Write a LinkedIn post people have a reason to finish

A LinkedIn post needs a clear promise and enough substance to fulfil it. The opening gets someone to begin. The body has to justify the time they spend reading.

Harry Long's live writing tutorial is useful here because it shows the work between an idea and a finished post: choose a specific situation, try several openings, remove generic sentences, add concrete advice and give the reader somewhere sensible to land. His hook collection offers more ways into that process.

Start with the point you can support. If you begin by looking for a dramatic opening and then search for a claim to attach to it, you are likely to produce something louder than the evidence allows.

Choose the reader and the change in their thinking

“Marketing tips” is too broad to guide a draft. “An agency founder should assign an owner before promising a client a delivery date” gives you a reader, a situation and a decision.

Write those down before composing the post. Then identify what you can add: an observation, a usable method, a documented result, an explanation of a mistake, or an informed disagreement. A post does not need all of them.

Harry's analysis of LinkedIn posts emphasizes one idea, readable presentation, genuine stakes and an opening worth following. Those are writing choices you can inspect. Claims that every successful post obeys an identical formula are much harder to defend.

A useful drafting test is to finish this sentence privately: “After reading this, this particular person should be able to...” If the answer is only “agree with me” or “know we are experts,” the idea probably needs more work.

For the agency example, the answer could be: “identify the missing owner in a client handoff and fix the delivery promise before it becomes a missed deadline.” That is enough material for one useful post. It does not require a complete guide to agency management.

Try several entrances into the same argument

Write a handful of openings before committing. Keep the underlying point constant so you can judge whether each opening makes that point easier to enter.

These are illustrative alternatives for the handoff idea:

Before you give a client a delivery date, name the person responsible for it.

A deadline with no owner is a promise nobody has agreed to keep.

Agency founders: check the handoff before you promise a faster turnaround.

The first intercepts a decision. The second states the underlying problem. The third names the intended reader and the relevant action. None needs an invented result or a claim that every agency has the same problem.

Harry recommends putting a large share of editing effort into the opening. Treat his 80% suggestion as a reminder to revise it, not a rule about the correct allocation of writing time. The visible preview varies with device, layout and format. Don't write around a supposed universal number of lines before “see more.”

Curiosity is useful when the answer is worth finding. An opening that hides an ordinary tip behind several paragraphs of suspense wastes the reader's time. State enough for them to judge whether the subject is relevant, then deliver what you promised.

Thirteen useful hook approaches from Harry's collection

The source video is titled “15 Hooks,” but the available transcript moves from number ten to number thirteen. It contains thirteen distinct approaches. The examples below are new illustrations of those approaches, not reported results or claims of personal experience.

A numbered set of useful actions

“Four checks before you hand an ad campaign to a new account manager.”

The number tells the reader what work the post will do. Use it when there really are distinct checks, and make each one useful. Don't stretch two points into five because the larger number looks better.

A specific change with an observable consequence

“Moving the approval question into the brief changes what an editor can deliver on Friday.”

This approach creates interest in a mechanism. If you claim that a change tripled a result, you need the original measurement, the comparison and enough context to explain what else changed. A precise number without those records is decorative certainty.

A defensible disagreement

“A faster turnaround is a poor offer when the client's approval process takes a week.”

A contrarian opening works when it challenges an assumption that affects a real decision. The body should explain the condition under which your disagreement holds. You don't need to announce that common practice is always wrong.

A question worth answering

“Who can approve a client revision when the account lead is away?”

Use the post to help answer the question. An empty “Thoughts?” beneath a generic opinion supplies little reason to respond. A real operational question can reveal a gap the reader can act on.

An honest difficult moment

An actual founder might describe realizing they had promised a delivery date without consulting the team. The useful part would be what happened, why the decision was made and how the process changed.

This approach requires a real event and permission to share any client details. If you don't have that story, use an observation or an explicitly hypothetical example. Fake vulnerability is still fabrication.

The result before the explanation

A team with verified evidence might open with a shorter approval cycle, fewer missed handoffs or a specific commercial result, then explain the work behind it.

Include the period, baseline and definition where they affect interpretation. “More leads” is vague. A precise total can also mislead if most leads were irrelevant. Show the result the reader should actually evaluate.

A belief you changed

“I used to treat the first draft as the main deadline. The approval deadline matters just as much.”

Use this only if the belief and change are yours. Explain the evidence that changed your mind and what someone should now do differently. An admission without a new decision is incomplete.

A myth tested against evidence

“You don't need a daily posting schedule to learn which buyer questions are worth answering.”

The body needs to distinguish what is necessary from what is merely one workable option. This is a good place to show limits: a frequent publisher with a strong production process may sensibly choose a different cadence.

A recognizable situation

“The client approves the concept on Monday and asks for a different audience on Thursday.”

A scenario gives readers a concrete problem to inspect. Explain where scope, briefing or approval could have prevented the conflict. Avoid claiming that everybody has lived the same story.

A decisive moment in a story

A real project story can begin at the moment an owner notices a consequential mistake, then explain the decision that followed.

This differs from a general confession because the event supplies the sequence. Don't imply a client disaster if the actual story was a routine correction. The scale of the opening should match the event.

Advice before a decision

“Before you add another channel to the campaign, check who will handle its replies.”

This approach earns attention by being timely in the reader's workflow. The body should supply a check, a condition or a practical warning they can use before acting.

A change over time

A genuine before-and-after account can explain how a process evolved over a defined period. Include what was difficult, what changed and what still fails.

A six-month window does not prove that your intervention caused the difference. Be clear when the story is an experience rather than a controlled comparison. Don't import someone else's revenue timeline as your own.

A direct role or situation callout

“Solo consultants: a meeting request is a large first ask from a stranger.”

Name the person when the advice is genuinely specific to their circumstances. Calling every business owner out at once is not much narrower than addressing everyone. Follow the callout with something the named reader can use.

You can combine approaches, but the body still needs one main job. A numbered, contrarian, results-first confession usually promises more than a short post can reasonably deliver.

Turn a weak draft into useful advice

Consider this deliberately weak illustrative draft:

Agency success depends on good communication. Successful teams must collaborate effectively to deliver exceptional client experiences. We believe in clear processes and accountability. Contact us to learn how we can transform your operations.

The problem goes beyond the first sentence. It never identifies the communication failure, the person who must act, or the action that would help. A more arresting opening alone would leave the same empty body underneath.

First, replace the subject “communication” with the actual handoff problem. Then identify the fields a team needs before promising delivery: an owner, a defined output, an approval route and a date the owner has accepted. Explain the consequence of a missing field. Remove the company boast and decide whether a sales invitation helps this particular post.

The revised illustrative post could read:

Before you give a client a delivery date, name the person responsible for it.

“The team will handle it” leaves the important question unanswered.

For a video project, the editor may own the first cut. The account lead may own feedback. The client may own final approval. Those are different commitments.

Put the owner, output and approval deadline beside the delivery date. Ask the owner to confirm the capacity before you promise it externally.

If nobody can confirm the handoff, give the client a provisional date and explain what must be settled first.

You can fix the missing decision now or explain a missed deadline later.

This version gives the reader a concrete check. It also makes the inconvenience visible: sometimes the responsible decision is to avoid promising the firm date the client wants. The close follows from the example instead of introducing a generic booking link.

You could end with a genuine question about how another team handles approvals if you want to compare practices. You don't need a question on every post.

Make the body easy to read without chopping it into slogans

Use paragraphs to separate changes in thought. Keep a short paragraph when one point is enough; keep related explanation together when splitting it would make the meaning harder to follow.

Lists suit steps, checks and genuinely parallel choices. A wall of dense prose can obscure good advice, but one sentence per line for an entire post can make a straightforward idea feel artificially dramatic.

Cut vague nouns where you can name the actual work. Replace “improve efficiency” with the removed step or delay. Replace “provide value” with the checklist, explanation or demonstration the reader receives.

Read the post aloud. A sentence you would never say to a competent colleague probably needs simplifying. Preserve necessary qualifications, particularly when a public observation only supports a hypothesis.

Choose an image for a purpose

Harry's low-engagement diagnostic recommends building a bank of authentic photos instead of attaching another generic graphic to every post. A founder or team image can help readers recognize the person behind the advice and reduce the work of publishing regularly.

That is an option to test. It doesn't establish that a personal photo always beats a useful diagram. For a handoff explanation, a readable example task or process sketch might communicate more than a photograph. For a real founder account, a relevant image of the work may fit naturally.

Use material you are entitled to publish. Remove private client details from screenshots, make text large enough to read, and provide useful image descriptions. Don't use an unrelated photo to imply that a client, result or event exists.

Check what the post asks the reader to believe

Before publishing, verify the evidence behind the opening and every consequential number. If you quote a person, check the wording. If you describe a platform update, use the current primary source rather than borrowing certainty from a creator's summary.

LinkedIn's feed engineering explanation discusses meaning and multiple forms of engagement. It does not justify claims that likes are worthless or that a particular opening guarantees distribution. Write for a reader with an actual question; use the distribution guide for decisions about timing and reach.

Check the final action too. A useful post can stand alone, invite a relevant discussion, or point to a resource that continues the work. Keep the next step easy to find when it is needed. Avoid disguising a sales request as an automatic reward for a keyword comment.

Then judge the published post by its job. Did relevant people understand the idea? Did the questions reveal a gap in the explanation? Did a buyer use the check, visit an appropriate resource or start a substantive conversation? Those answers give you material for the next post. A weak result is a reason to examine the promise and the payoff, not to invent a more dramatic story.