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What Is 'Hook'? (Marketing)

A Hook is a single phrase or sentence that describes an offer's primary benefit.

When creating a Hook, emphasize what's uniquely valuable about your offer and why people should care. Remember: it takes time. Crafting a Hook is a creative exercise.

The better your Hook, the more Attention you'll grab, and the easier it'll be for your message to spread.

Josh Kaufman Explains 'Hooks'

Complicated messages are ignored or forgotten. Your Probable Purchasers are busy-they don't have time to pay Attention to all of the information assaulting them every day. If you want people to remember who you are and what you're offering, you have to grab their attention and hold it-all in a matter of seconds.

A Hook is a single phrase or sentence that describes an offer's primary benefit. Sometimes the hook is a title, and sometimes it's a short tagline. Regardless, it conveys the reason someone would want what you're selling.

A classic example of a hook in the publishing world is the title of Tim Ferriss's book, The Four-Hour Workweek. This title conveys or implies intriguing benefits such as:

1. Four hours is a lot less than most people work;
2. You can potentially earn as much in four hours a week as 40+ hours a week;
3. If you're not working so much, you could do other cool things.

That's not bad at all for four short words. When paired with the book's cover image of a guy relaxing in a hammock on a tropical beach, the title goes a long way in convincing people to purchase and read the book.

Apple used a hook for the launch of the iPod: "1,000 songs in your pocket." At the time, portable music players consisted of bulky CD and cassette players, and advertising for early MP3 players focused on geek-speak: megabytes of disk space. Apple's hook highlighted the primary benefit: instead of carrying around hundreds of tapes or CDs, you could carry your entire music collection in one elegant device.

Apple's five-word tagline worked wonders. In a little under a year, 236,000 first-generation iPods were sold-an astounding start, considering this was the company's first foray into the portable music category. The hook grabbed attention, and the quality of the product closed the sale.

When creating a Hook, focus on the primary benefit or value your offer provides. Emphasize what's uniquely valuable about your offer, and why the prospect should care. Brainstorm a list of words and phrases related to your primary benefit, then experiment with different ways to connect them in a short phrase. Crafting a Hook is a creative exercise-the more potential options you generate, the more quickly you'll find one that works.

Once you've created your Hook, use it! Place it on your Web site, your advertising, your business cards-make it one of the first things potential customers see. The hook grabs attention, and the remainder of your marketing and sales activities close the deal.

The better your hook, the more attention you'll grab, and the easier it'll be for your satisfied customers to tell their friends about you.

Questions About 'Hooks'

• Can you communicate what makes your offer uniquely valuable in a single, simple sentence?
• Does your hook imply a benefit while describing what your offer does?

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"If you can do it, it ain't braggin'."

Dizzy Dean, Hall of Fame baseball player

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