YouTube Ads Case Study: Good Video Ad Structure

Brady Snow, Director of Content for TubeSift, compares our Scripting Guide for ads to the structure used in the hit ad Squatty Potty by the Harmon Brothers.

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Video Transcript:

How Squatty Potty earned 140 Million Views with good Video Ad Structure

Hi, Brady Snow here, Director of Content with TubeSift. Today, we’re back with another YouTube Ads Case Study. This one is going to be about one of our favorite ads here at TubeSift and this is Squatty Potty. It’s about five years old, they are still pushing ads out on YouTube, however. This first ad that they did was a huge success, grabbed viewers attention quickly, it was very humorous. Much of the success of these ads is that they use good Video Ad Structure. Squatty Potty got about 140 million views and that’s since October 6th, 2015. So, they just had their birthday.

They did just push out a video from the actor who you’ll see here in a second, Wes Tolman saying happy birthday. But anyway, before I get further into that, let’s just take a look at our video ad scripting guide, which you can get on our blog. You can just enter your email and get our scripting guide. And this just kind of helps you outline what you’re going to put in your ad, how you’re going to present your information in the best order to engage your audience.

The pattern interrupt, or hook, is what you lead your ad with and is your one and only chance to capture your audience’s attention on an in-stream ad before they click skip ad.

A Video Ad Structure to Follow

So, all rules are meant to be broken and the Squatty Potty does follow this guide per se. However, they switch up the order a little bit with these calls to action, but let’s just go one at a time here. So that in the beginning we have a pattern interrupt or the hook you want to start off and get your user’s attention quickly. A lot of times you only have a few seconds to do that.

The Pattern Interrupt or Hook

For the first five seconds, you want to grab their attention. They bended the rules on this a little bit, they took a little bit more time with that, but I mean, it’s true that they grab your attention the first five seconds. And then they just continue it before they move on to the next step here, which is qualify the viewer. But let’s just watch the beginning of this ad.

This is Where your Ice Cream Comes From…

This is where your ice cream comes from. Creamy poop of a mystic unicorn. Totally clean, totally cool, and self-serve straight from a sphincter. They’re good at pooping. But you know who sucks at pooping? You do. That’s because when you sit on a porcelain drone-

So in those first 15 seconds or so, you have this colorful setting, you have this medieval mystical landscape, you have a mystical creature, the unicorn sitting on a toilet, which is a modern appliance, a modern invention that we all use. We all maybe take it for granted because back in the medieval ages, it wasn’t quite as easy to go to the bathroom and relieve ourselves. But it’s comical because it’s a unicorn, it’s a fake creature, but it’s pooping ice cream. And we all … maybe not all of us, but we tend to love ice cream, it’s a special treat. So that’s kind of funny, grabs your attention quickly.

Qualify the Viewer

The narrator is dressed rather funny, he’s got that British accent, which we tend to all love. So let’s look at the second piece here and that is qualifying the viewer, telling the viewer what your product or service is about and making it relevant. And he does that by saying, “You know who sucks at pooping? You do.” And that intrigues you because it’s something we might take for granted. We all usually get it done. You are intrigued to want to hear more, especially after that comical intro. So let’s go ahead and watch how he continues by qualifying the viewer and elucidating on that issue of, why do you suck at pooping?

It’s muscle, it’s a kink in a hose and stop from Ben and Jerry’s from sliding out smoothly. Is that a problem? I don’t know, are hemorrhoids a problem? Because sitting at this angle can cause hemorrhoids, bloating, constipation, and a buttload of other crap. And seriously, unicorn hemorrhoids, the glitter gets everywhere. But what happens when you go from a sit to a squat? Viola, his muscle relaxes and that kink goes away faster than Pegasus laying a sweet sherbet dookie. Now your colon’s open and ready for battle.

So he qualified the viewer by discussing the problem, why is this issue relevant? And he kind of skips the call to action here, but it addresses the problem and explains the why. We just saw that as well, it kind of blends those two together. So that’s speaking to the pain that qualified people are experiencing and why our product and service is going to help them alleviate that pain. So that’s about to come up. So let’s go ahead and keep watching and see how that happens.

Address the Problem or Explain the Why

That’s because our bodies were made to poop in a squat and now there’s a product that you squat in your own home. Introducing the Squatty Potty. No, Squatty Potty is not a joke. And yes, it will give you the best poop of your life, guaranteed. I don’t just mean you bloated Lords and hemorrhoidal ladies. I mean everyone. Kink, un-kink, kink, un-kink. It’s simple science, really. Can’t get the last scoop out of the carton? With the Squatty Potty, you get complete elimination. Spend too much time on the chamber pot? The Squatty Potty makes you go twice as fast or your money back. Ice cream, you scream and plop, plop, baby.

Maybe you’re sore from squeezing out solid globs of rocky road. The Squatty Potty gives you a smooth stream of fro-yo that glides like a virgin swan. Plus when you’re done, it tucks neatly out of sight, thanks to its innovative patented design. Truly a footstool fit for a constipated King. So if you are a human being who poops on your butt, click here to order your Squatty Potty today at squattypotty.com.

Addressing the problem that your product overcomes is how you further escalate your prospect’s interest before you introduce the solution.

So that had a few of the components from our scripting guide, but you can see how it addresses the issue and how we build towards this intrigue of why this product would be useful. So we had the pattern interrupt in the beginning, you grabbed the attention with comedy, and then we qualified the viewer by talking about an issue at hand, “Oh, you suck at pooping.” “What? Wait, I do?” Interesting enough. And then he goes into more detail, addresses that problem. And apparently when you sit on the porcelain throne, you get a kink, we’re meant to poop in a squat. That’s still using humor because this is a sensitive subject we don’t talk about, but still makes a lot of us laugh in a lot of ways.

Educate the Viewer

So he addresses the problem, explains the why, and then he introduced the solutions. So this is educating, so speak to how your product or service is going to help the user achieve a goal or overcome some challenges they face. So if we suck at pooping, if you intend to poop in a squat, you’re going to unkink that part of your bowels. And it comes out much more smoothly, they say.

Insert a Call to Action

So then he gave us the call to action and that was when this popped up, a video overlay ad. This is not currently working on this video right now, but this is something you can click and you’d be taken to a landing page. For example, this is what their website looks like now. So we discussed that in some of our other trainings about how you can use these video overlay ads. You click, it’s extra real estate, it takes you to a landing page where you can learn more, shop, purchase the product. So this works in any niche, not just pooping.

So let’s go ahead and keep watching this ad. We had the call to action, he’s going to extend the call to action a few more times before the end of this ad and you’ll see that here with that pop-up. And he continues with the humor and more education. Let’s go ahead and finish this ad.

Educate More and Extend the Call to Action Again

You’d wish you’d tried it years ago. And if you don’t trust a Prince, how about your doctor, Shark Tank, HuffPost, NPR, Men’s Health, Howard Stern. He poops from his butt. They’re all crazy about the Squatty Potty. Not to mention the 2,000 Amazon users who gave the Squatty Potty five stars, including the author of this moving haiku.

Oh, Squatty Potty. You fill me with endless joy. Yet leave me empty.

So order your Squatty Potty today. I’m not saying it will make your poop as soft as this cookies and cream, but I’m not saying it won’t. Squatty Potty, the stool for better stools. Pooping will never be the same and neither will ice cream. I got one for you, very good. How does it taste? Is that delicious? Is that the best thing you’ve ever had in your life? There you are.

So you could see there, they continued to educate, they continued to use the humor, they extended that call to action again at the end. And then they showed the children eating ice cream, which in fact was the unicorns poop, more humor. You can see that they took a big risk with this ad, generally not the most comfortable subject, pooping, but they found a way to make it humorous for people of all ages.

Using Humor to Develop Brand Awareness

And so that is just a great example of using humor, getting your user’s attention quickly in the beginning with that pattern interrupt. And then also extending that call to action after you’ve educated your users. You can do this in several orders, you can extend the call to action after you qualify the viewer. And then you go into more detail, address the problem, explain the why. You can extend the call to action again.

It’s not one tried and true method, but the lesson here is that you can feel free to take risks with your ads. It just shows how much influence a video has over a human behavior. So I hope there were some key takeaways that you were able to get out of this video. If you did like this, please click subscribe button on YouTube and follow us on social media.

Download our Free Ad Scripting Guide

If you’d like a simple way to include good video ad structure to your ads, you can download our video ads scripting guide (leave your email above for instant access). Check back again for more case studies of YouTube ads. Thanks for watching and we’ll see you next time.