Format Headlines to Attract Readers
Careful headline formatting can improve message effectiveness by attracting readers
Headline formatting plays a vital role in the success of your ads, brochures and newsletters. Study after study has shown that if headlines are not read, the text that follows is unlikely to be read.
Successful headlines begin with the right choice of typeface, one that forms a strong visual contrast with the paragraphs that follow.
If you are using a serif typeface for text, like Garamond, Minion or Times, consider a sans serif typeface like Frutiger, Futura, Gill Sans or Univers. Consider investing in the variously named Black, Heavy or UltraBlack versions of your headline typeface. These create significantly stronger visual contrast than just the bold version.
Often headlines set in a small size using a Black or Heavy typeface will have more impact than headlines set in bold at a larger size.
Here are eight ways to make your headlines attractive and easy to read:
- Consistency. Choose a single typeface and type size for all the headlines in your newsletter or proposal. Use your software program's Styles feature to ensure consistent formatting.
- White space. Frame your headlines with as much white space as possible. White space will attract your reader's eyes to your headlines.
- Line spacing. Reduce line spacing in headlines. Your software program's default, or "automatic," line spacing is usually too generous for headlines set at large sizes. Strive to replace white space within your headlines with white space around your headlines.
- Punctuation. Never end a headline with a period, which reduces readership of the text that follows.
- Hyphenation. Never hyphenate headlines. Make sure hyphenation is turned off in your headline text style (if possible). Otherwise, use Line Breaks to push a word to the next line.
- Underlining. Do not underline headlines. This makes them harder to read rather than drawing attention to them.
- Line breaks. Use your software program's Line Break command, often Shift+Enter, to split headlines at natural points and create lines of roughly equal length. Add Line Breaks to avoid separating adjectives and prepositions from the words they modify or introduce, and to keep first and last names together.
- Alignment. Headlines set flush-left, ragged-right are usually easier to read than centered headlines. This is because readers don't have to search for the beginning of each line.
Avoid headlines set entirely in capital letters. Headlines set entirely in upper case type take up more space and are significantly harder to read than headlines set in upper- and lower-case type.
Words set in all caps lack the unique shapes necessary for easy recognition. Many choose to limit capitalization to the first word of the headline, plus proper nouns. This helps readers visually separate proper and improper nouns:
- Introducing General Disorder
- General disorder frowned upon
Keep headlines as short as possible. Whenever possible, keep headlines shorter than three lines; two lines are ideal!
Delete unnecessary words and search for long words you can replace with shorter words. Rewrite headlines if necessary to keep first and last names or dates (i.e., month, day, year) together.
Edit headlines in your page layout program, so you can double-check where line breaks occur.
Use color with care. Headlines set in color are often less noticeable when printed than headlines set in black. Easy reading requires contrast between the text and its background.
Instead of setting headlines in color on ads and brochures, consider reversing them out of a colored background.
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