Which is better? As a journalist, I really hate bad headlines and feel dreadful about writing them. I do understand that SEO is a powerful tool, and that blog headlines are an important part of SEO. However, I also know that if I saw a blog full of dull and obviously marketing-based headlines, I would leave the site. What do you think?
You can do both and if you are using an SEO plug in like All In One SEO, you can have one headline for your readers, and another for the SERPS and SEO each post individually.
Personally, I feel that it's better to write interesting content than SEO content or at least a mixture of the two. This is because I prefer building a loyal audience.
Right, a loyal audience is definitely my goal. I don't want a crappy headline to put people off reading on either, when the content is worth reading. But if people can't find me on the search engines, I can't build a loyal audience either.