The Scroll-Stopping Secret Most Brands Miss
The First Two Seconds: Why Your Hook Needs to Stand Out
Let’s be real: traditional, safe advertising puts the product front and center immediately.
But funny ads that go viral play a different game.
Instead of leading with product features or the same old UGC, funny ads make the content unignorable from the start.
Why is this guy in medieval armor shopping for deodorant?
Why is she leaf blowing cough drops across a lawn?
Why is there a superhero sprinting through an ice cream shop?
When done right, funny content keeps people watching.
The product gets remembered because of the story.
And most important, it can get shared with millions.
Roll the Tape, and Rake Those Leaves!
One of the strongest-performing openings we’ve worked on starts like a sports training montage instead of a product ad.
An overbearing coach is yelling at exhausted homeowners trying to rake leaves into bags.
The whole thing feels dramatically over-serious for something as ordinary as yard work.
A more conventional version of that ad would have opened with the product and the problem. Instead, the setup spends a few extra seconds letting viewers figure out what’s happening.
By the time the Leafbagger product enters the frame, they’re already invested in the scenario. They’re no longer deciding whether to watch another yard tool ad. They’re trying to see where the joke goes next.
The opening wasn’t trying to explain the product. It was trying to earn another few seconds of attention.
Across the videos we’ve seen perform best, the opening usually does one of three things:
Puts a character in an unexpected situation
Drops viewers into a scenario that doesn’t immediately make sense
Uses a tone that feels completely out of place in the feed
Different platforms reward different creative choices, but the underlying principle stays the same:
“Okay, Where Is This Going?”
When viewers can’t immediately predict what’s going to happen next, they’re more likely to stick around and find out.
That’s why so many memorable videos begin with an unexpected situation, an unusual character, or a joke that’s already in progress.
Humor is one way to create that effect, but it’s not the only one.
What matters is creating a gap between what viewers expect and what actually happens. That gap creates curiosity, and curiosity buys you time.
We’ve seen this repeatedly in our own work, and industry data points in the same direction. Motion’s analysis of DTC ad performance found that humor appeared more often among its highest-spending ads.
People don't want to be sold to. But they do want to be entertained.
What This Means for Ecommerce Brands
Most brands start by asking, “How do we show off the product?”
A better starting point is: “How can we create unignorable content that gets shared with millions of our potential customers?”
The answer might be an unexpected character, an unusual premise, or a familiar problem taken far too seriously. Not a complicated idea, but one that creates enough curiosity for viewers to stay.
That attention gives the product somewhere to land.
Want content people actually remember? Let’s talk.
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