By Claire Malon
No, I didn’t forget to write a headline. No, that’s not a placeholder title. This headline — like all others — is important. Headlines are important.
A headline can make or break even the best story, impacting the amount of engagement, the number of reads and how a story is received. For this reason, writing headlines can be difficult and daunting.
But then again, it should be. Headlines carry a lot of weight. Not only are they the first thing a person reads, more often than not, they’re the only thing a person will read.
A study from the American Press Institute found that six in 10 Americans don’t read past the headline. That means for roughly 60% of our readers, those big, bolded words at the top of the article are all that really matters.
So then shouldn’t we be cautious about what information we include in our headlines? I would argue so.
Acknowledging that a majority of readers won’t read any further, journalists have to ensure that our headlines are clear, accurate and not at all misleading or misrepresentative. That’s our journalistic responsibility.
The Society of Professional Journalists says as much. The SPJ Code of Ethics states that ethical journalism should “provide context” and “take special care not to misrepresent or oversimplify in promoting, previewing or summarizing a story.” And after all, what is a headline if not a summary of the story that follows?
Failing to provide context or oversimplifying a story in a headline can have dangerous and far-reaching consequences, even leading to the rapid spread of misinformation.
Take, for example, this headline from CNBC. On July 30, the outlet published a story on breakthrough COVID-19 cases. The headline read, “Breakthrough Covid cases: At least 125,000 fully vaccinated Americans have tested positive.”
At face value, the statistic seems staggering. Though technically accurate, without context the headline dangerously distorted the reality of breakthrough cases at the time.
Further in the article, the necessary context is provided: “The 125,682 ‘breakthrough’ cases…represent less than .08 percent of the 164.2 million-plus people who have been fully vaccinated since January.” The article’s headline, however, noticeably failed to provide this essential context.
Conversely, in a story published on the same day as CNBC’s, NBC5 Chicago headlined their article on the topic, “Data Shows Less Than 1 Percent of Vaccinated Test Positive for COVID.”
Using the same underlying data, the two articles manage to convey strikingly different pictures of the state of breakthrough infections. Thus, from these cases we can see how the same story can be characterized in vastly different ways depending on their chosen headline.
Intentionally or unintentionally, as journalists we must not amplify the spread of misinformation. So, whoever in your newsroom is responsible for crafting the headlines — whether it’s the reporter, editor, or copywriter — must take great care to write something that is fully reflective of the story, factually accurate and provides all context necessary for comprehension.
These things are of supreme importance and should always be prioritized over a headline that is eye-catchy, SEO-friendly, sensationalist or clever.
In all fairness, it is hard to summarize thousand-word stories in just a few words. But, knowing how few people will read any further, it’s our job to make those words count.
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