You Will Get More Readers If You Write Headlines This Way | Hacker News Reader

You Will Get More Readers If You Write Headlines This Way

random.andrewwarner.com

This post is just a (cleverly headlined) wrapper around the original story, http://www.membercon.com/from-police-reports-to-email-subjec...

You Will Get More Pageviews If You Simply Wrap Others Content

How's work at Mahalo going?

I was just trying to process what I read by blogging it. But it looks like Tim's techniques work because that's the only attention my little, mostly-photos, personal blog ever got.

Also, it's shocking that a post like this can get more hits that some of the interviews where I go into heavy depth and do a lot of research.

It's the bikeshed effect. Everyone can easily understand topics like this. Not everyone can understand in-depth discussions with startup founders.

The cynic in me wants to avoid blogging success at all costs. On the other hand, there's something to be said for making a topic approachable. Consider Jeff Atwood. His commentary on technical topics isn't that great, but it's written in such a way that any idiot programmer can understand it.

Admittedly people like me are probably outweighed by the opposite, but some of his examples are headlines I'd go out of my way to avoid. If I see something like, "Steps to improve your trading by 25%", I immediately think: make-money-fast BS with a number pulled out of a hat.

To be fair, I read those articles when they show up on HN, if for no other reason than to tear them apart.

I watched my iPhone app sales rise, when I made my blurb on the app store simple and assertive.

People respond to clear, strong sentences.

I didn't even need to see the domain to know where this was coming from.

The linked article misses the point: A/B test the subject of emails to see what works better.

: The asterisk is for the fact that you are selling out the truth for dollars. I guess if you have a problem with that you need to find a different career.

A/B testing email subjects is not the point, it's a tactic. Email subjects aren't the point either.

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