Oct 05, 2023
Sometimes you write a caption and it just feels… lifeless. Generic. How many times have you found yourself writing and rewriting your captions just because it didn’t sound interesting enough? Why does everyone else make it look so easy?
Captions can be rough when you’ve been writing about the same things over and over again. Here’s a neat copywriting trick anyone can learn to write captions faster and hook your audience in just a few words.
“Why Should I Care?”
A good caption (and good copy in general) should always answer this one question in your audience’s minds: “How does this benefit me?”
Here’s another way to put it. Imagine you’re the target audience. You stumble across your brand’s post and read the caption. Now ask yourself this one question: Why should I care?
How will this product help me? What’s in it for me? Why should I give you, a total stranger, my complete and undivided attention for the next 30 seconds? How can you solve my problems and make my life 10x better if I buy your product?
Always show customers how they’ll benefit from you. Selling an ergonomic chair? Focus on how much less back pain they’ll experience. Offering a new online course? Show them how much better they’ll be at their work after taking it. Launching a new thermal flask? Show them why yours is better than all the other brands already dominating the market.
Copywriters will mostly use this little exercise when writing the conversion-focused types of copy like emails, sales pages, or landing pages. While captions shouldn’t always be trying to sell you something, this technique is still just as effective getting your customer to care about what you have to say.
You Shouldn’t Always Use This Trick
Captions don’t always have to be so keen on tapping into your customers’ deepest lifelong desires.
They can be funny, vague, engaging, or even just a bunch of emojis and it could still be a great caption. It all depends on the situation.
Posting a pretty photo of your company’s workspace while hard selling how great it is to be part of your company may earn you a few eye rolls. Paint a vibe instead and let your visuals do the talking. Posting a shot of someone wearing your brand’s clothes? Write a 2-liner caption that highlights your brand’s lifestyle.
Since the rules of social media are constantly fluid, we say treat this technique as a starting point when writing captions. Or when you’re stuck finding the right angle.
We also recommend using it to fine-tune captions you’ve already written. If you aren’t confident about your caption, re-read it and always ask yourself this one question before hitting that post button: Why should I care?