Elinor Mills’ CNET article “Newspaper headlines lost in Web translation” offers a look back at a number of famous headlines and how they can be altered by installing keywords, thereby making them more easily found by searchers for relevant phrases. To make a headline “searchable” must we sacrifice effect for precision? Not necessarily. In some cases employing a subhead containing key phrases can help preserve the original headline’s artistic qualities. For example, in Ms. Mills’ article her SEO expert, Stephan Spencer, president and founder of search engine optimization company Netconcepts, takes on the task of revamping headlines using key phrases that are well searched and relevant for their topic. This is fine, however another way to approach the question would be to alter the main headline as little as possible, if at all, and add a subhead that would contain key phrases.

In Ms. Mills’ article it is suggested that the headline “Wall St. lays an egg” be changed to include “Wall Street” vs. “Wall St.” This is a worthwhile change that should be made. One could leave the remainder of the headline and write a subhead or one sentence summary like that which appears below the main headlines on many news sites: Headline: “Wall Street Lays an Egg,” Subhead, or one sentence summary below headline link, containing a key phrase: “Stock market crash worst in history.”

In some portions of a news site’s page one line summaries that can contain key phrases are present, but often the headline must stand alone. To preserve more of an original print headline’s artistic form, one could arrange it using a colon as the point of separation. A print headline that Ms. Mills refers to in her article states: “Sick transit’s glorious Monday.” It could be ‘web-enabled’ in this way: “Glorious Monday: Feds Save NY Transit.”

It is hard to recommend a search engine optimized headline when the power of words to move people emotionally can be lost. In the New York Daily News where the “Ford to City: Drop Dead” headline appeared in 1975, the words “New York” are implicit, and would be easily inferred if a reader saw the original headline on the newspaper’s site today.. However to allow searchers to more easily find the information Spencer is correct that at least adding “President” before “Ford” would make the headline more searchable.

We can broaden the discussion by asking what happens when a reader comes to a news website? How does he / she behave? Are key phrases all that influence the reader, or are there other factors to consider? According to Eyetrack III studies Eyetrack III - What You Most Need to Know, considering the size of the font used and the positioning of the headlines is also critical, and can influence if the reader scans lightly or focuses intently on the headlines. Eyetrack III reports that readers read headlines in the upper left of the page first: “Dominant headlines most often draw the eye first upon entering the page — especially when they are in the upper left, and most often (but not always) when in the upper right.” Eyetrack III also points out:

“A quick review of 25 large news websites reveals that 20 of them place the dominant homepage image in the upper left. (Most news sites have a consistent page design from day to day; they don’t often vary the layout as a print newspaper would.) We observed that with news homepages, readers’ instincts are to first look at the flag/logo and top headlines in the upper left.”

It is a fine line that 21st century writers walk, between that of artist and scientist. Ann Althouse, a Madison, Wisconsin law professor, blogged about the death of William J. Brink, the author of the Daily News Ford headline Althouse: ” FORD TO CITY : DROP DEAD.”:

“Set in huge bold letters, the headline screamed across Page 1 of the paper on Oct. 30, 1975. In six taut syllables, it brought home its message with the power of a knockout punch: At the height of New York’s fiscal crisis, President Gerald R. Ford had declined to bail the city out. Those six syllables, as Mr. Ford later acknowledged, almost certainly lost him New York State in his 1976 race against Jimmy Carter, and with it, the presidency. Powerful. The pen is mighty. The NYT, which had to resist saying Brink “dropped dead,” does poke fun at itself: The corresponding headline in The New York Times that day, FORD, CASTIGATING CITY, ASSERTS HE’D VETO FUND GUARANTEE; OFFERS BANKRUPTCY BILL, remains unsung.”

It seems most fitting to find a compromise where headlines can be crafted to elicit emotion and also be found in a Google search.

Elinor Mills’ recent CNET article, examines the topic of using key phrases for writing descriptive headlines that also act as enticements to get readers to click. Specifically the discussion centers around how online newspaper sites are training their writers to use search engine optimization (SEO) strategies to improve headlines for Web stories.

Elinor Mills refers to “SEO tricks” in her article. Since Ms. Mills’ article discusses writing for clarity and descriptiveness, perhaps a better choice of words in place of “SEO tricks” might be “SEO strategies.” This choice of words is important as the search engine optimization industry divides itself into “white hat” and “black hat” camps, with the “white hat” SEO practitioners working hard to differentiate themselves from the spam techniques employed by the so-called “black hats,” who engage in questionable tactics that the search engines themselves have declared off limits. The “black hats” might be able to fool the search engines temporarily; causing websites to gain high search positions in the short term. Researched, ethical, “white hat” search engine optimization strategies provide a longer term solution that will not get a site banned by the search engines, and form the basis for a broader Internet marketing program that can help drive more targeted traffic to a website.

Ms. Mills’ article provides intriguing insight into the challenges faced by the newspaper industry; and perhaps an effective idea for training online newspaper headline writers would be pay per click (PPC) ad writing, which can teach writers how to effectively incorporate key phrases within short, descriptive, enticing lines of text. There are many useful references that teach these PPC ad writing skills, including the authoritative Andrew Goodman’s Google Adwords Book.

But why stop with the written word? With the proliferation of broadband even smaller newspapers have designed video-centric websites that contain short video segments to complement the associated stories. Newspaper industry professionals can use SEO to optimize their video streams, podcasts, blog posts, and other new media offerings to build a richer experience for users that also allows the content to be more easily found in the search engines for targeted key phrases. Ms. Mills’ article has shown that newspaper professionals understand that SEO is more than “tricks” but a discipline that combines some art and some science. It is at the same time the challenge of thinking and writing precisely; serving two masters - the human user and the search engine robots.

Looks like 2007 will be the year that online advertising finally becomes the “core competency” of traditional ad agencies. According the the Boston Business Journal, Arnold Worldwide recently let go of 40 people in traditional ad jobs, and will be adding up to 30 new hires focusing on “interactive” media.

Our digital group used to be a department. Now, they are right at the center of the agency, digital guys are imbedded into every account,” said Fran Kelly, CEO of Arnold, which now has 100 digital experts in its 600-employee workforce in Boston. “Arnold will really morph into a digital marketing company over the next two to three years. Digital used to be on the edge of what we do. Now it’s more and more at the heart of what we do.

Whereas agencies used to be “all about pitching television and print campaigns as the end-all solution to clients,” now online media has assumed a vital role in clients’ campaigns.