How to Write Hooks for Short Video Ads

You filmed a decent 20-second video for your ad. The product looks good, the offer is clear, and the first thing viewers see is your logo sliding in. Most of them scroll past before the second sentence.

The hook is the first line and the opening seconds. Common advice says you have the first two or three seconds to give someone a reason to stay. That is a rule of thumb that marketers pass around, not a proven number, but the idea holds: nobody owes your ad their attention, so the start has to earn it.

Six hook types to try

You don't need all six. Pick the two or three that suit what you sell, then write several versions of each.

1. The problem. Say the annoying thing your customer already knows. "Your sambal always splits when you reheat it." It works when the problem is common and you can fix it.
2. The result first. Show the finished outcome before anything else. A cake box opened on a table, a clear patch of skin, a tidy shopfront. Then go back and explain how.
3. The demo first. Start with the product doing its job, with no introduction. A blender turning fruit into a drink, a hand sliding a phone case off and on.
4. A question to one specific person. Not "Want better skin?" but "Do you wake up with a stiff neck after sitting at a desk all day?" The narrower the person, the more likely they feel spoken to.
5. A before and after. Two frames, same angle, clear difference. Be honest about what changed and how.
6. Behind the scenes. The kitchen at 5am, the stock room before a sale, the person packing the parcel. It works because it looks less like an ad.

Three examples to copy the shape of

These businesses are invented. Use them for the pattern, then swap in your own details.

The three are a bakery in Bangsar that sells butter cakes and kaya buns, a skincare brand with a gentle cleanser for oily skin, and a gym in Jumeirah Village Circle, Dubai, that runs small evening classes.

Business	Hook type	Opening
Bakery	Problem	"Most butter cakes are dry by the next morning."
Bakery	Result first	A slice pulled apart slowly, caption "Day-two butter cake, still soft."
Bakery	Behind the scenes	"We start mixing at 4am so you can have these by 8."
Skincare	Question	"Oily T-zone by lunchtime, dry cheeks by night?"
Skincare	Before and after	Two close-ups, same light, a plain label of what was used and for how long
Skincare	Demo first	Cleanser pumped, lathered, rinsed, with no talking at first
Gym	Question	"Work ends at 6 and the big gym is packed? Here is a class of eight."
Gym	Problem	"You pay for a membership and go twice a month."
Gym	Result first	A member finishing a set, smiling: "Week eight, first unassisted pull-up."

Notice what these share. Each hook names a thing the viewer can picture, and none of them opens with the brand name.

Write for people watching with the sound off

Many people watch short video with the sound off, on a bus or in a queue. Treat the sound as a bonus and make the opening work without it.

• Put the hook on screen as text in the first frame, in the same words you say aloud or close to them.
• Keep it short enough to read in one glance. If it takes two reads, cut words.
• Use large, high-contrast type and keep it away from the edges, where the app's buttons and captions can cover it. Check a draft on your own phone in each app.
• Make the picture do half the work. If the text says "Day-two butter cake, still soft", the frame should show the soft crumb.
• Add captions for any speech that follows, so someone reading along doesn't lose the thread.

Think about which language the first line is in. In Malaysia, if your customers read Malay or Chinese more comfortably than English, a hook in their language will land faster than a translation tucked into the caption. In the UAE, English and Arabic are both widely used, so the same choice applies.

Make the hook match the ad

A hook that promises something the video never delivers is bait. People notice, they leave, and they remember the brand as one that wastes their time.

Check these before you post:

• The promise is kept. If the hook says "still soft on day two", the video must show or explain exactly that.
• The order makes sense. The hook raises a question, the next few seconds answer it, then the offer follows. Don't open with a dramatic problem and then talk about something else.
• The tone is the same throughout. A joking hook followed by a stiff sales script feels like two different ads stitched together.
• The claim is one you can stand behind. If you show a before and after, say what was done between the two frames.

A copy formula can help here. With PAS (problem, agitate, solve), the hook is the problem, the next beat makes it feel real, and the product is the solution. With AIDA (attention, interest, desire, action), the hook is the attention step, and the rest of the video has to carry interest and desire. Writing your script against a formula keeps the hook from drifting away from the body.

How to test hooks without muddying the result

The only way to learn which hook works is to change one thing at a time.

1. Make one video body. Same product footage, same offer, same ending, same caption, same call to action.
2. Record or write three or four different openings, a few seconds each. Use different hook types, for example one problem, one result first and one question.
3. Attach each opening to the same body, so you end up with several videos that differ only in the start.
4. Run them in the same period, to the same audience, with the same budget. A round example is RM50 or AED 50 each, but pick what you can afford to lose.
5. Look at the numbers that tell you how people react at the start, such as how many keep watching, and then at what happens after, such as clicks and cost per result. Wait until each version has had a fair number of views before you decide, because a few views can mislead.
6. Keep the winner, then write new hooks against it and test again.

If you change the hook, the music and the caption all at once, you won't know which one made the difference. It feels slower, but you learn more in fewer rounds.

Keep a short log: the hook text, the type, the date and what you saw. After a few rounds, you'll see which types work for your customers, and that is worth more than any general advice, including this post.

Where Marvis fits

Writing six or eight hook variations by hand is the dull part. Marvis can write video scripts, and you can pick a tone and a copy formula such as AIDA or PAS and write in any language. That makes it quicker to get several openings in different languages from the same idea. Marvis also lists translated videos among its features, which helps when you want the same ad for more than one audience. You still choose which hooks to keep, edit the words, and decide what to run and how much to spend. If you want to try it, start at /sign-up.

Your next step

1. Pick one ad you already run.
2. Write five new openings for it, using at least three of the hook types above.
3. Put the hook text on screen in the first frame.
4. Test them against the same body this week, and write down which one people stayed for.