5 ways to write better headlines for your Facebook ads

One of the toughest parts to being a writer is coming up with the perfect headline for your story. Anyone who faces this struggle on a daily basis will know that a good headline is short, informative, direct and attractive. These characteristics are what grab the attention of your readers and make them visit your page. But more often than not, it is difficult to piece together those 40 odd characters, even if you’ve just filed an 800-word story.

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The struggle is especially felt among brands and companies who have to promote their ads on various platforms and make it engaging enough to draw customers. This is especially true in the case of those brands and companies that are paying a platform as big and all-inclusive as Facebook for ad-space that needs to stand out among the millions of other national and international brands.

It is thus necessary for these companies to make sure that they create the perfect headline for their product or service so that they can garner traffic for their sites and avoid losing their customers and viewers to other competitors. With new information scrolling in every second, it is important to note that on a platform as big as Facebook, every second of the user’s time counts as value. As a person releasing an ad for your space, you cannot afford to take up too much of their time because there simply isn’t enough of it.

Here are a few pointers on how to write better headlines for your Facebook ads to direct users to your site and increasing your viewership.

Keep it short, snappy and simple

One of the first things to remember while crafting a headline for your ad is to keep it short and snappy. No one has the time or patience to sit and read a long and vague one and spend precious seconds deciphering what it indicates. For instance, if you are an e-commerce company and you have an offer on a new collection of winter wear, you could say something like “Buy 2 for the price of 1 on our winter collection” instead of a “We have a special offer for you on our winter wear collection where you get 2 for the price of 1.”

Make it a question

According to a study in Social Influence, headlines in the form of questions received 150% more clicks than statement headlines. Not to mention, these questioning headlines received 175% more clicks if the question included the word “you.” For instance, an online travel company putting out an ad that asks “Where do you wish to travel next?” would work better than a “Here a list of places that you can travel to in your next vacation”.

Give all the information at one go

Everyone likes a good mystery, but no one has the time for one. Similarly, putting across a vague headline won’t do you any good because people wouldn’t take out the time or patience to decode it. A good headline is short and contains all the basic information about the product or service it promotes. For instance, if you are a company dealing in babycare products and services, putting out something like “5 must-haves items for your baby kit” is much better than a “All mothers should make sure to buy these items for their baby’s care.” It is also necessary that once a user clicks on this link, the page is automatically directed to the five said items with prices and descriptions attached so they get their time and money’s worth, instead of redirecting them to the home page of your website or linking it to another unrelated article.

List out benefits

Like every other consumer pattern, online users will also spend their time on product sites that they know they will incur benefits from. It is thus advisable to offer a benefit or two in the headline itself so you can attract them to visit the page in hopes of more. For instance, if you are a health and fitness company, you could state something along the lines of “Lose 10kg in less than a month for Rs 3000 only” – winning over the interest of all those looking to lose weight faster.

Give a command and direction

What works well while drafting headlines for your Facebook ad is giving a clear-cut command and then direction to make the result easier for both you and your customer. For instance, a company like LIC could say “Click here to invest in LIC’s Jeevan Labh for greater benefits” so that all the user needs to do to is to just to click on the ad.

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