How to get people to read a newsletter

How does a title drive attention?

One of the first things you learn as a clown is this: If they laugh once, do it again. And again. And again. And again.

Do it the same way if they are still laughing. Each time you repeat yourself whatever thing you do - whether you’re pulling a funny face while pretending to be a chicken or opening a peanut with a sledgehammer, keep doing it. It will change by repetition.

If they stop laughing? Try a couple more times. Acknowledge that you are no longer funny. The joke is a union joke. It is on strike and no longer working. Move on.

(but keep that joke in your back pocket. It served you well. It deserves a raise, so please pay your jokes more. Try it again. Before you do, wait long enough for them to have forgotten that it stopped being funny but not so long that they’ve forgotten how funny it was initially)

That’s how bits emerge and grow.

Things that work get repeated.

When it comes to writing headlines, and trying to grow readership, there are some things that bring people in every ti…