If you don't master this, your content will never be seen and you'll end up living under a bridge...

Most people scroll past your content because your hook sucks. If you don’t capture attention in the first 3 seconds, you lose. Simple as.
Hook by the way for the newbies is the opening thing you say/do in your content.

Think how many people in your niche are releasing content daily, and you’re competing for a limited pool of attention, but put out content with a hook that bores the viewer to death… You need to master this.

Bad hooks are the #1 reason content flops. You might have the greatest insight of all time that will unlock the golden goose, but if you start out with “and to me I think” or “hi guys” or some other random nonsense, it won’t land. You will doubt yourself, think you don’t have what it takes, quit, take up drinking moonshine and start living under bridge (ok maybe not that extreme).

I strongly believe that if you are committed to making content and doing it consistently but aren’t quite breaking through, you are a 1 degree shift away from your unlock and that’s all in the hook baby!

First thing. You need to stop the viewer in their tracks. A BOLD statement that takes a stand and invokes curiosity in the viewer.

Second thing. Assume your content is being seen by people who have no idea who you are. You need to structure how you open so it’s accessible to everyone. Don’t assume. Never assume. (good lesson not just for social 😉)

Here’s an example of a reel script I saw earlier and how I would improve it.
The reel is about someone asking for advice for soloprenuers.

Original:

“What would you say to, to people who are solopreneurs, soloprofessionals, they're a one woman shop or maybe two or three people and they don't currently have the funds to, to scale, to grow? Well, I think first and foremost, you have to understand what are the blocks…”

BORING!!!!!!

What I would change:

“You can't be world class at absolutely everything. Nobody can.
And I was a solopreneur out of my mom's kitchen when I started and it was, okay, I need to generate X dollars in revenue before I can bring on this person. And this person is going to do this for the organization, which will free me up to hopefully bring on more revenue as the sale side.”

The above is just dialogue from later in the clip and if it was edited to start there, it would have 1000% more impact.

It now opens with a BOLD statement. The speaker has authority and opens the door for me to learn more. The original, I lost interest seconds into hearing a random voice speak about a point I don’t care about. Editors who don’t know the power of hooks will sink your brand.


Here are some examples of reels of various kinds that have a bold opening that get you curious within seconds:

What Can $1 Get in the World’s Cheapest Country?! https://www.instagram.com/p/CsCgoXLIR1J/

Do you care about your kids grades?
https://www.instagram.com/p/DGOurXCyqn5/

I say it time and time again- copy these guys' homework
https://www.instagram.com/codiesanchez/reel/DAWQVF4vaeL/

Airport Travel HACKS You NEED to Know
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DFa1bXBOb7y/

Travel like a VIP
https://www.instagram.com/reel/DCHHNHWx5pp/

I can talk about hooks for days, but don’t want to bore you too much. If you learn the basics above, you’ll be ahead of 90% of creators. (that’s a random % I pulled out the sky. You’ll be ahead of most creators!)

Lastly, I want to give you a tool to help make this easier. The quickest way to do good hooks is to copy good hooks. Find creators in your niche and literally copy the opening. It’s social proof it’s already worked, so you might as well take advantage of it.

The tool to make this easier is called Sort Feed. It’s a Google Chrome extension that can sort profile reels on Instagram by views, likes, comments, whatever you need. I suggest sort by views and start learning! Make sure you click the Reels tab on Instagram to make it work.

Until next week,

Bo