Dec 11
1
The Art of a Great Tweet
Like it or not, Twitter is quickly on its way to being FaceBook’s biggest rival in the business world. Twitter has become the place for sharing content links. If your content catches attention on Twitter and spreads, suddenly you’re getting significant traffic from people who may have never visited your site before.
That being the case, getting people to check out your site based on 140 characters is vital. Like most everything else in life there are rules. I really like Brian Clark’s idea about the 80/20 rule of Headlines. He says….
“Every time I tell people about the 80/20 Rule of Headlines, they seem shocked. Remember that one? On average, 8 out of 10 people will read a headline, but only 2 out of 10 will go on to read the content. This is in a typical headline environment, such as a newspaper, magazine, or web page. In an RSS reader or email inbox, the percentages are likely worse. The battle for attention intensifies due to the nature of the environment.” “People are scanning more ruthlessly than ever, looking for interesting tidbits. Your content link is competing with conversations, quips, and tantalizing revelations related to this morning’s breakfast cereal.”
Why Should I Read What You Write?
Never forget that a headline is a promise. It promises some kind of benefit or reward in exchange for attention.
That reward could range from an amusing joke to the solution to a pressing problem.
A good way to make sure your headlines always offer a compelling reward is to use the 4-U approach. This is a copywriting technique taught by AWAI.
Your headlines must:
- Be USEFUL to the reader,
- Provide him with a sense of URGENCY,
- Convey the idea that the main benefit is somehow UNIQUE; and
- Do all of the above in an ULTRA-SPECIFIC way.
The Triumphant Return of the Short Headline
As Brian Clark says, “Some people will tell you that a good Twitter headline is as short as possible. This is due not only to the 140-character limit that Twitter imposes, but also because in order for your headline to spread, people need room to retweet it. Twitter culture dictates that you give credit to the person who originally exposed you to a tweet when you retweet, so extra space is needed for the hat tip.
Too many people, however, focus on “short” and forget about “as possible.” A better way to think about it is as long as necessary, but no longer. Luckily, history provides us with some strong encouragement in the short headline department.”
The 100 Greatest Advertisements by Julian Lewis Watkins shows that 95% of the most effective headlines from the early years of magazine advertising were eight words or less. This is because magazine copywriters had to write tight headlines due to space concerns, just like Twitter users.
And studies done from the direct mail industry show that about 50% to 60% of the most effective headlines are eight words or less, leaving ample indication that longer headlines work, too. On a webpage, there are no space concerns, so web copywriters found that longer headlines communicated more benefit right at the top of the page where eye-tracking studies show people focus, and therefore worked better. Watch our free webinar on heatmaps for more information on placement for key elements on websites.
Always remember that people will follow you and retweet because they trust you!
Your followers will help you build a bigger following if you tweet relevant content and not drivel. So practice restraint. If you are tweeting six and seven times a day and offering no relevant content, your followers will quickly become annoyed and stop following you. So be cognizant of how often you tweet and make sure that it fulfills the 4-U goals.
Take five minutes and learn a new way to make your practice remarkable!