Social media’s a bit like your favorite spy movie. You spend a long time thinking through the perfect plan of attack, assembling your dream team, double checking all your resources – or you barrel in and hope for the best. Either way, you have it down to an art. No one can top you! Until you reach some complicated piece of tech without your trusted hacker. But for social media, the complicated tech is social media captions. Every caption will have it’s own formula – it’s own specific code to crack.
Consider us your spy-team hacker. In this article, we’ll be taking you through the formula step by step. We’ll start with the basics and what you need, what you’ll have the answers to once you begin, and some things you’ll only be able to figure out along the way. Queue the Mission: Impossible theme, and let’s crack in.
What Are Your Goals? 🤔
What do you want this caption to do or accomplish? This will change a lot about your caption, and you’ll need it to successfully crack the code.
To Sell Something ☑️
If you want to sell something, your caption will need to be concise with a clear call to action. Tell people how they can find the thing you’re selling, if there’s a discount, or anything else that might make them buy. This could look like “Prints are 50% OFF in my shop! Check the link in my bio 🔗”
To Connect ☑️
If you’re wanting to connect with your followers or people who see your content, the best way is to include a question in the caption. Make it related to your content and make it fairly easy to answer, of course! Something like “What does your current skincare routine look like,” or “If you could be an animal, what would it be?”
To Engage ☑️
You could also leave a question in the caption for this, but we’d suggest shifting it a little and prompting them to leave a comment of some kind. This still encourages them to comment and helps you interact, and it can be easier than answering a question…meaning they’re more likely to engage. A prompt would look more like “Drop your favorite emoji in the comments!”
Once you know exactly what you want your caption to accomplish, writing a successful one will be much easier.
Know Your Audience 🧠
You should already have a feel for what they want out of your content, so apply that to your caption. If they like videos where you joke around and are silly, infuse that into your caption. Maybe your audience expects you to be more to the point and concise: you’ll want to keep your captions in that vein. If you’re introducing a video with a tone different from your usual one, then we’d recommend shifting so they match. But for the most part, you don’t want to change from what your audience knows.
Be Mindful of the Length 📐
We can’t definitively tell you to always do short or long captions. This will vary depending on you, the content you create, and the platform you’re on. For example, someone with a cooking channel will need to have longer captions so they can type out the recipe they’re referencing. But a comedy creator probably doesn’t need as much real estate. Most of them might just need a place to drop a hashtag! Still, you want to keep your social media captions concise and to the point. Don’t make them longer than they need to be.
Again, the length will look different for a lot of creators and videos. Just be mindful of how long the caption is when you’re writing it. Ask yourself if you’d read the full thing, or if they truly need the information you provide to understand and appreciate the video.
Break It Up ✂️
Nothing is more intimidating than a huge wall of text – and that’s basically what a caption is. If your caption stretches beyond three or four lines, try to break it up! It’s as easy as a strategically placed line break, or two “enters”.
Some creators also use bullet points and short lists to break up the caption. So instead of writing a paragraph sharing their top tips for promoting your work, it would look like:
“Here are my tips for promoting you work!
- Stay consistent
- Have fun
- Connect with your audience”
This is a lot less intimidating to readers, and makes it easier (and quicker) to read!
Tag It Up 🏷️
Don’t forget the hashtags! We talked about hashtags in another article, but they’re an integral part of your captions. They can help add context or personality, or connect your post with the communities that would enjoy it. You can read more about optimizing your hashtags and finding the perfect fit in this article.
Have a Clear Hook 🪝
We recommend having a very clear point of interest within the first line. Starting your caption with a question can work really well, but that’s not the only way. Maybe you start with some attention-grabbing hashtags, or a headline about what’s in the caption.
Show Your Personality 🤡
Your followers are likely following you because they like you. They enjoy your personality, so spend some time infusing it into your captions! That might look like adding a little joke, infusing some emotion, or using a specific style. If you’re unsure of what your personality is and how to infuse it into the caption, try testing out some different alternatives!
Use Emojis 🔮
Emoji’s are a fantastic tool for your social media captions! Not only are they expressive, adding a little hint of emotion or enhancing your message, but they do infuse some personality into your caption. Plus, they immediately catch the viewer’s attention and will add some interest to the copy. And they also help break up the copy.
Seriously, emojis are a game changer!
Test It Out 🧑🔬
Unlike spy movies, you have time to test out your code on social media. You don’t need to have the perfect social media captions right away. Spend a little time trying out a few different kinds of formulas and final captions. Play around with length, personality, emojis, and find the best fit for your brand.
Let’s get into how you can run tests and find the best caption style for you.
The Long and Short ⚖️
When you’re next writing a caption, break it into three steps. First, write your knee-jerk caption idea. Keep it short (one sentence or less) and check it for technical errors, but don’t make any edits. Then pause and write a longer caption. For this one, you don’t have to keep it under a certain length, just expand it. Again, check to technical errors, and in the third round write a long caption. Don’t hold back!
Take another pause and revisit your short, medium, and long captions. Now that you have some space, which do you think is the best representation? Which one grabs attention, includes personality, and best matches the video? If there isn’t one, think of what they need!
Get Feedback 🎤
Plan out a couple of captions for a video and have your audience vote on which one they like better! You could even ask them to tell you what they like in captions. You can’t please everyone, so don’t stress about that. But this will give you a very clear, general idea of what your followers want.
Test Drive It 🪂
Develop a few strategies and formulas you want to test out, and try them for an extended period of time. So instead of testing new formats or styles with every post, you’d use the same style and format for the five to ten of them.
Resources 🗃️
Your best resource will be content in your niche. Look at what your favorite creators, your creator inspiration, are doing. Don’t copy them exactly, but see what you like about their style!
If you’re really in a creative rut and aren’t sure what to use as a caption, Chat GPT or AI text generators can be a great resource. You have to be careful, though! They often write captions that are too long and too fluffy, or just don’t fit your voice. Use it sparingly, give it clear prompts, and make edits. And if you’re new to the world of AI and working with Chat GPT, keep an eye out. 👀 You may find some YouTube videos that help you adjust to the platform.
Just remember: it may take some time to find the perfect formula for social media captions. Don’t give, and stay patient!