Create a High-Converting Website Headline

Your product or service is ready to hit the market. You have all the appropriate insurance to cover you against costly claims and lawsuits. You have your digital advertising ready to activate across the most popular channels. Your SEO skills have never been better. You are ready for business.

An overlooked item can undo all of your hard work.

Your website headline is an essential component of your website and overall marketing campaign. An ineffective one can make your site appear boring and not worth visiting, which can hinder its chances of driving sales.

This article can help you create a high-converting website headline that engages visitors and compels them to do business with you.

Know Your Headline’s Goal

The headline is typically the first item people will see when they visit your website. The goal of any headline is to attract attention. Once you have this purpose in mind, then you can begin to draft your own headline.

If you need help wrapping your head around headlines, just look at news websites, newspapers, and magazines. The homepage of any news website is loaded with headlines. Newspapers and magazines live and die by their headlines. Use what you have found and see how you can apply them to your website.

Make the Headline About Your Customer

Your website headline should attract prospective customers first and then keep them on your site. You can accomplish this by emotionally engaging them. Focus your headline on them. Tell them why they should consider your product or service. You can outright tell them by addressing their pain points. Alternatively, you can tease them. Your visitors want something. Give them a taste of it in your headline. When your headline tantalizes them, they can then choose to discover what you can offer them.

Focus on the First Four Words

Many people have short attention spans. Others simply want to get to the point and quickly get what they want. You should value your website visitors’ time. You only have a few seconds to capture their attention. Therefore, the first four words of your website’s headline are probably the most crucial elements on the entire web page. You must attract the visitor and compel them to go further down your sales funnel in four words.

One way to accomplish this is to use a subject/verb formula where the subject should be the visitor/potential customer. You do not have to blatantly call the subject “you,” but you should try to make your headline about them.

Use Imperatives

Many resources suggest using questions in your headline. You should do the opposite. You can demonstrate that you respect your website visitors’ intelligence and time by acknowledging that you know why they have stopped on your site. Skip the question and go straight to the answer. Better yet, you should use imperative words that place the visitor in control of their purchasing journey. This method can increase engagement and keep visitors moving forward on your site.

Focus on the Strongest Value

By now, you should know what your ideal customer or client wants. If you do not, then you should create a detailed profile of their desires, pain points, and fears. You can use this information to derive the strongest value they can hope to gain by using your product or service. You can use the strongest value to guide your headline writing efforts. You can also word your headline in a way that suggests visitors should pursue your product or service otherwise they might be stuck with their pain points without any suitable resolution.

Test Your Headline

Your work is not finished once you write a headline. In fact, you probably should write several. Having a few to work with can help you find the one that converts visitors into customers. 

Once you publish your headline, give it some time and then evaluate your website and sales metrics. You can see how many visitors remain on your page, how many click-thru, and how many leave. Your sales numbers can also suggest how well your headline performs.

If the analytics are less than satisfactory, then you should use an alternate headline or edit the one you published. Keep testing until you get the results that drive revenue your way.

Headlines Can Convert

Creating a high-converting website headline is yet another investment you should make to generate interest in what you are selling. Headlines have power that you can easily harness to produce additional revenue opportunities.