How to Write a Hook for Social Media (The Complete Framework)

TL;DR -- What You Need to Know

What a Hook Actually Is (And What It Isn't)

A hook is the opening of your content -- the first words someone reads, hears, or sees -- that determines whether they stay or scroll.

On TikTok, it's the first 1-3 seconds of your video. On Instagram, it's the first frame of your Reel or the first line of your caption before "...more." On LinkedIn, it's the 2-3 lines of text visible before the "...see more" fold.

That's the entirety of the audition. Everything you say after the hook only matters if the hook worked.

Here's what a hook is NOT: it's not clickbait. It's not a gimmick. It's not a trick you tack onto otherwise boring content to manipulate people into watching. A good hook is an honest preview of the most interesting thing in your content. It takes the part your audience would care about most and moves it to the front.

Think of it this way: if your content is a movie, the hook is the trailer. It doesn't spoil the plot -- it creates enough tension that you need to see how it plays out.

Why Hooks Matter More Than Anything Else You Do

You can have the best content in the world. The most valuable insights. The most beautiful editing. None of it matters if nobody makes it past the first two seconds.

This isn't an exaggeration. The data backs it up:

Every platform has built their algorithm around the same insight: the opening is the most reliable predictor of whether content is worth distributing.

Which means the hook is the single highest-leverage thing you can improve. Better hooks don't just get more views -- they make everything else you do work harder. Your editing, your insights, your calls to action -- all of that gets amplified when more people actually see it.

(Short on time? Captain Hook AI generates hooks based on the exact framework in this article — but understanding the psychology first will make you better at using any tool, including AI.)

The Psychology Behind Why Hooks Work

Hooks aren't magic. They work because of specific, well-documented patterns in how human brains process information. Understanding these patterns is the difference between guessing at hooks and engineering them.

Pattern Interrupts

Your brain is constantly filtering out information that matches expected patterns. When you scroll through a social media feed, most content blends together because it looks and sounds like everything else. A pattern interrupt is anything that breaks the expected flow -- an unexpected statement, a contradiction, a change in visual tone.

When your brain encounters a pattern interrupt, it briefly drops its filters and pays attention. That's your window. The hook doesn't need to keep someone's attention forever -- it just needs to break through the autopilot long enough for the content to take over.

This is why "Hey guys, welcome to my channel" never works as a hook. It matches the expected pattern perfectly. Your brain categorizes it as "generic intro" and keeps scrolling before you even consciously process it.

Open Loops

An open loop is an unresolved question, story, or promise. When your brain encounters one, it treats it as a task that needs completion. Psychologists call this the Zeigarnik effect -- we remember and fixate on incomplete tasks far more than completed ones.

"I gained 50K followers in a month, and the reason is embarrassingly simple." That's an open loop. Your brain now has an incomplete task: find out what the reason is. You can't close that loop without watching the rest of the video or reading the rest of the post. So you stay.

Every effective hook contains at least one open loop. Sometimes two or three stacked on top of each other.

Curiosity Gaps

A curiosity gap is the distance between what someone knows and what they want to know. Hooks create curiosity gaps by implying that valuable information exists just past the scroll point.

The key word is "implying." You're not giving the answer in the hook -- you're making the reader aware that an answer exists and they don't have it yet. "I analyzed 500 LinkedIn posts. Here's what the top 1% had in common." You now know the analysis exists. You don't know the result. That gap is uncomfortable, and the only way to resolve it is to keep reading.

Specificity

Vague hooks get ignored. Specific hooks get clicked. This is consistent across every platform and every content type.

"Tips for growing your business" -- vague. Your brain categorizes it as generic advice it's seen before. "The 3-second change to our landing page that increased conversions by 41%" -- specific. Your brain treats it as new, concrete information worth investigating.

Specificity works because it signals firsthand experience. Anyone can say "tips for growing your business." Only someone who's actually done the work can say "the 3-second change that increased conversions by 41%." Specific details act as proof that the content is worth your time.

Tension

Tension is the engine behind all of these mechanisms. A hook creates tension -- between what you know and don't know, between two contradicting ideas, between a promise and its reveal -- and the content resolves it.

Without tension, there's no reason to stay. The most common hook mistake is opening with a resolved state: "I love my morning routine!" There's no tension. Nothing to resolve. No reason to keep reading. Compare that to: "I used to wake up at 5am every day. Then I stopped. My productivity doubled." Now there's tension between the expected outcome and the actual outcome. You need to know why.

The 5 Types of Hooks That Work on Every Platform

After studying what actually performs across TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn, the same five hook archetypes keep showing up. The execution changes by platform, but the underlying structures are universal.

1. Contradiction Hooks

What they do: Present two ideas that seem like they shouldn't go together.

Examples:

Why they work: Contradictions create instant tension. Your brain encounters two conflicting ideas and needs resolution. It can't categorize the information and move on -- it has to stop and figure out how both things can be true at once.

The framework: Take a common belief or practice in your space and argue the opposite. The more widely held the belief, the stronger the hook. "Stop posting every day" works because everyone says to post every day. The contradiction creates a strong enough gap that people have to find out your reasoning.

2. Curiosity Gap Hooks

What they do: Promise a payoff without revealing it.

Examples:

Why they work: They open a loop that can only be closed by consuming the content. The specificity of the setup ("30 days," "one word," "one thing") creates a tight, focused curiosity gap. The reader knows exactly what they're going to learn -- they just don't know the answer yet.

The framework: Set up a specific scenario or experiment, then withhold the result. The more specific the setup, the stronger the curiosity. "I tried something and it worked" is weak. "I changed one word in my bio and my DMs exploded" is strong -- because the specificity of "one word" makes the result feel both surprising and learnable.

3. Specificity Hooks

What they do: Lead with a concrete, narrow detail that signals firsthand experience.

Examples:

Why they work: Specificity is the fastest way to establish credibility. Numbers, timeframes, and exact details tell the reader's brain: "This person has actually done this." Vague claims feel like recycled advice. Specific claims feel like primary sources.

The framework: Take your most interesting result or insight and strip it down to the most concrete version possible. Instead of "I improved my email marketing," find the specific number, the specific change, the specific timeframe. The narrower you go, the more universal the appeal -- because the reader trusts that someone this specific actually knows what they're talking about.

4. Authority Hooks

What they do: Lead with credentials, experience, or volume of work to establish that what follows is worth paying attention to.

Examples:

Why they work: Authority hooks borrow credibility from volume. "500+ clients" and "1,000 resumes" signal that the insight isn't based on one experience -- it's based on a dataset. The reader infers that the advice is battle-tested, not theoretical.

The framework: Quantify your experience. How many clients, projects, years, experiments, reviews, or data points can you draw from? Lead with that number, then tease the insight that came from it. The authority claim creates the credibility, and the teased insight creates the curiosity gap.

5. Story Hooks

What they do: Drop the reader into a specific moment with unresolved tension.

Examples:

Why they work: Humans are wired for narrative. When you drop someone into the middle of a story -- a moment of change, conflict, or surprise -- their brain automatically wants to know how it resolves. Story hooks also feel personal and authentic, which cuts through the noise of generic advice-style content.

The framework: Identify a specific moment where something shifted for you -- a conversation, a decision, a realization. Start your hook in that moment, not before it. Don't set up the context. Drop us into the tension. "Three years ago I made a decision that everyone thought was a mistake" works because we're in the moment. "Let me tell you about a decision I made three years ago" doesn't work because it's framing, not tension.

How to Write a Hook: Step by Step

Understanding hook types is useful, but you also need a repeatable process for actually writing them. Here's the framework.

Step 1: Identify the Core Tension

Before you write a single word, ask yourself: what's the most interesting tension in this piece of content?

Tension can come from contradiction ("the thing everyone does is actually wrong"), surprise ("I found something unexpected"), transformation ("I went from X to Y"), or conflict ("I had to choose between two things"). Find the tension first. The hook writes itself once you know what tension you're building around.

Step 2: Lead With the Most Interesting Part

Most people write their content in chronological order and then use the first sentence as the hook. This almost always buries the interesting part.

Instead, scan your finished content and find the single most compelling sentence, insight, or moment. Move it to the front. Your hook should be the most interesting part of your content, not the introduction to it.

A practical trick: write your entire post or script first, then delete the first paragraph. Your real hook is usually hiding in the second or third paragraph. The first paragraph is almost always throat-clearing.

Step 3: Create an Open Loop

Once you have your core tension and your most interesting element, shape it into an open loop. Give enough information to create curiosity, but withhold enough to require the reader to keep going.

Bad: "I increased my revenue by changing my pricing model to value-based pricing." (Loop is closed -- you gave the answer.)

Good: "I changed one thing about my pricing and revenue jumped 40% in 90 days." (Loop is open -- what did you change?)

The art is in the gap. Too little information and the hook feels vague. Too much and the reader has no reason to continue. Give them just enough to know what the topic is and why it matters, but not enough to satisfy their curiosity.

Step 4: Be Specific, Not Vague

Go through your hook and replace every vague word with a specific one.

Each specific detail adds credibility and creates a tighter curiosity gap. Vague hooks feel like they could be about anything -- and content that could be about anything is content you can safely scroll past.

Step 5: Cut Ruthlessly

Read your hook out loud. If it takes more than 5-8 seconds to say (for video) or more than 2-3 lines to read (for text), it's too long. Cut everything that doesn't directly create tension or curiosity.

Common things to cut:

The hook's only job is to earn the next 5 seconds. Everything else can come later.

How Hooks Change by Platform

The psychology behind hooks is universal, but each platform has its own mechanics. Here's a brief overview.

TikTok: Your hook is spoken and visual. You have 1-3 seconds. The audience is scrolling fast through an infinite feed of entertainment -- your hook needs to break through at speed. Raw, chaotic, and slightly unfiltered hooks outperform polished ones. Spoken delivery dominates. Average hook length is about 21 words. For a deep dive, see our TikTok Hooks: The Ultimate Guide.

Instagram: Your hook is visual (first frame/text overlay) and written (first caption line). Keep it under 15 words for Reels. Instagram still rewards polish -- even "chaotic" content looks intentional here. Text overlays matter because most people scroll with sound off. Personal, Hot Take, and POV hooks over-index. Read more in our Instagram Hooks: The Ultimate Guide.

LinkedIn: Your hook is pure text -- the first 2-3 lines before "...see more." This is a professional audience with longer attention spans, but lower tolerance for boring. Contrarian takes, data-driven hooks, and vulnerability perform best. The "see more" click is the conversion event. Professional-but-human tone wins.

The same hook framework applies everywhere. But how you execute it -- length, tone, delivery, energy -- should match where you're posting.

Common Hook Mistakes (And How to Fix Them)

Burying the Lead

The most common mistake across all platforms. You have an interesting insight buried in paragraph three, but your post opens with "I've been thinking about this topic lately and wanted to share some thoughts." By the time you get to the good part, everyone's gone.

The fix: Write your content first. Then go back and find the most interesting sentence. Move it to the top. Delete everything that came before it.

Being Too Vague

"Want to grow your business?" "Struggling with content?" "Here's something you need to know." These hooks fail because they're so broad that they apply to everyone -- which means they feel targeted at no one.

The fix: Get specific. Who exactly are you talking to? What exactly are you promising? "Want to grow your business?" becomes "The outbound strategy that added $23K MRR to a 3-person SaaS startup in 60 days." One of those is scrollable. The other isn't.

The "Hey Guys" Problem

Starting with a greeting, a wave, a "what's up everyone" -- all of it is wasted time. Greetings don't create tension, curiosity, or value. They match the expected pattern perfectly, which means the brain filters them out.

The fix: Start mid-thought. Your first word should be the beginning of your hook, not a social courtesy. Nobody stopped scrolling because someone said hello.

Over-Promising

"This one hack will change your life forever." "The secret that will make you millions." When the hook promises more than the content delivers, you might get the initial click -- but you'll lose the viewer before the video ends, your comments will be negative, and the algorithm will notice the drop-off.

The fix: Match your hook's intensity to your content's actual value. A hook that slightly undersells and overdelivers will always outperform one that overpromises and underdelivers. Build trust by consistently delivering on what you open with.

Using the Same Hook Every Time

If every post starts with "3 things you need to know about..." your audience stops reading. Predictability is the enemy of attention. When people can finish your sentence before you do, they've already scrolled.

The fix: Rotate hook types. Alternate between contradiction, curiosity gap, story, specificity, and authority hooks. Keep your audience guessing about how you'll open -- that unpredictability itself becomes a hook.

How to Test and Improve Your Hooks

Writing hooks is a skill that improves with feedback. Here's how to build a feedback loop.

Study your analytics. Every platform gives you retention data. TikTok and Instagram show you exactly when viewers drop off. If the drop happens in the first 1-3 seconds, your hook is the problem. If the drop happens later, your hook worked but your content structure needs work.

A/B test your openers. Instagram's Trial Reels feature lets you test content with non-followers before it goes to your audience. On TikTok, you can post the same content with different hooks on different days and compare. On LinkedIn, try the same core insight with different hook styles and track which gets more "see more" clicks.

Study what stops YOUR scroll. This is the most underrated hook research method. For one week, every time you stop scrolling on any platform, screenshot the content and write down what hooked you. After a week, you'll have a personal database of hooks that work on you -- and if they work on you, they work on people like you.

Keep a hook swipe file. Collect hooks that catch your attention -- from any platform, any niche. Don't copy them word for word. Study the structure. What type of hook is it? What tension does it create? How does it open a loop? Then apply that structure to your own content.

If you want to skip the blank-page problem entirely, Captain Hook AI generates hooks based on these exact patterns. Tell it your topic and platform, and it creates multiple options built on the psychology that actually drives engagement. It's useful when you understand the framework but need to move fast.

FAQ

What is a hook in social media?

A hook is the opening element of your content -- the first words spoken, the first line written, or the first visual shown -- that determines whether someone stays or scrolls. It's the most important part of any piece of social media content because it's the gatekeeper: if the hook doesn't work, nothing else you created gets seen.

How long should a social media hook be?

It depends on the platform. TikTok hooks average around 21 words. Instagram hooks perform best at 15 words or fewer. LinkedIn hooks should fit within the 2-3 visible lines before the "...see more" fold. Across all platforms, shorter and more specific tends to outperform longer and more general.

What makes a hook different from clickbait?

A hook creates genuine curiosity and delivers on its promise. Clickbait creates curiosity but fails to deliver -- or worse, misleads. The test is simple: does your content actually resolve the tension your hook creates? If yes, it's a hook. If no, it's clickbait. Audiences and algorithms both punish the difference.

Can I use the same hook on TikTok, Instagram, and LinkedIn?

The underlying patterns (contradiction, curiosity gap, specificity) work everywhere. But the execution should change. A TikTok hook can be raw and chaotic. The same hook on Instagram should be tighter and more visual. On LinkedIn, it should be slightly more professional while still being human. Adapt the structure to the platform's culture and mechanics.

How do I know if my hook is working?

Check your retention analytics. On TikTok and Instagram, look at the audience retention graph -- if there's a steep cliff in the first 1-3 seconds, your hook isn't landing. On LinkedIn, track your "see more" click rate and compare it across posts. If one hook format consistently outperforms, do more of that.

Do I need a different hook for every post?

You need a different hook structure, not necessarily a different hook type. If you use a contradiction hook, the specific contradiction should change every time -- but you can use the contradiction format multiple times across different posts. The key is to not become predictable. Rotate between the 5 hook types so your audience can't anticipate your opening.

Go Deeper: Platform-Specific Hook Guides

This framework gives you the foundation. For platform-specific strategies, templates, and examples, check out:

Start Writing Hooks That Stop the Scroll

You now have the framework. You understand the psychology -- pattern interrupts, open loops, curiosity gaps, specificity, tension. You know the 5 hook types that work across every platform. You have a step-by-step process for writing them.

The only thing left is practice.

Every piece of content you create is a chance to test a hook, study the results, and get better. The creators and professionals who grow the fastest aren't the ones with the best ideas -- they're the ones who learned to open with the most interesting part.

Try Captain Hook AI free --> -- generate hooks built on these exact psychological patterns, tailored to your topic and platform.

Written by Shani from Captain Hook AI. Background in neuroscience + neurotech. Mildly obsessed with why content performs.