Post title importance – “Look better naked”

Post Titles are critical!

The titles/headlines of your posts (and blog) are very important.

Not only can they “grab” people and entice them to read, but they can also generate search engine traffic, and an incredible amount of Internet traffic, including for blogs, is driven by search engines. Many blogging platforms also use the blog title to help generate the filename they store the post in, making it even more important to search engines as they consider file names in their rankings.

“Look Better Naked” is an interesting title. The local health club is using it in their advertising. Hey, fit people look better naked. I think it’s brilliant – offline.

Online, it has problems. It both contains no “keywords” or “ key phrases,” things people would search on when looking for a health club, and it’s too generic. People might look because it’s cute and sexy, but it doesn’t particularly appeal to someone looking for a health club, and it won’t help get search engine traffic.

Let's improve it by adding keywords. The follow two titles are infinitely better:

• Exercise – Look Better Naked
• Health clubs help you "Look Better Naked”

So, what keyword is best, “exercise,” “health club,” or  . . .

There are simple tools that will help you out. I like the “Keyword Selector Tool” at http://searchmarketing.yahoo.com/rc/srch/ (or look in the "Resource Center" at overture.com) - it’s free. Other keyword tools include the well-regarded wordtracker.com (free trial available).

The keyword selector tool tells you roughly how many times a term has been searched on in search engines in the past month. It’s the relative numbers that matter.

• exercise has been searched on 116437 times
• health club has been searched on 333616 times
• gym has been searched on 183545  times
• world gym has been searched on 14572 times

Since this happens to be a “World Gym,” and that phrase includes “gym,” I’m going to pick “World Gym” and the final title is  . . . World Gym – Look Better Naked.

No it’s not exact science! Health clubs help you Look Better Naked would be fine as well.

Now in the post, include the other keywords and phrases as well to please the search engines and help people find your no-doubt great content. Make sure you include them in a natural way – i.e., write for the reader, not the search engines. DO NOT write something like the following garbage. People, and the increasingly intelligent search engines, will hate it!

Health clubs and gyms are great for exercise to look better naked. Everyone should exercise in a health club or gym. Give a health club or gym membership as a present to a loved one. I love to exercise in health clubs and gyms because I love exercising in health clubs and gyms . . .

A couple of hints:

• Keywords at the beginning of a title are better than keywords at the end of a title.
• Put keywords early in the post.
• Don't obsess over this!

Yes, I know, that was three hints. My three year old Amelia told me today that a couple was three, and who am I to argue?

One final hint for now: if you’re writing about a local establishment, for example the Worlds Gym in Seabrook NH, make sure you include “Seabrook NH” at least once or twice in the title and/or body!

OK, a question: Why the subtitle Blog Titles are critical! in the enlarged font?
Answer later!

Comments

[Motivator]

Your articles are very useful and of great benefit to those looking to monetize their blogs!

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Best Wishes,
-Motivator

[Easton Ellsworth]

Thanks for the blogging tips, Ted. The blog network for which I work, Know More Media, teaches its bloggers to use post headlines that follow the same kinds of guidelines that you've discussed here. As I've tried to put that into practice, I've often found myself rewriting a post title just before I hit "publish." I'll typically make the title something pithy at first, but then repent and make it more clear and descriptive (and therefore more search engine-friendly). It's well worth the extra effort at self-restraint.

[Markus]

I'll go ahead and disagree. When you add the extra words to the title, you completely dilute its appeal.

"Exercise - Look Better Naked" does not pack anywhere near the punch that the mysteriously terse - therefore much more inviting - title, "Look Better Naked" does.

It depends on what you're going after more - human interest or search engine interest (which might drive some human interest)

[T Demop, Blogging for Business]

Markus, the two titles are very different. Adding extra words does make a BIG difference.

As I said, I love "Look Better Naked" offline. In some circumstances it may be better online, for example if you have a big RSS readership who are going to see your title and you want them to click on it, but in general I'll take the search engine friendly title.

This is one of my more popular posts - most people find it via a search engine.

In the end, use a title you like. Search engines aren't everything!

[Email Marketing Software]

Thanks for the blogging tips. Your articles are very useful for me. Thanks for the valuable information you have shared here! Keep it up! I will apply these hints for my blog also.

[Rainbow]

Your site is very interesting and a big help.