7 Tips for More Shareable Titles (updated)

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Titles need to catchy and descriptive, obviously, but in today’s 140 character world, they also need to be shareable.  I run into titles all the time that I have to edit in order to share on Twitter – usually because they’re too long, but sometimes because they have too much extra “stuff”.  Here’s some tips for making your titles more shareable…

1. Descriptive – Many people share & see content on Twitter or Facebook and make snap decision whether it’s interesting based only on your title.  A good title accurately describes what the content is about.
2. Concise – A long title may be cute or funny, but you need to catch people’s attention in the first few words.
3. Less Than 100 Characters – I run into it all the time – titles that are longer than 140 characters, which means I have to do some editing.  Extra effort means people make just not bother.  Keep your titles under 100 characters to allow room for shortened URLs & retweets.
4. No Extra “Stuff” – Having the name of the site at the end of the title is understandable.  Adding a bunch of extra stuff (for keywords, etc.) is just annoying.
5. Same Title as Content – I see this occasionally, where the title of the page isn’t the same as the title of the content on the page – usually for SEO reasons.  Very annoying to people who want to share and to people who follow a link and find a different title.
6. A Couple Relevant Keywords – Including descriptive keywords is good (especially for people using searches), just make sure they’re concise and relevant (and not overdone).
7. Tips or How To – People like information they can quickly digest.  Titles with “tips”, Top # or “How to” grab attention (Thanks to Nikki Stephan for pointing this out)

What other tips do you have for making more shareable titles?

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