Choosing a title for your book, article, or other work is very important.  The title or headline is the first thing that potential readers will see and it will give them a first impression of your work.  It is often the deciding factor between a book that is sold and one that is left on the shelf.  A title is a very powerful marketing tool.

There are different types of titles for different kinds of work.  Newspapers, technical and how to books use titles that are straight forward and explanatory.  The purpose is to correctly label the information so that readers can find what they’re looking for.  This is the kind of title that I use for the Home page articles of this blog.  I want readers to easily find the appropriate information about writing.  Using words that people might type into a search engine is a good system because Google and other search engines check the words in an article’s headline first.  That’s how most of you found this website.

Works of fiction, non-fiction, and poetry usually have more artistic titles; titles that capture your attention or arouse your curiosity.  Imagine yourself in a book store.  You’re looking for a book to read on an eight hour flight.  How do you choose?  I first choose by title and then by the summary on the back cover.  The Weekly Word and Obiter Dictum articles in this blog have artistic titles.  They allude to the articles purpose without being too descriptive.  These titles should stimulates the reader’s curiosity and keep them reading.

Everyone knows the saying “you can’t judge a book by it’s cover”.  I wish that saying was true, but it’s not.  The reality is, people do judge books by their cover and people by their clothes.  Therefore, choose your title the same way that you would choose your clothes for a job interview.  Remember that first impression is everything.