🫂General Social What is with videos starting with the ending first?

[Preying Mantis]

Anyone else seen this? You start a video on TikTok or Reddit or whatever and the ending or punchline or whateva plays first, then the rest of the video plays?

Is there some kinda audience that’s meant to appeal to?

 

[RiskyStuff]

But it's not a movie with complex story.

And it gives first what users seek satisfying them early, so they can leave.

Because if you love someone, you are able to let them go.

 

[GoldenGlovez]

Likely an attempt for audience capture/view retention, putting the hook before the lead up. Reportedly attention spans have significantly decreased over the last two decades, and even more specifically with 'screen content'. Netflix are purportedly pushing screen writers and filmmakers to use more exposition and repeated plot point reinforcement in recent TV shows and movies because they've found many viewers tend to stare at their cellphones while a show or movie is playing.

Matt Damon spoke on what Netflix was telling him a few months back for his film The Rip that pretty much lines up with what you're seeing as well, "put the big action in the first five minutes. Hook them fast or lose them forever."

 

[BlogPro]

@GoldenGlovez has gotten it pretty much right.

Although, most people that do it now have no idea what they're doing.

I call it the trailer/teaser method.

So historical analytical data has shown that the first 5, 15 and 30 seconds of a video matter, when it comes to audience retention.

It's also well known that all three - YouTube, Tiktok and Meta use these engagement metrics to optimize their algorithms.

This "technique" predates the social video age though.

Movies have had trailers/teasers since forevers. Telenovelas and Daily soaps often teased the upcoming episode at the end of the current episode.

Even news channel specialist programs (that are pre-recorded) have an "In Today's Episode" segment at the start showcasing guests, a couple jokes or antics from the program.

All of this translated to YouTube (and others).

My best guess is this started with travel channels that began displaying an "In this video" and they'd show bits and pieces of the areas they covered - food platters, people, mountains, rivers, beaches or whatever else.

The idea was to awe the audience so that they'd stick around to see the same place in more detail.

This then began getting carried on to other channels. They brought along their niche specific nuances and it doesn't always translate well.