Comments on: I Hated This Headline … So Why Did it Work?

By: Darren DeMatas

Darren DeMatas — Thu, 02 Jan 2014 23:05:21 +0000

In reply to Jerod Morris. Jerod, thanks for responding. If Ogilvy is the Father of Advertising, who is the Father of Internet Advertising? Larry Page maybe?

By: Jerod Morris

Jerod Morris — Thu, 02 Jan 2014 22:14:28 +0000

In reply to Darren DeMatas. Darren, your comment highlights an ultra-important point: audience and medium must be the first two elements taken into account when writing a headline. Who is it targeting? Where will they see it? Your headline must me appropriate for both to work.

By: Darren DeMatas

Darren DeMatas — Thu, 02 Jan 2014 20:38:35 +0000

Hey Jerod!

Great example from the Father of Advertising. It is too bad that he passed before Internet advertising really took off. I would love to see his ebook on writing PPC ads!

I think the Lemon headline works great for its media type, but I know that this headline will be a total fail in the world of PPC where a single word cant be combined with a powerful image. It is 100% text.

Even with the lead in sentence, I don’t see this ad copy being effective in Adwords.

I know the audience here is mostly bloggers and that this technique is great for blog post headlines. I just thought it was interesting…and kind of ironic that the Father of Advertising’s headline would probably fail in todays internet advertising and is being used in a clinic for blog headlines.

The lesson here is certainly effective and timeless, and I hope my comment doesn’t take away from that. Mastering short headlines is a critical aspect of PPC. But the “intrigue” aspect doesn’t work there. I’ve tried.

By: Ryan Law

Ryan Law — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 16:41:24 +0000

It’s a breathe of fresh air to read an article about the efficacy of unconventional headlines. There seems to be such an emphasis on formulaic titles in the content marketing industry (1 Weird Trick…/X Ways to…) that I often find myself relying on overused and hackneyed title structures. This post made me realize that there’s nothing wrong with an unconventional title – and sometimes, going for the purely compelling and intriguing headline is going to be more effective at attracting attention and interaction.

My inner copywriter feels a bit more liberated after reading this!

By: Jerod Morris

Jerod Morris — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 13:51:36 +0000

In reply to Sri Varshan. Haha, well, it was not intended to be. But I suppose that is a secondary or tertiary benefit of publishing this.

By: Jerod Morris

Jerod Morris — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 13:49:51 +0000

In reply to Carolin Geissler. Thanks Carolin. :-)

By: Carolin Geissler

Carolin Geissler — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 12:30:29 +0000

Great post, Jerod and it says exactly what I was thinking. I had been wondering how that post had done and I appreciate you picked that up again.

By: Carolin Geissler

Carolin Geissler — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 12:27:47 +0000

In reply to Greg Strandberg.

And yet, the post itself is a perfect example you could study.

This is them, your teachers, actually trying to sell something. So, even if you’re not the target audience for this post, you could still crosscheck it with all the points you’ve learned from the courses you took or articles you read that are free and see how they’ve practiced what they preach.

I’d still consider that to be pretty valuable, to be honest.

By: Alexandra Petean-Nicola

Alexandra Petean-Nicola — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 09:53:57 +0000

I think you need to dare to do it first. You also have to make the want to know. We know that it is hard to make people do what you want. So why not make them want what you want’em to. They will come out of interest to your idea or product.

By: Sri Varshan

Sri Varshan — Thu, 19 Dec 2013 05:47:02 +0000

So is this a blog post to shed some light on the doubtful minds, which refrained themselves from visiting the “Why I Hate Copyblogger” post 😉 ?