) are better than short headlines (one-five words) ergo MEGA-headlines of 30, 40, 50 or 60 words have to be three, four, five or six times better! This “guru” (or “gurus”) forgot what the basic purpose of a headline is supposed to do.

Well, I agree with him. But since I’m a proponent of long headlines, I felt the need to explain because there’s room for misinterpretation.

A lot of what people are told to do in copywriting is based on hearsay and/or interpretation, such as assuming that a rule enunciated by some guru (or a test result, for that matter) is universally applicable.

As a result, a lot of rules and tests are erroneously extrapolated to other industries, markets or media.

Granted, some of them are tested numerous times, and the likelihood that the results are statistically significant enough to be applicable to other areas is quite high.

(But never universal.)

For example, I’m not only a copywriter. I’m also a fanatical tester. And a lot of what I teach stems from the results of those tests.

Not one test. Not two. Not one type of test or two.

But the result of many, many tests.

However, some of these tests are very specific and have too many variables that, making assumptions and cross-pollinating their results to other areas, may be premature or misguided.

For instance, my tests show that long headlines do work. But my tests are not, and should never, to be treated as gospel. Every market, every product, every offer and every piece of copy is different. (And every manner in which a market is targeted and qualified before they hit the copy is different, too.)

I write copy primarily for top marketers who have devout, eager lists of people who will read and gobble up anything they say. It would be different than copy for a brand-new website visited for the first time by a new market.

Dan Kennedy is the one who talks about, and extols the virtues of, long headlines, to which JayKay vehemently and skillfully protests.

But what I think has been misinterpreted is not the fact that long headlines are bad (or good, for that matter), it’s that they’re overused. And more often than not, they’re grossly misused, too.

Kennedy is a self-professed technophobe. And he’s referring to sales letters for direct mail or to prequalified lists. (He often talks about “gathering the herd.”)

Thus, he’s not referring to newspaper display ads like Ogilvy did. Nor does what he say applies to the Internet and all websites, especially first-time visited websites.

Based on my tests, I truly believe that “backend” websites (selling to an audience or a list that’s prequalified, targeted and presold), long headlines do work. (Kennedy often refers to this as “message-to-market match.”)

Why do they work? Because people expect it. And people want to read what the sales letter says because they are told — and sold — to do so, often even before they hit the website in question.

(Take major product launches, for example, by some top marketers out there. Mike Filsaime’s Butterfly Marketing is one of them, whose long headline I wrote, incidentally.)

Agora, the large publishing and direct mail company who does a lot of Internet promotion, uses long headlines all the time with their lists. (And they are fanatical testers, too. So if they use long headlines, then it tells you they’re profitable.)

However … and it’s a big HOWEVER …

… Brand-new, first-time visited websites, especially those whose audience’s frame-of-mind is to strictly gather information, as most first-time audiences are, I am of the opinion that long headlines are bad.

First, they scream “sales letter!”

When you visit a website for the first time (for information or browsing only, and without the intent to buy or considering buying what it offers, which applies to 99% of websites out there), then long headlines are going to kill your sales.

More importantly, the vast majority of these long headlines, when they are used, are done all wrong. I mean they’re terrible. Often, back-asswards. They blabber on and on. They say too much. They’re not just long, they’re long-winded.

Why? Is it because the copywriter did a poor job? Is it because the copywriter doesn’t know any better? Not entirely.

Quite often, and in my experience, the copywriter is trying to say as much as possible to cover all the bases. But doing so stifles readership. They tell rather than sell. Specifically, a headline is meant to sell the reader on reading the copy in the first place. It’s meant to CREATE readership.

(I’ll come back to this later, as it is important.)

There’s a difference between being pithy and being brief. A difference between being straightforward and being curt.

You can be pithy in a long headline. Being pithy means being relevant and straight to the point with the least words possible. Using long headlines is feasible only if it’s proven to be the optimal approach for the market, and there’s no other way to say the same thing with less words.

(Often, it is not the optimal approach, or it is simply untested. In fact, 99.9% of marketers out there don’t test. And that’s the real shame.)

My friend and top copywriter John Carlton said it best: Pithisize.

In other words: Edit. Edit. Edit.

As my friend Peter Stone, another top copywriter, said: “Write fearlessly, but edit ruthlessly.”

Look at your headline and ask yourself: “Can I say the exact same thing in less words?” (And do so only after you decided on the headline, which is in itself a strategic and thought-intense task.)

If you can say what you need to say in the least amount of words, then do it. But if you can only say it in 20 words or whatever, use 20 words. The point is not to be short or “not long.” The point is to be pithy or “not long-winded.”

There is a big difference.

Another top copywriter and friend, Clayton Makepeace, said it best: “Be newsy rather than benefit-oriented, since benefit headlines create lackluster response rates.”

In other words, rather than saying:

“How to Lose 40 Pounds In Just 6 Weeks!”

(Or worse yet, “How to Lose 40 Pounds In Just 6 Weeks Using My Accidental Diet Discovery That Took Me From An Overweight Blob of Fat To a Fit, Trim and Toned, Never-Go-Hungry Mother of Three (And It’s Easier Than You Think When You Learn How) …”

Say:

“Most Americans Are Only a Hamburger Away From A Major Heart Attack, Doctor Reports.”

The reasoning is simple: Benefit-oriented headlines scream “sales letter!” They drive people away. More importantly, they sell the reader on topic of the sales letter, rather than selling them on the need to read it. (Again, big difference.)

The idea of the headline (well, its very job in fact) is only to do one thing: To get people to read the first paragraph. That’s it. That’s all. No more. No less. End of story.

If accomplishing this requires three words, then great. But if it really does require 20 words or more, then fine.

But the question is, do you really know? And that’s the rub: People don’t test. Or they mimic other websites and copywriters, or listen to what some guru said, and assume that the application of one strategy in one medium is applicable to another.

Whether it’s Ogilvy or Kennedy, or any other guru for that matter, people take their advice at face value and apply them to other industries, but do so prematurely or, as JayKay stated earlier, erroneously.

When their response rates tumble (or when the results seem to be good but are less than what they can truly achieve), they often blame the copy, the offer, or the market.

Sometimes, the problem is the market, the offer, or the copy. But more often than not, the problem is the headline (and just the headline).

Just testing and tweaking headlines, I’ve seen dramatic boosts in response; anywhere from 40% to 700%. Why? Because headlines can either induce readership or deter it.

I see this all the time when I do critiques. Some of the sales letters, I see, have awesome copy. But their response rates are low simply because the headline is weak and what causes the bottleneck.

If people can’t read past the headline in the first place, then who cares about the rest of the copy?

If the headline doesn’t get the reader to start reading, then they won’t read the rest of the copy, no matter how good the product is or how well-written the rest of the copy is.

Now, I’m about to make a controversial statement.

Hang on tight.

You see a lot of copywriters say that online copy is no different than offline copy. They say that the Internet is just another medium, and that writing copy for the Web is the same as writing copy for offline media.

Well, that’s bull.

I don’t buy the notion that they’re the same. I do believe that the principles of direct marketing and direct response are the same, yes. But not the writing itself, the cosmetics and, more importantly, the psychology and state of mind of the reader.

Online copy in many ways is VERY different. Sure, the Internet is just another medium. Sure, most of the rules of copywriting apply to the Internet. But there are some important and critical differences.

For one, the state of mind one has while online is different than the offline world. People watch TV to be entertained, not to be informed. People may read the newspaper to be informed, but they often do so almost exclusively, reading one thing at a time.

People browse the Web to be informed, too. But they do so as their first and often only goal, and not to buy. Buying online is almost always an afterthought.

Moreover, they’re click-happy, and they search for information online at the speed of electrons all with the attention span the size of a subatomic particle.

Look at it another way:

You don’t show sales letters on TV, do you?

You don’t read out a sales letter, exactly as it’s printed, on the radio, do you?

You don’t open and read e-mails the same way you open and read direct mail sales letters, do you?

And that’s my point.

People online surf. They browse. They skim, scan and scroll.

And on top of that, they’ve got 12 browser windows open. They’re downloading and skimming 53 e-mails. They’re responding to the two or three instant messages they’ve received from a friend on Skype and AOL Instant Messenger. They’re sifting through 118 feeds in their RSS feed application for some interesting piece they feel is worth reading.

And on and on.

Plus, they do all this at the same time. Some simultaneously, others consecutively, yet in a piecemeal, scattered fashion.

Above all, people don’t go online to shop or to buy something from the onset. They want information, first and foremost. So they search for it. They browse for it. They unconsciously scurry through hundreds of different online messages, only to quickly stop and glance at one that catches their attention.

That’s why the Internet is different than, say, TV or radio or direct mail. Any kind of marketing message in those types of media are interruptions at best. Often, forced interruptions.

But online, however, they’re more than just interruptions. They’re easily ignored “negligible nuisances.”

So if small headlines increase readership because they’re easier to skim and catch people’s attention, then great. But when targeted to an already identified, selected and pre-qualified market, that’s a different story.

However, a caveat.

Some copywriters write long headlines in an attempt to increase readership, when this often backfires. Their long headlines are ostensibly weak, even though they are filled with seemingly benefit-laden, power-packed statements and promises.

Copywriters resort to long headlines when they fail to use headlines properly or ignore the goal of a headline in the first place. And that’s where I have a HUGE problem with long, mega-headlines—because they are often done wrong, and not because they are too long.

You see, poor, long headlines exist for 2 reasons:

1) Copywriters are lazy.

2) They attempt to tell the entire story in trying to cover all the bases in the headline, hoping to capture as much of the audience as possible.

I know this. I’ve been guilty of these.

As far as #2 is concerned, here’s the thing: copywriters try to put all the big benefits in the headline with the hope that one of them will hit the target.

Problem is, it never does, or such long headlines obfuscate the one benefit hidden deep within the headline that might be the one trigger that’s needed to get them to start reading in the first place.

Remember the rule: The headline is meant to create readership that leads to a sale. Not increase it. And certainly, not create the sale itself, as well. Get people to start reading your copy. That’s your job. And once they do, then — and only then — you can tell them what they need to know by covering all the bases.

But not until you’ve got them reading first.

In fact, #2 is often the fallback position because of #1.

Copywriters are lazy.

They say what they want to say without too much thinking. They ignore other variations of the headline that can be used, namely how less wordy they can be to say the exact same thing they want to say.

Granted, finding out what to say that forces people to start reading the copy is a tough job. It requires a lot of work, a lot of research, a lot of thinking and a lot of creativity.

And perhaps, a lot of headlines, too, to finally discover the one that truly works.

(Stories are plenty of many a top copywriter who would spend days on the body copy, but then spend weeks on the headline itself. Ogilvy was one of them. Gene Schwartz was another.)

While coming up with the best possible headline first is tough, pithisizing and trying to edit your headline ferociously to bring it down to the least number of words possible is even tougher.

The job of coming up with a great, solid headline is onerous, which is why many copywriters are lazy and tend to flake out.

Brian Keith Voiles once noted that you should write 50-100 headlines or even more before you choose the headline for your ad. I agree. Coming up with the first 10 or 20 is easy, because you’ll write down what comes to mind right away. The next batch, however, is what requires a lot of work.

And often, it’s where the best headlines are found.

Michel Fortin
Guest Contributor
THE TOTAL PACKAGE

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18 Comments »

1. Comment by Leon Altman — August 25, 2009 @ 12:18 pm

   Excellent article. Particularly the observation that shorter headlines work better with a first-time audience and longer headlines work better with backend offers. That’s certainly what I have found. That’s why optin page headlines definitely do work better with shorter headlines.

   Also one fix I’d suggest for overly long headlines: The headline to subhead synch. So many long headlines would work better by extracting the main message, making it into a pithy headline and letting the subhead expand on it.

2. Comment by Fimi Arthur — August 25, 2009 @ 12:40 pm

   Wow,

   What a well-written article. The summary of it all is that what works in one medium (direct mail) may not necessarily work in another (the Internet). While the principles are the same, the logistics and the mechanics are very different.

   You said it best when you said that whatever the guru tells you, don’t swallow it hook, line and sinker, You need to test it for your own market, and fanatically too.

3. Pingback by Short or Long Headlines? Answers Within... (Great Article) - WarriorForum - Internet Marketing Forums — August 25, 2009 @ 12:50 pm

   [...] article from Michel Fortin on Makepeace’s blog. If any of you guys missed it, go here… The Truth About Mega-Headlines | The Total Package Great discussion on when to use short or long headlines as well as the key differences between [...]

4. Comment by Merrill Clark — August 25, 2009 @ 1:32 pm

   Great article Michel!

   To me, writing the headlines is the hardest part of it all.

   It’s so much easier to write a long one because…as you say, I’m guilty of being lazy.

   But it’s worth it to for all involved in the promo for the copywriter to spend whatever time is necessary to get the right combination of words in the right order to get prospects to read on.

   Thanks for the info,

   Merrill Clark
   Crestview Marketing Services

5. Comment by Ralph — August 25, 2009 @ 3:34 pm

   As I remember from my studies, if you read 18 words to a person, additional words replace those first remembered. The capacity of the mind is 5 to 7 words. Memory nuts chunk. If you jumble numbers 1 to 9 some will remember 5, best you’ll get is 7. I once had a guy fresh from the (politically incorrect to mention) remember all 9. He chunked the 9 numbers into 3 hundreds numbers. For example, remember - 7, 2, 4, 9, 3, 1, 8, 6, 5. He recalled seven hundred and twenty four, nine hundred and thirty one, eight hundred and sixty five. He only remebered 3 things not 9. Memory’s got something to do with our reptile like conscious memory having to be clear to recognise danger and able to decide - freeze, fly, fight. In other words accept what’s been said, ignore it, or argue. Seen in this way every word is a threat or challenge. The reader makes an offer in acceptance, rejection or discussion which hopefully you accept. So KISS - Keep It Stupid Short ( I know it’s simple)

6. Comment by Jim — August 25, 2009 @ 4:53 pm

   HI - thanks for a great article.
   There are some really good points here and I’m particularly interested in the bit about selling the readership with the headline- not the product. There is one thing that I always find challenging with this approach though, and its something not mentioned. In order to effectively GET people to your website in the first place we are often using SEO or Google adwords. To make these traffic systems effective and cost efficient we are often preached to about the importance of having keywords in title tages. SO you see my point - it can be quite a challenge to get keywords in headlines if you avoid the obvious product/benefit style headline. I’d love to hear your thoughts on some approaches to doing this.
   Jim

7. Comment by Steve Gill — August 25, 2009 @ 5:20 pm

   Excellent article. I learnt a lot from it. I agree with Jim’s comments about headlines and SEO, and I too would like to know the best approach to handle this.

   Steve

8. Comment by Jennie Heckel — August 25, 2009 @ 6:31 pm

   Dear Michael and all,

   For a Web Copywriter…

   Your Mission Should You Chose to Accept It Is:

   Churning out Knock ‘Em Dead Headlines with decent readability… AND superior conversions… AND don’t forget… to keep Google’s SEO Tactics in the back of your mind while you write the blankety blank web sales letter copy… THAT is the game!

   For SEO, my recommendation is to create separate landing pages for each keyword phrase you are targeting and tweak the lead in, headline and first couple sub heads to match.

   Each landing page is targeted for 1 different keyword phrase. Remember primary word order for the keyword phrase is important too for Google More Love…

   Marketing Internet Guru is more frequently searched than Internet Marketing Guru.

   Sweet spot is 3,000 or less searches per month and less than 100,000 competing webpages with 3% keyword phrase density (keyword in title for sure and in the beginning) will get your sales letter, (even if it is just one long 20 scroll length page) to the first page of Google.

   Just make sure you have a privacy policy/terms of use and contact page linked to the sales letter too. To determine the EXACT number of competing web pages just use double quotes like this in a Google Search Bar to see the EXACT number of web pages Google has in the index with that EXACT keyword phrase in the title of the page. Also you want to check the web pages you want to beat, and be sure that they don’t have a gazillion links on them to other websites, if so then try a longer or differently worded keyword phrase like “internet marketing gurus”.

   Like this: “Marketing Internet Guru”

   Results 1 - 10 of about 438,000 for “Marketing Internet Guru” (0.60 seconds)

   Google Results:
   Results 1 - 10 of about 101,000 for “Internet Marketing Guru” (0.21 seconds)

   Now if you add an “s” to it you get these results:

   Results 1 - 10 of about 70,100 for “internet marketing gurus” (0.44 seconds)

   See the astronmical difference?

   (Caps may be important and can change the number of competing pages so be sure to check it both ways.)

   It’s a lot of work but creating sales letter with custom headlines, but this stratgy makes for more of your sales letters with Google Top Ten rankings… And in the long run really pays off.

   Regards,

   Jennie Heckel
   SEO Expert Consulting
   Sales Copy Secret.com

9. Comment by Mark Andrews IMCopywriting — August 25, 2009 @ 8:48 pm

   Many thanks for these very useful tips Michel, this is absolutely top notch advice to say the least.

   Similarly, Joseph Sugarman covers some of these all important points too.

   Huge appreciation for posting this up.

   Wishing you all the very best for the future.

   Mark Andrews
   Internet Marketing Copywriting

10. Comment by Kyle Tully — August 25, 2009 @ 8:58 pm

    The title of this article really should be…

    The Amazing Truth
    Behind The Shocking Real-Life Story
    Of The Never-Before-Revealed Insider Secrets
    (That The Gurus Have Been Hiding From You)
    Of How To Write Super-Short And To The Point Headlines
    That Turn Your Weak, Wilting Salesletters Into
    Powerful Powerhouses Of Perfect Persuasion
    And Suck Cash Out Of Your Prospects Wallets
    With More Power Than A Vacuum Cleaner On Steroids
    – GUARANTEED!

11. Comment by Mark Andrews IMCopywriting — August 26, 2009 @ 12:50 am

    ^ LOL

    Very funny Kyle.

    Mark grins.

12. Comment by Paul Hancox — August 26, 2009 @ 7:43 am

    118 feeds? Michel, in your case it’s more like 500 feeds open at the same time… but then, you can speed read

    Once again, a wonderful article. In the field of “internet marketing”, the longer headlines phenomena is a kind of self-feeding monster.

    Amateurs see a lot of people using long, benefit stuffed headlines and so they think it’s easy to do the same… but they make it even longer, which in turn, leads yet more amateurs to do the same - until the headline takes up pretty much the second half of the page (after the flashy banner at the top takes up the first half.)

    But as you say, the headline’s only real job is to get them to read the copy. It’s a sales pitch for the COPY, not the product!

    Paul Hancox / copySnips

13. Comment by Kevin Francis — August 26, 2009 @ 8:55 am

    Michel,

    Great post and timely reminder of the fundamental purpose of the headline…to get the reader to start reading the ad. And the best headline to do that will depend on the CONTEXT and the Robert Collier principle of entering the conversation that’s already going on in their heads (plus your “QUEST” formula, of course!).

    Great points about how the internet does differ from other mediums…all about that “conversation” again.

    Thanks again!

    Kevin Francis

14. Comment by -- TW — August 26, 2009 @ 1:31 pm

    Please, Kyle, you forgot to stick in…

    …Even If You’ve Never Written a Single Headline Before In Your Life, and You Have No Website, No List, No Product, No Money, Bad Credit, and English Is Your Second Language…

    Cheers.

    – TW

15. Comment by Lawrence Bernstein — August 26, 2009 @ 1:51 pm

    Michael, you hit the nail on the head with this article.

    If I may sum up your splendidly pithy analysis in one line: effective headline writing boils down to understanding your prospect’s state of awareness.

    Kennedy, Carlton and Fortin are expected to come out with guns blazing for a red hot offer to their warm markets and fans. But the long-headline approach to a fresh prospect, despite the sumptuously good copy, often has the effect of a traveling salesman trying to batter the door down to deliver his pitch.

    Maybe the salesman is wearing a Brioni suit and polished wing tips but the homeowner standing in his worn green bathrobe rejects the very idea of the pitch at that moment.

    Kudos also in singling out the reader’s state of mind as the key difference between direct mail and web copy.

    Carry on,

    Lawrence

16. Pingback by Please critique my squeeze page? - WarriorForum - Internet Marketing Forums — August 26, 2009 @ 6:08 pm

    [...] Originally Posted by Mona I’d try a headline along these lines: "Stop Being Humiliated In The Bedroom Because You Can’t Keep It Up Long Enough To Satisfy Your Lover…Now You Can Learn The Secrets That Are Helping Thousands Of Men Kick Their Premature Ejaculation To The Curb So They Can Go All Night…" Go to the emotional point of how painful this is for these men. This is a seriously big deal to them. If you can acknowledge this and touch on what they’re experiencing, they’ll really hear what you’re saying and want to know what you can offer them. No offence but the advice contained above isn’t exactly brilliant to say the least. The suggested headline is WAYYYYYYYYYY too long for starters. Mona - Mind if I suggest that you go read this… The Truth About Mega-Headlines | The Total Package [...]

17. Comment by seo — August 27, 2009 @ 10:41 pm

    SEO helps add potential customers and the number of quality leads to your website as well. In fact, most organizations can adopt Internet marketing and advertising strategies to generate better business.

18. Pingback by The Copy Maverick » Archive » Copywriting tips from the Total Package. — September 2, 2009 @ 6:43 pm

    [...] The Truth AboutMega-Headlines [...]