What about post captions?

03 tactics for copywriting using Behavioral Science to improve social media posts.

Writing about Behavioral Science on social media is very important to me. It’s my way to share valuable knowledge with people that are starting to learn or apply it.

Over the past year I shared articles mostly. Although I reached a significant group of people , I realized I had to complement the content with graphic design so it would be easier to comprehend and “digest” (some topics on BeSci might be challenging to address in an easy-to-follow manner). This allowed me to reach a broader audience that not only engaged with my content but also repurpose it.

However, I did notice that I was giving too much importance to graphic design (getting a little crazy on Canva as I'm definitely not an expert) instead of focusing on an equally important part of the posts on social media. So I started wondering…what about post captions?

Most of the time, people (like me) design aesthetically appealing posts on social media to increase user engagement in the form of shares and likes. However, in some cases, what and how you communicate in the captions can be crucial to trigger your followers into taking action. By optimizing your communications on social media, you could increase not only the engagement on the platform (more likes, more comments, more sharing), but also the macro conversion (more leads, more sales).

How can you optimize your communications?

Integrate good copywriting with Behavioral Science principles to elevate your content value and engagement rate.

Here are 03 tactics to improve your post captions and turn followers into paying clients. These are structured on the ABC of copywriting which stands for Attention, Big promise and Call to action. These tactics will be complemented with behavioral insights to fuel your content production 😎

Attention

Post captions are important because it is the first thing users see when scrolling on social media like LinkedIn or Instagram. As we live in a “scrolling generation”, good copy should be valuable for people to grab their attention quickly and hook them into reading more (before taking further action). Otherwise, your prospect is gone.

How can you rewrite captions that make your audience stop scrolling?

You NEED to know your audience. Conduct a Behavioral Audit to understand which factors influence your followers to engage with your content.

Let's consider the 125 characters hook (which are shown in the captions before the “read more” button”). If you know what your audience expects from you, you can leverage the “Confirmation Bias” in your copy, i. e. the tendency for people to seek information that confirms their previous beliefs. You could also apply the “Teasing Effect”, e.g. starting with a question that creates curiosity and engages your audience to continue reading to find the answer.

For example, the message “Ryanair flies you to a warm beach for only €19” can be broken into two parts: “How do you get to a warm beach for only €19?”. After a few seconds the answer: “Fly Ryanair”. People will feel happier, more positive towards you, and be more likely to choose you.

Big promise

Even if our audience is hooked in the first part of the post caption, they will block the following information if they do not consider it relevant (as shown in the B.I.A.S framework).

Big promise refers to the “what's-in-it-for-me” part of the post captions. It is relevant to think about the benefits for your clients, your product doesn´t matter so much in this context as people don't buy the what, they buy the why.

How could you portray the gains your audience would obtain by using your product?

You can use the “Endowment Effect”, which states that people value things more when they own them (or perceive that they own them) (Kahneman, D., et al., 1991). Even the idea of ownership, imagining how a product would be used (virtual property) is enough to trigger action because users will find more value, hence will not want to lose it.

For example, if you´re talking about shoes, showing a scenario in which your potential client could wear them might illustrate what it would be like to own a pair: “Use this model every time you go for a walk”.

Call to Action

As the purpose of the post is to engage your audience or make them act, Call to Action is the cherry on the top that needs to be structured.

The important thing here is: you should be asking your followers to do one thing. People can suffer from “Information Overload” or “Uncertainty Aversion” if you´re not clear on what you want them to do. It is much easier for your audience to execute the desired behavior if they know what’s expected from them (Feedforward).

Conclusion

Applying these (and more) principles of Behavioral Science in your copywriting can help you improve your communication while growing and engaging your audience on social media. It surely can increase conversion, too. So, don't forget to experiment in order to boost conversion while measuring the impact of your communication 🧪

Silvia Cottone

Behavioral Science Consultant & Worldwide Speaker

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Reference

- Kahneman, Daniel; Knetsch, Jack L; Thaler, Richard H (1991). Anomalies: The Endowment Effect, Loss Aversion, and Status Quo Bias. Journal of Economic Perspectives.

- Ruan, B., Hsee, C. K., Lu, Z. Y. (2018). The teasing effect: An underappreciated benefit of creating and resolving an uncertainty. Journal of Marketing Research.

- Thomas McKinlay (2022). The teasing effect. Newsletter.