EP: 95 - Capturing Pain Points With A Great Headline!

“People are hurried. The average person worth cultivating has too much to read … They are not going to read your business talk unless you make it worth their while and let the headline show it.” ~ Claude Hopkins

 

Welcome to Episode 95: Capturing Pain Points With A Great Headline!
 
Let’s be honest for a moment here … We all want to be seen and heard. It is gratifying, empowering, and makes us feel valued. We want others to get who we are and to hear our ideas and valid arguments, even if they don’t agree with us -- though, of course, we’d like that as well. What we may not realize is that the best way to get our point across is often counter-intuitive, to be successful we must try less and listen more. By doing this, your point (or idea) will become more vivid in the recipient’s mind. 

Short, simple and sweet.
 

Here's what we will be untangling in this episode ...

• Creative ways to get your point across
• Follow the 3C’s (clear, concise, consistent)
• Capturing attention with subject lines
• Tailoring your message to your audience
• 6 key characteristics every great headline should have
• Pointers on capturing pain points in headlines 

Are you ready?
Pop in your awesome earbuds and let's dive in! 

Transcript

Your brain is mighty powerful, and it tends to come up with all sorts of magical ideas. Realistically, as an entrepreneur it can be all too easy to get lost in thought process and maybe even forget all about the “doing”.

So, let’s be honest for a moment here … We all want to be seen and heard. It is gratifying, empowering, and makes us feel valued. We want others to get who we are and to hear our ideas and valid arguments, even if they don’t agree with us -- though, of course, we’d like that as well. What we may not realize is that the best way to get our point across is often counter-intuitive, to be successful we must try less and listen more. By doing this, your point (or idea) will become more vivid in the recipient’s mind.

That being said, let me ask you this …

Have you been feeling stuck lately on getting your point across with some of your clients, your peers, and your audience? Or perhaps having a heck of a time just getting them to listen? Feeling frustrated? Or, maybe not feeling heard at all?

To help ease the pain of not being heard (I have been there and I understand) here are a couple ways to help you can ease into some creative ways of actually getting your point (and ideas) across … 

PLOT THE COURSE OF COMMUNICATION AND KNOW WHERE YOU’RE GOING.

Plain and simple, a strategy is required. Your creative energies need to be clear, concise and focusing on whatever it is that needs “fixing”.
 
It’s okay to let yourself get a little crazy once and awhile. Just roll with it. And you can start the process by writing down the main point, idea, or issue as well as the ideal outcome you’re hoping to achieve. Then from there, plot the course of the “road travelled” to get to this outcome. 

Keep in mind, when you’re sharing this course of action, you want the recipient to be imagining the entire process while you’re going through the motions. Then once you’ve reached the end of your “speech”, you want them to imagine the end results has been achieved. You want them to envision the feeling of achievement and not just think of it as some long-lost fantasy. A picture creates a thousand words. So, build and inspire!

Next up … 

DROP THE CORPORATE ATTITUDE.

You want to sway people when they’re sitting on the fence with a good actionable idea … triggering emotions, integrity, and logic. If you don’t tap into all those human touchpoints, you won’t get your message across. It’s truly as simple as that. 
 
Emotion drives change. And change drives accomplishments.

And lastly … 

REINFORCE THE END GOAL.

A huge part of communication is also being a good listener. The conversation must flow two-ways and not just be some giant brain dump! Momentum builds when you bring the conversation together to deliver ideation and execution. Remember, an idea (or point that needs to get across) is only a seedling being planted; it takes a cross-functional conversation to bring it alive. 

Okay, so not that we got those creative ways to get your point across out of the way, let’s do a quick dive together into email subject lines – which gently flows into the full span of today’s “untangling” topic; capturing pain points with a great headline! 

What people don’t always realize is that email has a magical ability that many other channels just don't: creating valuable, personal touches -- at scale.

An email list is probably one of the most valuable and responsive assets you can have as an entrepreneur. Unlike your social media followers, you own your email marketing list. Now in this realm of marketing-land, we want to make sure that our emails are not immediately deleted, marked as spam, or ignored altogether. 

👉 We want to build relationships. 

👉 We want to provide value and solutions. 

👉 We want them to pick US. 

That being said, in a few previous episodes followed by some social shares, we dove into the skinny on social media best practices and now we want to take a moment to shine the light on more best practices in the realm of virtual marketing, this time with email. And what we want to impart today is the importance of using the very best strategies. And some quick tips in creating a strong email strategy that will get those dream clients, build trust, and help your branding and reputation flourish and grow. 

Building a strong plan takes a strategic approach and a heck of a lot of organization. 

But if you’re determined to do a stellar job, you must commit to keeping things real. Be yourself. Always, always. Your true authentic self. I really cannot stress this enough!

What audiences nowadays are looking for is real connections and real truths. Disingenuous emails that are just used to make a pitch and promote on the regular just to make a quick buck are as easy to see through as a freshly washed window. And by no means, a good strategy. 

The clients that you want are looking for you to make their lives easier every single time they are in contact with you -- in any way. They need you to not only be real and keep your branding consistent, but also to catch their attention instantly.

And even when you decide to make those dream changes to your business, consistency is still totally possible.

This is the truth folks!

Skip the gimmicks and give them the straight up goods. 

The real you. The good stuff.

You want people to have “the feels” when they have an interaction with your business. And that also goes for every email you send them. Not just in the land of social or digitally on your site or landing page offerings. And to do that through any kind of marketing, you need to make sure that your brand is following what I like to call the 3 C’s … CLEAR. CONCISE. CONSISTENT. 

Even the most seasoned email marketing experts’ experience email delivery issues, it happens all the time. So, let’s talk about how to instantly capture their attention with a great subject line, and avoid the spam folder altogether … keeping your message happily at home in their inbox:

• Provide a preference center
• Avoid using all caps
• Do not use too many exclamations
• Use no more than 3 punctuation marks per subject line
• Don't end a subject line with "..."
• Don't add quotation marks to words in a subject line
• Choose not to use too many exaggerated phrases
• Be compliant
• Send relevant content ALWAYS
• Emoji's in the subject line do not affect (or not affect) open rates
  • Emails without have been considered to be less distracting and have more value with a higher open rate (without) at 52.94% to 47.06%

Now if you’re working hard at being creative with your capturing first line, and if you're not quite sure if the subject line you creatively worked up is actually going to work for your open and click rates, I have fun and easy to use subject line tester tool called Email Subject Line Tester by OmniSend! It's free and truly the best we've found and tested yet! If this tickles your virtual fancy, you can grab the link from the transcript of this episode. 

In short, before we dive into headlines a bit further, here are the takeaways to increasing your chances of getting your point across …

Focus more on the receiver than on the sender. Tailor your message to your audience to improve comprehension and don’t worry so much about what you want to say as about what you want them to hear and understand! 

Okay, we’ve crammed a lot of goodies into your noggin in a very short amount of time while only slightly diving into the main topic. However, the information I just shared with you needed to be spoken of first, before we dove into the rest.

That being said, and to get right to it, there are 6 key characteristics every great headline should have -- especially when you’re trying to capture someone’s pain points, and they go a little something like this …

1. Be simple to understand.
2. Be the right length.
3. Be emotionally compelling.
4. Be very targeted to the pain point.
5. Be critically examined.
6. Be leading to a specific reaction. 

Now how can YOU make great headlines?

More than anything, you first need an interesting salvation to their problem, story, or resource. Even the greatest headline writer in the world will fail with something that’s boring or confusing. That’s because the greatest headlines aren’t necessarily the ones that make people click – they are the ones that promise greatness and then go ahead to fulfilling that promise.

And here’s a trick we’ve learnt over the years …

The process of writing headlines can make your pain point solutions ideas better. Afterall headlines should be specifically targeted to the pain points you’re trying to solve. But the purpose of a great capture headline isn’t only to get people to click (or at least it shouldn’t be for public media). We want to create a positive experience for people -- from spotting the headline to clicking to reading, watching, or listening to sharing and then (hopefully) returning. 

We don’t want people to feel tricked or disappointed.

If you think about it, learning how to write a catchy headline filled to the brim with greatness can be the difference between a well-distributed piece or a complete dud. 

So, after some additional research on the best of the best tips to share with you on this topic, we came across an article from Grammarly and figured we’d give full credit to their insights and just share with you what they shared with us …

They are the writing pros of the world afterall, so why try to re-spin the wheel.

Here’s their pointers …

• KNOW YOUR AUDIENCE.
  Which we feel is an automatic given for any form of marketing -- which we’ve talked about many times before. So, rinse n’ repeat … Keep your audience in mind when drafting a headline. The world’s most shocking title may contain the words “sex,” “lies,” and “videotape,” but it could be a complete turn-off to an audience of monks.
  
  
• OPTIMIZE YOUR SEO.
  Which means including “focused keywords” to help your writing get discovered in search engines. You can do this by building the headline around the most important keywords in your written text, then ensure that it is fewer than 70 characters. Additional words are considered too long for Google to index.
  
  
• CREATE A KNOWLEDGE VACUUM.
  An exceptional headline always leaves the reader wanting more -- which means it’s done its job. Take this one for example: “These Pieces Of Advice Found On Instagram Could Change Your Life.” Does it make you want more? Does it intrigue you? Your readers will probably look for more information in the rest of your article.
  
  
• SOLVE A PAIN POINT.
  After reading a headline, readers may wonder, “Why should I read on?” 
  Many decide to do so because they believe from the title (or subject line) that you can solve their pain point. For instance, consider the headline of this “untangling” episode; perhaps you are reading the transcript with the hope it will solve your headline-writing problem?!
  
  
• ADD SOME NUMERICS.
  People love numbers, especially headlines. Numbers are something we know and feel comfortable with; they give us a sense of familiarity and advise our brain on how long something may take to read. With numbers we can justify the exchange of information for our time -- especially with numbers that describe how many points will be covered. For example: “6 key characteristics every great headline should have”.

And last but most certainly not least … and I never say this but am going to just the one time as inspiration means everything and can come from anyone or anywhere …

• CHEAT.
  Yes, you heard right. Don’t be afraid to look for inspiration wherever you can. If you write for a publication, review older copies, and look for examples that you know would work with your audience and tweak them. For example, Tim Ferris created multiple titles for his book, “The 4 Hour Work Week”, before settling on the mega hit. He ran a series of Google ads and looked at the click through rates, simply choosing the one with the highest. 

All-in-all, a great catchy pain point capturing headline should speak directly to the part of the brain that subconsciously cares. However, a headline is truly nothing without quality, thoughtful, engaging content that is shared and admired. 

So, remember … that’s the main reason we wanted the catchy headline in the first place. And until we start reading from the bottom up, catchy headlines are here to stay.