How to write perfect News Headlines

Writing news headlines in an art, the purpose of writing headlines is to grab the attention of your reader. A headline usually is a phrase which summarizes the story and yet is different from the lead paragraph. The focus while writing a headline should be on the main point of the story and hence headlines give a reader the gist of the story. It is the headline which entices a reader to read a story. No matter how good your news story is a reader will only read your story if he finds the headline to be interesting.

• Writing headlines

Writing headlines as said earlier is an art. It is the duty of a sub-editor to give a story an attractive headline. Following are the guidelines to be followed while writing a headline.

1. Should be accurate: A headline should do justice to the meaning and the tone of the news story. Often you might have noticed many misleading headlines especially on the online platform. Writing misleading headlines to sensationalize a trivial matter is not good journalism practice.

2. Should be concise: Shorter the headline the better it is. In print people often stick to short and sharp headlines due to space constraints. But on the online platform where space is not a problem people tends to give lengthy headlines which is not advisable.

3. Should fill the space: In order to avoid too much of free space (which is called the white space) the person writing headline is require to fill the space as much as he could.

4. Should not be abstract: The purpose of writing a headline to convey the meaning of the story effectively. So writing a straightforward, direct headline is always better that writing abstract, confusing headlines.

5. Should be written in present tense: While news stories are written mostly in the simple past tense the headlines RE written mostly in the present tense. 

For example : ‘Trump hosts dinner for Modi’ (Present tense)

Washington: Ahead of their Summit talks, US President Barack Obama on Monday hosted a private dinner for Prime Minister NarendraModi as the two leaders sought to reinvigorate bilateral ties. (Past tense)

6. Should use active voice: Using active voice will help you to communicate more information with lesser number of words. In active voice subject performs the action described by the verb. 

For example: Modi (Subject) visits (Verb) Canada

7. Avoid repeating the lead: Both the headline and the lead should focus on the main point of the story. If you are using same words both in the headline and the lead then the lead will become needless. Hence it is better to different words in headline and lead.

8. Avoid bad breaks: A bad break is when a headline with more than one line splits an adjective, noun verb, adverb or a prepositional phrase. 

For example look at the headline below:

Trump hosts white

house dinner

Here the phrase white house should not be split to the second line. In this case a better headline would be:

Trump hosts dinner

at the white house

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Guidelines to Editing Process

The process of editing requires immense concentration and can’t be done in a hurry. A sub-editor focuses on the report prepared by a reporter to achieve the following goals:

• To make sure that the report is logical and meaningful

• To present accurate information, facts and figures to the reader

• To trim a report and make it concise and clear

• Is targeted towards the reader

• To render an appropriate tone and tenor to the report

• Makes it purpose clear

The important questions a sub-editor must ask himself while editing a piece are

• Does the lead paragraph provide a summary of the news to the readers?

• Do the individual paragraphs contribute to the key idea in order to form a meaningful whole?

• Does the purpose remain consistent throughout the story?

• How relevant is each sentence to the purpose of the story?

• Is there any sentence in each paragraph that summarizes its meaning?

• Do the paragraphs contain a single meaning each?

• Is there a logical flow of text from one paragraph to another?

• Is the story properly worded avoiding unnecessary filler words (actually, basically etc.) and repetitions?

• Is the story free from clichés, slang and jargons?

• Has evidence been given to back up the statements?

• Is there an appropriate tone given to the story?

• Does the story fulfil readers’ requirements?

• Does the final paragraph properly conclude the story?

If the above mentioned guidelines are met then the copy is said to be clean and is ready for proofing. In most of the cases major changes are to be made on a report prepared by a reporter or have to be rewritten to make a piece publishable. After the necessary adjustments are made the copy is ready for proofreading.

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News Editing Process

Editing literally means to prepare any text, image, audio or video for publication or presentation by making necessary corrections, alterations and modifications. The process is similar while editing news articles also. The aim of news editing is to present a reader an accurate, balanced and fair account of the event, incident or happening in an easily digestible format.

The process of editing starts with the selection of events a newspaper decides to report. There are many incidents of varying significances happening at time and all those events may not become news because of time and space constraints. And also every newspaper organisation has a set of guidelines which govern the process of selection and presentation.

It is the duty of a reporter to write an account of the selected event which is then sent to the editing desk. It is at the editing desk where a sub-editor shapes a story and makes it easily comprehendible to the readers.

A sub-editor structures the story in such a way that all the relevant information is disclosed at the beginning of the story. He aligns the story to the style followed by the newspaper and also double-checks facts, figures and names. He makes a report clean, clear and consistent and writes strong and attractive headlines. He also responsible for the basic page lay-out.

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Structure of Editorial Department

It is the editor or editor in chief who heads the editorial department. The editor plans and guides the actions of the department. He is assisted in this process by news editors, chief sub-editors, senior sub-editors etc. The editorial department of a newspaper organisation works in shifts. A detailed division of labour is as follows.

• Editor

The editor or the editor in chief is the captain of the ship. He/she heads both the reporting and the editing sections. An editor is responsible for the content of a newspaper including comics, news stories and editorials. He/she is the one who can be sued for libel or any such scurrilous matter published in the newspaper. The editor in chief takes important decisions on publication of news and expression of opinion on significant issues and events.

An editor is not just a person who writes the editorial, but conducts the news operation and opinion of the newspaper. In early times newspapers name were known associated with the names of great editors. But presently the editors are chosen among the proprietors and focuses on the management aspect of newspaper.

Every newspaper is required to publish the name of the editor. He/she wields the entire responsibility of bringing out the newspaper. Other than this an editor shares the responsibility of news rating and circulation. So he/she should face pressure from management, government, advertisers and public for the content published in the newspaper.

• News editor

News editor is the person who oversees the selection and preparation of news items for publication or broadcast. In simple words a news editor plans daily newspaper. A news editor is also responsible for assigning articles to other journalists and overseeing their publication. The duties of a news editor may vary based on the size of the organisation. In larger newspapers they focus on a specified area, like sports, politics, etc. In local newspapers a news editor performs multiple tasks in addition to editing.

News editor can stop printing of a newspaper to add an important breaking news item. It is the responsibility of the news editor to supervise the dummy for the first page. His/her responsibilities also include conducting editorial conferences and assigning duties.

• Sub editor

Sub editor or copy editor plays a crucial role in the editing process. He/she improves the formatting, style, and accuracy of news reports. Sub editor has to assemble important points from the mass of material sent by the news reporters and scrutinize them, giving a shape in a logical and interesting way. He/she has to give suitable headlines and where necessary, revise and condense the material to suit the available space. This is rather a difficult task which requires skill, flair for writing and mastery over the language. Sub editor is primarily answerable for what goes in his/her section of the paper.

Sub editor is responsible for ensuring the correct grammar, spelling, house style and tone of the published work. He/ she make sure that the copy is factually correct and that it suits the target audience. Sub editor also lay out the story on the page, and ensures that the text flows, that it is sensible, fair, and accurate, and that any legal problems have been addressed. If a passage is unclear or an assertion seems questionable, the sub editor may ask the reporter to clarify it.

Sub editors often specialize in a particular field, such as foreign news, sports, films, commerce, etc. and work on national and local newspapers, magazines and online publications.

There are also other members in the editorial department like Photo editors, Magazine editors, proof readers, page designers, etc.

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