Hook patterns that work
Good hooks create a question in the viewer's mind that the clip then answers. A few reliable patterns:
- The bold claim: “Your long videos already contain your best shorts.”
- The mistake: “Most people get captions wrong.”
- The number: “Three changes that doubled our views.”
- The story opener: “Last month, a 40-second clip beat our whole episode.”
- The direct question: “Why do people scroll past your videos?”
Find hooks in what you already said
When repurposing, you don't write hooks from scratch: you find them. Start the clip on the sentence where you make your point, not on the warm-up before it. Cutting the first few seconds of throat-clearing is often the single biggest improvement.
Match the hook to the payoff
A hook that promises more than the clip delivers loses viewers' trust. Keep it specific and honest, and make sure the payoff arrives before the clip ends.
How Clippergen helps
Clippergen looks for moments that open strongly, starts clips on those lines, and suggests a hook and title for each clip based on what is actually said.
Hook formulas you can reuse
Fill in these templates with what your clip actually delivers:
- "Stop doing X if you want Y."
- "Here's what nobody tells you about X."
- "I tried X for 30 days. Here's what happened."
- "The biggest mistake I see with X is…"
- "If you only remember one thing about X, make it this."
Testing your hooks
Treat hooks as experiments. When two clips cover similar topics, try different opening styles and compare how many viewers stay past the first few seconds in your analytics. Over a few weeks you will see which patterns work for your audience, and you can use them more often.