Writing a great headline is a surefire way to win the (albeit) temporary attention of your reader for a few moments. The mistake which a lot of copywriters make is simply promising too much in their headlines. It’s important that you shy away from using “too tall” promise copy. Some examples of too tall promises in copywriting could be:
“Lose 100 pounds in 3 months with this proven technique”
“Make $30,000 each month with my guaranteed methods”
You’ve seen them before. These kinds of headlines certainly grab the attention of your reader, but the promises are so far fetched that most readers won’t entertain them. Besides simply sounding too good to be true, most people have been overexposed to this kind of kitchen sink (everything but the) marketing and have been trained to not entertain it.
Even reliable copy terms like “guaranteed” or “proven” won’t convince people to overlook a too good to be true scenario; the kinds of promises which induce an instant reaction from their readers who immediately say to themselves “um… no way”.
The “um… no way” is one of your biggest adversaries in the marketing world. If people don’t take you seriously, you won’t see any real business coming to you.
You can do much better by yourself and your reader by curtailing your promises in your headlines to something more realistic and believable. Taking our above examples, let’s take a look at them after we bring them back down to Earth.
“Lose 50 pounds in 3 months using my proven technique”
“Add an extra $1,000 a month income stream on autopilot with my guaranteed technique”
Couple your more achievable headlines with the power of the “If” which I covered last week and you’ve got a surefire way to dismantle the “umm… no way” factor.
“If You Have 60 seconds, I’ll Show You How to Lose 50 Pounds in 3 Months Using My Proven Technique”
“If You Give Me 10 Minutes, I’ll Teach You How I Make $1,000 Each Month On Autopilot”
Both of these revamps further legitimize these claims by asking for a bit in return which most people are only too happy to oblige if they think that they’ll get something out of it. It’s the ads which promise the world and ask for nothing in return in the copy which get the “um… no way” toss off.
Make all of your promises realistic and couple them with your “If” device to get people back on your side and drinking the kool-aid.