Meta Ads: Quickly Hook Your Audience

Abhay Gupta

Sep 9, 2024

A while ago, I saw an ad that had a really bad pun for a headline.

Now I can't remember the ad.

Well, because it was awful. It violated all of the basic rules for creating a good ad.

Anyway, the guy who wrote the ad was trying to justify the headline by saying:
"It's really clever because if they read on, they'll understand the headline…"

"WHAT?!
IF!
IF THEY READ ON!" I thought to myself.

"With that disaster of a headline, no one will ever read on!"

People Have Short Attention Spans

In a previous post, I discussed why most ads suck.

I mentioned that people have short attention spans.

In short, if you don't get your audience's attention immediately, they'll just move on.

Especially on social media.

It's too easy for a prospect to scroll past your ad.

In fact, it's come to the point where if someone even sees an ad, they'll immediately swipe away.

So, what if some prospects scroll away?

Well, besides not getting the extra clients, this ruins your ad's engagement.

Less Engagement Means Less Push

Meta will show poorly performing ads less often.

Low engagement also affects normal posts, but it's even worse for ads.

Why?

Because you're paying for ads.

You're paying for Meta to push your ads to more people. More than what a regular post would do.

Advertising is supposed to be pay-to-win.

With a poor hook, it turns into pay-to-lose. It's just wasting money.

What Should a Good Hook Do?

Ads are supposed to sell stuff, right?

So a good hook should lead to more sales.

It's a simple procedure.

Good hook =more engagement = better ad performance = more reach = more clients = more sales.

How Do You Design an Effective Hook?

You need to get the prospect's attention fast.

You must not confuse them (like by using a bad pun). This will just drive prospects away.

So Keep the hook short. Keep it simple. Get to the point.

This gives people a reason to pay attention.

An easy way to test if a headline / hook is good is to ask:
If you only advertised the headline (and a CTA), would the prospect actually get in touch with you?

If the answer is yes, then you have a great headline.

This is how I approach headline design.

So let's start using efficient hooks in your ads.

Don't let the audience's short attention span let them scroll away. Keep the ad's engagement high.

Make sure that the hook you use is simple and gets straight to the point. No waffling. No awful puns.

Finally, test the headline. Ask if the headline makes sense on its own.

Talk Soon,
Abhay