The title of a blog post is very crucial in deciding the fate of your blog in terms of popularity. The popularity of your blog is all that matters in gaining ROI from all that hard work that you have put into. So, you should be very much concerned about coming up with a suitable title for your blog by sifting through a number of catchy titles that you can lay your hands upon. This should be done methodically by ticking all the checkboxes that are enlisted in the notepad in your kitty.
Here are some tips that you have to be sure that you have had a look at before writing a title for your blog post:
• Take your own time
Take your time before you stick with a title that is worthy of your blog post. This is important as you have to do justice to the hard work you have put into writing the content of your blog. An instant title that you have come up with is surely not consistent with the factors that decide the popularity of your blog. Do not rely purely on your gut feeling. You can trust your hunches, but not on such a decision that requires a lot of foresight.
This forethought can keep a lot of problems that crop up in the promotion of your blog post later, at bay. At the end of it all, you won’t spend your productive time in regretting the mistake that you committed in not arriving at an informed decision regarding the consistency of your title with various parameters that decide your blog’s likeability among the audience.
• Keep the title short
The title should sum up in a few words the whole of the content of your blog. The search engines have the habit of reducing the size of the title if it does not meet their standards of restricting word length. The worst part of this tendency of search engines is that they may even alter the meaning or the message your title wants to convey to the reader.
The old rule of thumb for blog title tags is under 70 characters. There is an indication that these rules are changing. Speculation is rife among the industry people on whether there are any limitations that can be incorporated concerning the number of words, number of characters or pixel width. To be on the safer side, a title tag of 60 characters or less is advised.
These restrictions on part of the search engines can clip your wings and rule out the possibility of coming up with a hard hitting or a verbose title. Do remember to stick to the restrictions on the title length as your cries of help later can fall on deaf ears upholding the fact that there is no damsel in distress in this situation here. If it were, there would be a high possibility of a rescuer dropping in from nowhere to take control of the situation.
• Do not mislead
Do not mislead the visitors by deciding to use irrelevant titles for your blog posts that hide something else in its entrails. This can make the visitors to linger on for some time and later go on their way at the prospects of finding other interesting content elsewhere on the web as they were directed to your blog on the premise of finding something else.
These high bounce rates mean that you begin to lose a reputation in the eyes of your visitors. The aftermath of this results in you making both ends meet in building your reputation. You should be aware of the fact that it takes a lot of effort and time to build something like a reputation, but a second to destroy it. Be in the readers’ good books and leave no stone unturned to keep it so.
• Research
Do some research on the target audience regarding their reading habits and other preferences. Visit a few forums that are replete with information regarding how to be consistent with the SEO needs. You may find exhaustive and voluminous information in these forum threads helping you in your research. Be sure that the information provided in these forums is reliable.
After your thorough SEO research, use the keywords generated by this process in your title tags. This will help search engines to recognize that your content is relevant. The search engines are accustomed to prioritize the keywords that end up being in the front end of your title. Hence, it is better to you if you place the keywords that you have generated from your research at the beginning. This makes your target audience all the more likely to have a look at them during scanning the search results.
A rampant problem that the bloggers face is to come up with relevant titles that are in context with the keywords. You should be able to use the keywords creatively and craftily in your title so that it won’t look to your visitors that you have stuffed them into the title. This makes your blog lose its sheen and its reputation that you have built from so long.
Reputation is everything. The aircraft Concorde, jointly developed and produced by Aerospatiale and British Aircraft Corporation (BAC) under an Anglo-French treaty was at a few of its last flights before being decommissioned, after being plagued by the number of casualties in the infamous 2000 crash. Still people chose to fly in it irrespective of technical difficulties that the flying machine experienced. Such was the euphoria and the fanfare that it made brisk business even amidst the crash. Any other airliner would have shut shop but Concorde’s reputation kept it going.
• Value proposition
If a potential reader visits your site, let him encounter with a proposition in your blog’s title. Make it a tempting one that he can’t ignore. Speak to his heart. For example, the blog title ’10 tips that ensure you have a successful digital marketing campaign’. In this title, the blogger ensures the reader of a successful campaign. This works most of the times because obviously, every business owner aims for success of his brand.
• Appeal to the reader
Use appealing words that can elicit a number of clicks from the targeted audience. Words such as free, successful, discover, easy, secrets, stunning and the like can work to your advantage.
(a) Free
Using this word maximizes your chances of luring more people from your target audience. There are a lot of people who have benefited from the use of this word. Nobody refuses freebies partly because there is no hassle involved in filling out the particulars that are often involved in paying up online.
(b) Discover
‘Discover the secrets of money making’ is also a good title as it engages visitors who are curious about the method of making money. Make sure you find a suitable title that evokes curiosity in the readers’ mind through a lot of other fancy and hard hitting words.
(c) Easy
This word can lure readers who do not want to be acquainted with the functioning of processes that involve technical lingo or industry jargon. They are wary of them.
(d) Secrets
This also appeals to a large section of the audience who want a lucid and a clear explanation in the content for web. ‘Secrets of mind boggling magic tricks revealed’ can be a good title as it aims to disclose closely guarded secrets of the Magicians. The prospects of this revelation can enchant many readers to have a close look at the content of your blog.
Picturesque, idyllic, serene, magical can be hard hitting words for photography blogs; mouth-watering, delicacy, delectable, indulging, aromatic, savouries are other words for food blogs; hilarious, funny are words for humoristic blogs; subtle, suave, hot, tempting, seducing, romantic getaways, awe-inspiring, placid waterways, tranquil are words for fashion and travel blogs. The list can go on and on with innovative use of words for your blog.
Apart from these tips there are a lot of creative and innovative ways that you can devise a strategy around for a hard hitting blog title. These can help you garner a huge following for your blog that is consistent with the SEO needs and quite appealing to a number of users. They can surely be employed in coming up with a blog title that can outdo years of experience and constant experimenting.
