While arresting visuals help draw the eye to your post, it's typically the headline that gives users the context that drives deeper reading/watching/listening with your content. And the great news is that through extensive data analysis, people have figured out the science behind what makes people engage.
One company that has a great headline analyzer is Coschedule. They have poured through the data from over 1MM blog posts and figured out what the levers are that make for a great headline. It's free for all and extremely simple to use. Just enter your headline in and click Analyze Now. What's nice is that they don't just give you a score for your headline, they break down (and visualize) the science behind it through an interactive infographic and show you what dimensions can be improved to drive engagement. Example below uses the headline for this blog.
Caveat is that while this tool is great for snackable headlines in digital channels, it may not be appropriate for EVERY type of headline needed.
Another benefit: writer collaboration
A great writer not only knows how to tell a great story but also understands the nuance of how to write for the medium. Where things get uncomfortable for marketers is when they have to ask the writer to change their lovingly crafted words because it just won't get the eyeballs, isn't provocative enough, etc for modern digital channels. With an anonymous tool, the writer can use it up front to inform the writing and the marketer can use it to check work when it comes in. And then if a conversation happens, the two parties can have a data+subjective conversation vs. a purely subjective discussion.
If you have other tools you use, please feel free to send them my way and i'm happy to give them a run through. Otherwise, look out for my next post on "Conquering ADD".
*Source: National Center for Biotechnology Information, U.S. National Library of Medicine, The Associated Press