Headlines and Taglines – But what about Grablines

So no surprises there. We write our headline wrap it in H tags and away we go.

But as I said that is only half the story. I would add a further far more important definition

3: the opportunity to grab a reader’s attention and make them want to read the rest of the page, post or email.

That is why I don’t think of them as headlines. Instead, I refer to them as ‘Grablines’.

What is a Grabline?

A Grabline is a headline that grabs the reader attention.  For those from a marketing background think of it as the A from the AIDA funnel. So all grablines are Headlines but not all Headlines are grablines.

So now you know what Grablines are, let me show you how to use them…

For this we will use a scenario, we run an online shoe shop. We are going to write a post about the hot new looks for spring 2018 inspired by some images we have just seen from New York Fashion Week.

So here we go let’s find a title for our new post, it’s headline

Ladies shoe fashions for spring 2018.

Headlines to Grablines

Well if we go back to our definition that seems to fit the bill for a headline. Now can we turn it into a grabline?

Ladies shoes – what’s hot for spring 2018.

Ok, now we are getting there. We have a headline that is starting to grab the readers attention and importantly it is now incorporating one of our keywords. However, we have two more tricks up our sleeve. Firstly we could add a verb to our grabline. Adding a verb or “doing word” helps to engage your reader. So now we would have;

Ladies shoes – Find out what’s hot for spring 2018.

I am now not only telling the reader what my post is about but also telling them to read it.

Our final trick is to consider adding a tagline to our post.

What is a tagline?

A tagline is a short phrase or sentence that goes below the grabline in order to either clarify its meaning or for a dramatic effect.

You don’t need to always add a tagline but if you think it helps clarity drop one in.

So let’s think about what we might add in a tagline; we could go with something like

We take a look at the latest styles from New York Fashion Week.

Now lets put our Grabline and Tagline together

Ladies shoes – Find out what’s hot for spring 2018.

We take a look at the latest styles from New York Fashion Week.

By now your reader should know exactly what your post is going to be about and we should have grabbed their attention. Remember there should be no nasty surprises. Your grabline and tagline must relate to your post. If not you will soon lose the trust of your readers and they will become ex-readers.

Another thing worth remembering is to avoid making your grabline and tagline too long or complex. When it comes to grablines and taglines I always think of KISS. Not the rock band with painted faces but – Keep It Simple Stupid.

It is important to remember that everything I have said here applies equally to your email marketing activities. Here your goal is to get the recipient to open your email. We all receive many marketing emails per day so yours need to stand out. Open and click through rates are often quite low for email campaigns so anything you can do to entice the reader to open yours is time well spent.

Not everyone will understand your Headlines.

One final piece of advice I would give you is, test your grablines on others. In our example, we would expect everybody would be able to understand what our post is going to be about. If you are writing in a more specialised area you may need to run it past a few people first. In that way, you can be sure that your readers will know exactly what to expect. If they don’t just play around with it until it becomes crystal clear.

I hope this has given you some ideas of how you can turn your headlines and taglines into killer grablines.