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Initial Caps Or no initial caps For Headlines?

by Raydal
14 replies
A very interesting question I've never really seen addressed by any
other copywriter until now. Check out this blog post by Chris:

3 "Marlow Tips" for writing more powerful headlines | S.S. Treasure Hunt - Membership Community for Copywriters

-Ray Edwards
#caps #headlines #initial #inition
  • Profile picture of the author pewpewpewmonkeys
    Drew Eric Whitman discusses this in his book Cashvertising. Unfortunately the research quoted only covers all-caps vs initial-caps.

    All caps slows readership by 18.9% compared to initial.

    But here's a question: Would you want the reader to slow down anyway?
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    • Profile picture of the author Raydal
      Originally Posted by pewpewpewmonkeys View Post

      Drew Eric Whitman discusses this in his book Cashvertising. Unfortunately the research quoted only covers all-caps vs initial-caps.

      All caps slows readership by 18.9% compared to initial.

      But here's a question: Would you want the reader to slow down anyway?
      I'm familiar with that research as well, but this is the first time I see the issue
      of initial caps discussed. ALL CAPS ARE HARDER TO READ because if
      you cover the bottom of the letters you can't read them as you would with
      common case letters. A simple test of covering the bottom half of the letters
      would prove this.

      -Ray Edwards
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  • Profile picture of the author splitTest
    Quotation marks around the headline pull better (supposedly).

    Same with using an initial dropcap in the first paragraph...
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  • Profile picture of the author onehalf
    All caps IS screaming in print. I find the initial caps (title case) format more readable.
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  • Profile picture of the author godinu
    The only time any word in a headline should ever be in all caps is if you really want to scream the message at the reader, making that word stand out on the page. This would be rare. Too many caps = harder on the eyes and tiresome after a while.
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  • Profile picture of the author shawnlebrun
    I'm willing to bet that every market you test these in...

    "The Headline is Here" or "the headline is here"...

    You'll probably get varying results. Some markets it may
    make a huge difference... maybe where the market is a very
    analytical one and can spot differences like these.

    The more I'm online, the more I realize you just never know, so
    now I don't even bother asking anyone anymore... I just test it.

    For example... a copywriter I GREATLY admire uses ALL CAPS
    here in his headline...

    https://www.freshpressedoliveoil.com/c/FPOO/dl

    And yet, a billion dollar company... many pages on their site, no
    initial caps at all in many of their headlines... they use all lower
    case letters in their headlines...

    Apple

    So, my thoughts are... it doesn't matter what you think may work,
    I lost a lot of money online "thinking" something would work better.

    Now, I just test the sh*t out of everything...
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    • Profile picture of the author Raydal
      Originally Posted by shawnlebrun;10405199
      For example... a copywriter I GREATLY admire uses ALL CAPS
      here in his headline...

      [URL

      https://www.freshpressedoliveoil.com/c/FPOO/dl[/URL]
      If you take everything into consideration, you'll see in that particular ad
      that he is going for the vintage look. The ALL CAPS and choice fonts
      makes the add looks like an old newspaper ad. Plus, the headlines is
      just 7 words. Plus, when you are that big, those "little things" don't
      matter anymore.

      -Ray Edwards
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      • Profile picture of the author gjabiz
        Originally Posted by Raydal View Post

        If you take everything into consideration, you'll see in that particular ad
        that he is going for the vintage look. The ALL CAPS and choice fonts
        makes the add looks like an old newspaper ad. Plus, the headlines is
        just 7 words. Plus, when you are that big, those "little things" don't
        matter anymore.

        -Ray Edwards
        But, it depends on the media. Like the post by Chris Matthews, the target market and the message meet at X, and that should help you decide which one to test.

        ONLINE, and with digital products, I'm not sure it matters, but, I'd love to see some real data on the subject, but speculation doesn't cost anything does it?

        gjabiz
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  • Profile picture of the author dmaster555
    These things should be tested individually and not accepted as "the rule".
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    • Profile picture of the author Kieran D
      There is no hard and fast rule for this. It all comes down to testing in the individual market.

      Kieran
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      • Profile picture of the author Raydal
        Originally Posted by Kieran D View Post

        There is no hard and fast rule for this. It all comes down to testing in the individual market.

        Kieran
        For sure it's best to test everything but you still need a baseline from which
        to test. That's what the "rules" of copywriting are--baselines.

        -Ray Edwards
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  • Profile picture of the author Princess Balestra
    weirdZ.

    Guess there is room for maneuvre when it comes to capitalizin' on attention grabbin' ~ apart from mebbe ALL CAPS, which works OK in punctuated bursts BUT READS SO DARNED RUDE WHEN THERE IS NO END TO THE SEEMINGLY SHOUTY MADNESS.

    (My '~' is not attention-grabbin' cuteness here, btw ~ I have yet to find a decent dash on my tab keyboard, an' I figure a casual & unironed '~' offers a better kinda wrong than a circumcized '-'. Prolly jus' me...)
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  • Profile picture of the author niksto82
    I would put some spam such as "You wouldn't believe what happened next!"
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    • Profile picture of the author DavidAllan13
      Actually, the above Olive Oil example was tested by the famous copywriter Shaun alluded to above and ALL CAPS beat out the other things he tried.

      Dave
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