The full method on real content: find the raw material, generate across mechanisms, score, pick.
Voice here is the blunt indie-founder voice from the voice-builder examples (short, no
exclamation marks, dry, concrete). Your output uses the loaded voice.md.
Example 1 — Caption hook
The content: a post about deleting a feature the team spent six months building because nobody used it; the fix (a "boring" feature) became the most-used one in two days.
Raw material (Step 2): the surprising numbers (6 months → 2 days), the stakes (wasted work), the contrarian lesson (build less).
Generate across mechanisms (Step 3):
- Specificity: "Six months to build. Two days to replace. Nobody noticed the first one."
- Mistake: "I spent six months building a feature nobody asked for. Classic."
- Contrarian: "Shipping more features is making your product worse."
- Curiosity: "The feature we deleted today taught me more than the one we shipped."
- Stakes: "We torched six months of work in one commit this morning."
- Question: "What's the feature you keep building because customers 'ask' for it?"
Score (Step 4): All are on-voice and true. #1 and #2 have the strongest specificity and pull and land well inside the ~125-char cutoff. #3 is a strong contrarian but slightly less true to this post (it's about behavior, not feature count). #6 is good if the goal is comments.
Pick: #2 for reach (self-deprecating, on-voice, instant story), #6 if the goal is comments. Recommend #2.
Example 2 — Video hook (first 3 seconds, muted-first)
The content: same story, as a 30-second Reel.
Deliver all three channels:
- Opening visual: hand hovering over a keyboard, then hitting "delete" on a big block of code — motion in frame one.
- On-screen text (sound-off hook): "Deleting 6 months of work."
- Verbal (first words): "We just deleted our most-requested feature."
Why it works: the visual is a pattern interrupt (destroying work), the on-screen text carries the gap muted, and the spoken line adds the contrarian twist ("most-requested"). No logo, no "hey guys," hook complete inside ~2 seconds.
A weaker alternative (for contrast): opening on the founder's face saying "Hey everyone, so today I want to talk about product decisions…" — the gap doesn't arrive until second 6, by which point the viewer is gone.
Example 3 — Carousel cover
The content: a 7-slide carousel on writing hooks.
Cover candidates:
- "7 hooks that actually work →" (specificity + promise of the swipe)
- "Your hooks are why nobody reads your posts" (stakes/callout)
- "Stop writing hooks like it's 2019 →" (contrarian)
Pick: the callout if the goal is to stop the scroll of people who suspect their hooks are weak; the specific "7 hooks →" if the goal is saves. Either way, one idea, legible at thumbnail size, promising what slides 2–7 deliver.
What every example shows
- The hook is extracted from the content's real strongest element, not invented.
- Several mechanisms are tried before one is chosen.
- The winner is specific, true, in-voice, and inside the cutoff.
- For video, all three channels (visual + text + verbal) are delivered and work muted.
- The recommendation is tied to the goal (reach vs comments vs saves).
