A Writer's Guide To Writing Hooks For Instagram Posts
Dos, don'ts, twenty-two hooks to try
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Writing hooks can sometimes feel like pulling teeth, but the good news is itâs not something youâre either good at, or you arenât. Like with everything, some people will have natural gifts in this area, but thatâs not to say you canât develop your own skills and start to write better hooks for your content.
What is a hook?
A hook appear in the first three seconds of a Reel, or on the first slide of a carousel post, and itâs the âthingâ that stops the user viewing your post from scrolling on.
In order to achieve this, a hook has to do several jobs:
grab attention and communicate to your ideal reader/ target audience member that your post is worth watching or swiping through
articulate an idea or offer something your target audience member (your ideal reader) will see the value in. The value can be information, advice, entertainment, resonance etc. but you need to centre your ideal reader/ target audience and think about what they will get out of the post, rather than what you want to tell them
BE TRUE. This is where I think hooks get a bad name as many hooks I see being used across Instagram are so wildly over-the-top that they âstop the scrollâ but the post then doesnât deliver. Iâm not going to engage with a piece of content that I feel duped by, and Iâm definitely not going to hit follow on that account, so in my opinion those kinds of hooks are a waste of time (not to mention feeling gross to write) unless youâre only interested in the vanity metrics of reach and views.
DOs
NB: you might not be able to deliver all of the below in a single reel hook but make sure your hook uses at least one of these elements
Be relevant - identify the person your reel is for e.g. my hooks often use the words âwriterâ or âauthorâ
Be specific - mention a particular problem, emotion, solution that is relevant to your target audience/ ideal reader
Pique your audienceâs curiosity - hint at something intriguing, surprising or valuable that the content will reveal
DONâTs
Use jargon - I see this mistake most often with non-fiction authors who are also experts in their field. Unless your target audience is other people in your industry, you need to think about the language your readers are using to describe a problem, use simple language and appeal to their emotions. If you feel strongly that youâd like to educate people about the âcorrectâ vocabulary, make this a feature of your content. You could do a âmyth bustingâ series where you explain common misconceptions about language, or you could even create a âNew to [subject], start hereâ pinned post where you introduce key concepts or language.
Make the text too small, too curly, or not high contrast enough. This will make the hook difficult to read and make your audience less likely to stop their scroll.
Make your hook too long - a short and catchy phrase works best (yes, I know this is hard!)
How to use hooks in Reels and carousels when youâre a writer
The options for using hooks are pretty much endless but here are some examples to illustrate how you can take a hook and make it better by applying more relevance, specificity and/or curiosity.
A sleep expert whose book is about the science of sleep. Which hook is better?
Hook 1: 5 tips for better sleep
Hook 2: These soothing pre-bedtime rituals will get you deep sleep
Hook two because it identifies what the audience want - âdeep sleepâ - and why they should keep watching the reel - the âsoothing pre-bedtime ritualsâ.
A marketing expert whose book is aimed at small business owners. Which hook is better?
Hook 1: How to get more leads
Hook 2: My favourite techniques to build trust and generate leads
Hook 2 because itâs more specific, piques the viewers curiosity - what are the âfavouriteâ techniques? - and speaks to a desire of the small business owner - they want people to trust them.
A fiction writer whose rom-antasy novel features dragon riders and magical powers. Which hook is better?
Hook 1: The best three fantasy books Iâve read recently
Hook 2: Escape to another world where dragons rule and someone else does the washing up with these three books
Hook 2 (are you sensing a pattern here??!) because itâs more specific - âwhere dragons ruleâ - and taps into an emotional yearning to escape domestic drudgery - âsomeone else does the washing upâ.
A writer whose book is a collection of stories about seventeen ways she has defied death
Hook 1: Three times I met death and survived
Hook 2: How death reminded me of the fierce joy of being alive
Hook 2 (surprise ;-) because it piqueâs curiosity - you want to know how death reminded her - and appeals to emotions - âthe fierce joyâ, who doesnât want to feel that!
Twenty-two hooks for writers
Like most things on Instagram, learning what works for you and your audience can take a little time and testing, but here are a few ideas you might like to try. These are sampled from Reels Iâve seen performing well across Instagram that Iâve tweaked to work for books/ writers/ authors/ readers and a few of them Iâve tried for myself!
Most of these will work well with b-roll video, or as talk-to-camera Reel hooks. Some of them will also work as the first slide on a carousel post.
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