Hook
The opening one to three lines of a post that determine whether a reader clicks "see more" or scrolls past. On LinkedIn, only the first ~210 characters show before the truncation.
A hook is the opening text of a social post, designed to stop the scroll and earn the click-through to read the rest. On LinkedIn, the feed truncates posts after roughly 210 characters with a "...see more" link, so everything before that point is your hook. On X, the hook is the first tweet of a thread or the visible portion before "Show more".
Strong hooks share a few traits. They make a specific claim, not a vague one ("I made $43k from one LinkedIn post" beats "Here's how to grow on LinkedIn"). They create an open loop the reader wants closed ("I almost quit my job last year. Here's what changed."). Or they state a contrarian position that demands a response ("Most personal branding advice is wrong").
Formatting matters as much as content. Line breaks let the eye breathe. The first line should land alone, ideally under 12 words. The second line either deepens the tension or hints at the payoff.
Avoid throat-clearing openers: "I've been thinking a lot about...", "In today's world...", or anything with the word "excited". These burn the character budget on filler and signal generic content.
A useful test: cover everything below the first line. If the hook alone makes you want to read on, it works. If not, rewrite it before publishing.