Lesson Learned: Choose Your Article with as Much Care as You Write The Article Itself!

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Lesson Learned: Choose Your Article with as Much Care as You Write The Article Itself!

Posted on September 5th, 2009 in Writing by martie

One of Triond’s greatest assests is that it is a site where we can learn to become better writers. I recently learned a valuable lesson on writing titles for my articles.

I just learned a valuable lesson in writing. A day or so I go I published an article which I thought had a title that was guaranteed to be catchy enough to garnish some views. It did accomplish that purpose, but did so in an unexpected way.

The Title of my article was: My article idea has been stolen by other Triond Members….all I have to say to the offenders is Thank You!

While I meant the title to be lighthearted and sincere at the same time, several took it as a sarcastic comment on the work of others. That was just the opposite of my intent and if some of these readers had spent a few minutes to actually read the article they would have discovered that I was genuinely grateful for the service I felt these two writers provided.

However, their comments did cause me to do a great deal thinking and after studying these comments I can clearly see why they reached the conclusions that they did. While I am not a person who uses sarcasm others do, and could very well take my title in that vein. Some did.

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Perhaps in lieu of the words Thank You, I could have better gotten my message across with the words I applaud you.

Maybe not.

The point is, while catchy titles do get our attention and earn us readers, they can also be misrepresent the entire point of your article.

Choosing a title that is both catchy and representative of your message is of vital importance. It is important that before we publish an article we not only view the article itself for errors, but take a good hard look at the title and determined if it can in any way be misconstrued.

In this particular case, I am not sure that I would have realized the implication many would put on the title, but, one learns through experience and I certainly learned from this experience.

That is one of the reasons I love writing for Triond. I have learned so much about writing on this site and continue to learn every day.

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7 Responses to “Lesson Learned: Choose Your Article with as Much Care as You Write The Article Itself!”

Nikita K
September 5th, 2009 at 1:24 pm

You look at even the most darkest things in such a positive manner, martie that I just have nothing but pure respect for you. A really thoughtful article and I’m sure those who misunderstood you, including I, are cleared of any doubt.
Lucas Dié
September 5th, 2009 at 1:59 pm

Martie, you say something very important in this article, and I don’t mean what you learned out of the incident, but: IF THEY HAD READ your article … that is a problem with many comments given on the net … so don’t hesitate to go for other catchy titles, there will always be people who want to misunderstand you – ignore them!
Goodselfme
September 5th, 2009 at 5:27 pm

You said it correctly! I have noticed so many people do not read.
Goodselfme
September 5th, 2009 at 5:29 pm

You said it correctly! I have noticed so many people do not read.I think I broke your “I like it” button.
Ruby Hawk
September 5th, 2009 at 7:13 pm

It’s easy to be misunderstood but pay no attention to it. Some of my articles with the most views have had critical comments.
Jenny Heart
September 5th, 2009 at 7:14 pm

I thought personally your article was written in good taste. I applaud you. Like it!
PR Mace
September 5th, 2009 at 11:10 pm

I enjoyed your article but I too thought you were a little upset by it. One of the lessons I learned in school while working on my English Degree was the hook and a good title, these are the foundations of a good article, short story or book. I have worked hard on these and still I don’t think I always get it right. Well, writing is talent that grows and hopefully in my case it grows better. Keep up the good work.