Subscribe to Our RSS Feed

Archive for September, 2008

6 Practical Tips for Effective Headline Development

If you're new here, you may want to subscribe to Gestbiz RSS feed. Thanks for visiting!

A lot of the positive responses a write-up will receive rest on the headline. The headline is the title of the article and is the very first line on which the reader’s eyes will fall when reading a write-up. A bland, unexciting headline will fail to stir the interest of the reader even if the body of the article is well-written and informative. Never waste a good article by making sure you use these tips for effective headline development:

Outline your article.
The headline and the article body feed off each other. One must reflect, promote and support the other in order to be effective. As such, it’s important that you build a relationship at the very beginning so your readers won’t be confused at the progression.

To make sure you don’t get lost, write a short outline of the article. This can be in the form of notes to help guide you on the topics you will be covering for the article and the succession of these topics. That way, you will have a reference on how the article will appear, something you can use for effective headline development.

Decide on the tone you will use

The tone of your article should be reflected by your headline. An optimistic, happy headline may not work with an article that is written in a serious, businesslike tone. Conversely, a formal headline may seem ill-conceived when used with an upbeat article.

Develop your headline based on the type of article you will be using

Ever read headlines developed by researchers for a certain scientific or medical study? They’re not exactly the kind of headlines you’ll find in a write-up for topics such as sports, personal care or relationships. These headlines tend to be formal and technical and there are no colloquial or slang terms used with them.

When developing headlines for your article, make sure it’s a good match to the type of write-up you will be doing. If it’s more technical, consider using a more structured headline. If it’s more upbeat, then do the same with your title.

Offer an overview.

Your article has to compete with others in the market. This is especially true if you will be writing for the Web, where for a single topic alone, readers will find thousands of sources, all of them original.

For effective headline development, make sure to write a title that offers your readers a good idea of what the article contains – and then interest them enough so they read the rest of the article.

Headline too long? Consider a sub-headline

Sometimes in order to grab the attention of your readers, you will be stuck with a headline that’s too long to be effective. If this happens, consider cutting the headline into two: one as the main headline and the other as the sub-headline. Readers can easily focus on these headlines and find the most interesting, salient points of the article.

Or, you could cut a long headline, use a provocative or interesting word or phrase followed by a colon and then write the rest of the headline. Some examples are below:

Game Hacks: How to Be a Master of Every Video Game You Play

Earth Angel: One Woman’s Journey to Becoming a Celebrated Environmentalist

Birds of a Feather: How Your Friends Affect Your Luck in Life

Use intrigue

Notice how successful many of the marketing campaigns and promotions have been in the past? It’s because the copywriter was able to stir up intrigue and grab attention by using their headlines well.

An excellent method of headline development is using teasers that create intrigue. Words such as ’secret to’, ‘little known ways’ ‘lazy man’s guide to’, ‘beginner’s guide to’, ‘you don’t have to be ___ to be ___’ and ‘methods you never knew existed’ can be quite effective for making the readers wonder and want to read more.

Get 40 New and Exclusive Premium Wordpress Themes with 5 Color Variations

Get 40 New and Exclusive Premium Wordpress Themes with 5 Color Variations + the HTML and PHP Versions of those 40 Themes x 5 Color Variations to Cover All Your Needs!

That’s 200 unique Wordpress themes, 200 static and 200 dynamic templates you can use for any of your projects

When we go live, each theme will be sold for $27 which is already a bargain price for such premium designs (retail price of the whole WordPress, HTML, PHP collection is: $2160).

BUT… today you can get those 40 Themes for just ..$97 ONLY!

>>Click Here To Download Those 40 Premium Themes and the matching 40 Templates (in html and php) with 5 Color Variations for just $97 <<

Terms: All the template are for your private use ONLY. You can alter them, but you cannot claim copyright, nor sell any derivative templates. You can use them on as many domain as YOU OWN, but you are not allowed to share them in ANY way.

Time Management Techniques in Business

In business, every second counts. Therefore, an efficient system must be adopted in your workplace. You must always ask yourself if you are doing things at maximum efficiency because if not, then maybe its time to change a few things in your system.

Here are a few tips and techniques to remember for you to effectively maximize the potentials of your business.

Setting Goals for your Business

Every business should start with a clear and attainable business goal. This will serve as your ultimate destination and it is your responsibility to control the wheel in order to reach that destination.

Aside from using it as your motivation, the goals you set will also help you in the production process. Set specific number of quotas for your workforce per day so that you will efficiently meet up your own quota. Just like with your goals, you have to make your everyday quota realistic enough so you won’t be frustrated because you did not meet them.

Dividing the Workload

Even with starting business, an equal appropriation of the workload to your employees will enable to get all aspects of the business taken care of. By dividing workload to your employees, you each give them a specific task in which they can focus on and dedicate their time too. Theory supports that dedicated tasks improve the speed of efficacy of the entire system.

If you know anyone amongst your employees who you believe is best suited for a specific type of job, delegate him or her into doing that task. That way, you can ensure that you have the best person taking care of a particular aspect of your business.

Keeping the Whole Workplace Clean and Organized

Ineffective time management is often the cause of inefficiency in your workplace. More importantly, you also need to have a working environment that is conducive for work. Hence, you have to keep your workplace clean and organized to eliminate the time it takes looking for materials or papers you need. The time you wasted looking for a sheet of paper among thousands of papers could have been spent on more productive work.

Most businesses, specially the ones in the food industry strategically place their utensils and other materials needed for food processing in areas where they could easily be accessed. This improves the efficiency on time with regards to food preparation. The faster they can prepare the food, the more they can cater to their customers needs. And when they have more satisfied customers, it will produce your much needed income.

Make a Specific List of Activities for the Day

What the List does for you personally also works on your own business or workplace. Setting a list of what to do for the day will make the work free-flowing. When you have a lot of priorities to think about, it is so easy to forget some of them. Hence, the list will serve as a little reminder of what other important tasks to attend to. This tip though only works on businesses that do not involve mass production.

Purchase an Answering Machine or Hire a Secretary

Answering phones usually eats up a lot of your time. Instead of using those precious minutes in propagating your own business, you waste it on talking to people who might not even had to do with your business.

Hiring a secretary to answer your phone calls can help you to fully focus on your work. The secretary will just list the names of all those who called and return their call if necessary. Remember that one of the best ways to proper time management is through reduction of distractions from your surroundings.

by Gestbiz