Simple Tricks to Choose a Catchy Title for Your Article or Essay

The content of any essay is determined by the title, and all readers make conscious choices as to whether to read or not to read any work just by their subjective judgment of the title. A title is a gateway to your content, and you do not want your titles to turn away your prospective readers. A title serves many important purposes to your essay and its clarity, brevity, and relevance cannot be overlooked. You must pay special attention to how you write your title, it will make or break your essay. It determines the thesis statement upon which you build your arguments and consequently the whole essay.

A title determines the scope of your writing, and it should capture the attention of the user to go through your work. In the age of social media, you might have come across ‘click-bait’ which are titles purposely meant to lure users to click some links to reach some content by exploiting their curiosity. Click baits are often misleading titles, and they show the power of titling on the audience. Thus, this article shares some simple tricks from team at Essay Zoo, that can help you choose a catchy title.

Use Numbers

Numbers are known to trigger curiosity in readers to prompt them to read your work. Numbers, especially in figures, show specificity of the information and they are easier to note and understand. Using collective terms tends to be less clear on the impact substance covered in the essay. Find a way of including numbers and building your title and content to deliver the figures you promise your audience.

Numbers also direct your content to specific lengths and help the user to determine if they have the time to consume the content. The numbers will vary depending on your content and objectivity. Organize the content tot reflect the numbers you have in the title and keep your reader glued to your content. Bloggers have taken up this number titling and writing ‘listicle’ in their publications, and they attest they have driven their periodic reader. It is a proven concept and recipe for more readership, and you can use it appropriately in your writing to create catchy titles.

Keep it Short

Brevity in writing title is important. Longer titles tend to be ambiguous and give away too much such that they kill the interest of the reader to go through the whole article. For content likely to be published online, keep it less than 70 characters to avoid being truncated by search engines. Shorter titles if worded correctly are sweet and interesting. They also give the author the flexibility to build on them later rather than limiting the scope of an essay by many words, However, it is important to note that sometimes long titles are required to describe the content for the audience accurately.

For the long title, they tend to be very specific and mostly filled with technical jargon for a specific audience in particular fields. However, short tiles fit the general category, and though they must encompass the scope of the essay, they tend to give room to the author to work around how to present the content of the essay.

Make it Exciting

Making titles exciting is probably a subjective term, and some of the exciting elements to an author may not necessarily trigger the same reaction from the audience. However, there are standard ways humans define fun and how they get excited.

For example, adding descriptive words can make a title more exciting and capture the attention of the reader. For example, a title may be ‘The City.’ This is a dull topic that may not prompt readers to go through the essay. However, here is an example of descriptive titles that are more exciting. The farthest city, The Cleanest City, The Abandoned City, etc. Figure out ways to make the title more exciting by preferably making them descriptive.

Solve A Problem

Most people read to fill an information gap and typically it is a solution they are seeking. Given the amount of information out there most readers tend to skim through topics presented by search engines to find the likely ones that are likely to solve their problems. These titles tend to promise to have the recipe to solve particular problems that prompted them to look for the information. Capturing an aspect of problem-solving in your title catches the eyes of those seeking similar information and decide to go through your work.

A problem-solving title attracts readers seeking to satisfy the desired goal typically information gap, and a promise on the issue is likely to prompt them to go through the article. Exploit the information gap by titling your essay or article in a manner that promises to solve a problem or helping the reader to achieve the desired outcome.

Make Them Laugh

Making your audience laugh draws them to read your work. Humor triggers curiosity to go through the article in search of more humor or related content. Presenting your work humorously helps you establish a bond with your readers, and they perceive your content as fun to read. Humor can be used even in nonfiction writing since it is equally effective in engaging readers by taking them someplace they don’t expect to go.

Humor also sets a light tone to your work and helps readers to relax and go through it in a relaxed environment. Humor is effective but must be used where appropriate. It is also challenging to incorporate humor into a short title but if there is a way you can do it. Irony and satire can help in bringing out the humor.

Concisely, it is undeniable that titles play a critical role in determining the level of interest it triggers in in the readers. This article has featured some of the best tips a writer or author can use to headline his/her essay to prompt readers to go through the work. Each of these tips has been clearly described in details in this article and provided examples where necessary. Practice using them, and they will surely improve your writing generally and they will certainly increase readership of your work.