Keepin’ it simple in order to attract readership.

Okay, so you have constructed your final body of work and now here comes the tough part. Should you  use your wit to attract readership on your blog by using catchy headlines? Or should you be straight-forward so the reader knows exactly what you are talking about right off the bat? That is the struggle that fellow blogger’s and myself alike, deal with everytime we decide to publish our work. Although we all like to showcase our creativity with language choices that will up our egos,  it may be counter-productive when it comes to attracting readership.

According recent article I read on the way Google news is changing the way headlines are being written, it became clear to me just how hard it is to get the RSS feed to pick up your work, no matter how great it may be, without explaining in the headline exactly what it is you are talking about. For example, in a recent blog I posted entitled “Whose thought is it anyways?” which entailed the process of groupthink, I noticed at one point the automatically generated related links that were associated with my piece, held no relevance when it came to my topic, groupthink. Now, who is going to want to read a piece on the process of group think when they were really searching for the results of a gameshow? Not most people. So this got me thinking about that old saying we all have engrained in our minds, “less is more.” Could it be true that the less we rack our minds to create headlines that we deem catchy or creative, the more readership we will attract? Well in a fast-paced world where we want our information instantly, if we can condense our language to be clear and concise then the readership is bound to grow. If only I could have posted my headline as “groupthink” rather than sit at the computer for 15 minutes trying to think of something that would stick maybe I would have gotten more than just 4 views!

-How can bloggers attract readership without forfeiting creativity when it comes to creating headlines?

- When it comes to what makes the cut for the RSS feed, how can bloggers guarentee themselves a spot on the list?