HonestHook

Glossary

The words people throw around when they talk about growing on social — explained without the jargon, for founders who’d rather be building.

• Best time to postThe hour and weekday a post goes out, and why it changes reach. What the generic charts leave out, why the answer never transfers between platforms, and the only version of it that holds.
• Build in publicSharing your revenue, decisions and mistakes while you build. What actually makes it work, what makes it backfire, and why it isn't for everyone.
• Engagement rateHow engagement rate is actually calculated, why the same post scores differently on every platform, and why a high rate can still mean nothing.
• HookThe first line or first second of a post — the part that decides whether the rest gets read. What makes one work, and why copying viral hooks usually backfires.
• KarmaThe score Reddit and Hacker News attach to an account. It works as a gate rather than a scoreboard, which is why a new founder's first link disappears without anyone disliking it.
• Reach vs impressionsImpressions count times your post was displayed; reach counts people who saw it. Why the gap between them is the number worth watching.
• ShadowbanWhat a shadowban actually is, why most suspected shadowbans are something else, and how to tell the difference before you rebuild your whole strategy.
• Show HNThe Hacker News format for something you built that people can try right now. What qualifies, the mistake that gets most launches flagged, and what the traffic is actually worth.
• Trending topicA subject a platform has decided is rising right now. How trending is actually computed, why the label arrives late, and why yesterday's list is unrecoverable.