Hook Linkbait With The Right Headlines

Feb 6, 2007 at 9:53am ET by Barry Schwartz

Andy Hagan has published an in-depth look at his link baiting methods. In his analysis, he finds that the “single most important aspect of a link bait piece is its title.” I have been hearing this for years, you can have excellent content but if your title isn’t link bait worthy then it won’t make it to the front page of Digg.

Andy borrows Copyblogger’s 10 Sure-Fire Headline Formulas That Work to list the “title cheat sheet.”

Who Else Wants [blank]?
The Secret of [blank]
Here is a Method That is Helping [blank] to [blank]
Little Known Ways to [blank]
Get Rid of [problem] Once and For All
Here’s a Quick Way to [solve a problem]
Now You Can Have [something desirable] [great circumstance]
[Do something] like [world-class example]
Have a [or] Build a [blank] You Can Be Proud Of
What Everybody Ought to Know About [blank]

There are more great tips in Andy’s article as well as our articles on link baiting and link building at Search Engine Land.

Barry Schwartz is Search Engine Land's News Editor and owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics. Barry's personal blog is named Cartoon Barry and he can be followed on Twitter here.

See more articles by Barry Schwartz >

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