My hook is weak but the video still sells. Should I care?

The problem

A video has a weak opening. Well under where it should be. It is also one of the best-selling videos on the product per ten thousand views.

The creator wants to re-shoot the opening because “the hook is red.” The brand is nervous about anything that changes a video that is paying for itself. Both are waiting for you to say what the next version should be.

Every stage exists to explain the sales number. When the sales number is already good, the explanation is “something about this video beats a weak opening.” Useful to know. Not a brief for a remake, because a remake is a new video that starts at zero with no promise it keeps what made this one sell.

A weak hook on a winner has a real cost: fewer people reached than it could. That is upside. You chase upside with an iteration: same middle, new opening, posted beside the original. The original keeps earning and nobody edits it.

The example

Two strategists saw the same shape and briefed the creator differently.

The first asked for a fix to the red stage and got a video that lost the green one, because whatever made the original sell was not in the opening and did not survive the remake. The second kept the part that worked and added reach beside it. You will not always know what made the original sell. That is exactly why the brief says “keep the middle,” not “remake it.”

Do this in Verdict

1. 1
   In the Leak Finder this row reads SCALE with a red Hook. The report pane flags the leak as a caution on a winner and suggests the next version, not an edit.
2. 2
   Read the verdict badge before the stages, every time.
3. 3
   Brief the iteration as a version of the original, so the two are compared side by side. That is Lesson 25.