Rewriting a Million-Dollar VSL Hook

This is how I turned a million-dollar VSL hook and made it better

Ali Abdaal has his LifeOS course. In short, it's a course/community that helps you become more productive in a non-toxic environment.

Hello, how’s it going? If you’re on this page, then I would love to tell you a little bit about LifeOS

{animation}

Which is the productivity system that helps you manage your time, beat procrastination, and take consistent action towards the goals that matter most to you.

If we haven’t met, hello, my name is Ali. I’m a doctor turned entrepreneur and the author of the New York Times and Sunday Times Bestseller - Feel Good Productivity. And apparently, according to my publisher, I’m also the world’s most followed productivity expert.

This is his hook. We can dissect it by the first 3 seconds, the grab, and the intro

First 3 seconds

The first 3 seconds are weak. Putting it bluntly, it's going to get people to click off because their attention span has worn out.

After reels and shorts were introduced, people's attention spans have gone from 7 seconds to 3 seconds. That basically only gives you one or two lines to hook their attention.

On shorts, people like to use visual hooks. This is a VSL, not a short, so we need to grab their attention with words.

Hello, how’s it going? If you’re on this page, then I would love to tell you a little bit about LifeOS

This hook is not very captivating. It's more of an offer to give an opinion than a hook if anything

So how do we solve this problem? Well, I like to use Pain Points.

I cover this in another blog post/video that will release soon, but in short, Pain Points are statements that trigger people to watch by hitting them (with words) where it's deep

So Ali's target audience is probably sick of procrastination, for example, so you'd start off by mentioning their procrastination.

The viewer hears that and immediately thinks, "I am sick of procrastination. Hold up."

The Grab

After they think "hold up", they'll stay for a little longer to see if you can solve their problem

If somebody calls your name, you'll pay attention for a bit. But if they want something that's not worth your time, you change your attention to something else

This is where you grab their attention and convince them to stay for the video. Let's take a look at Ali's Grab.

Which is the productivity system that helps you manage your time, beat procrastination, and take consistent action towards the goals that matter most to you.

A good rule of thumb in copywriting in general, is that you need to do most of the thinking for the reader

You need to force-feed them information, so you can't just state the benefits of your product. You need to tell them exactly what they will get out of it.

I like to call these Base-level Benefits and High-Level Benefits, but that's a topic for another day.

So the problem here is that Ali doesn't state outright that the course will solve their problems

Yes, it's heavily implied, but you can't cut corners like that.

The Intro

This is a very underrated part in a VSL, and most people do it badly and think they can get away with it

However, this isn't Ali. The reason for this is that VSL intros basically do the same thing as YouTube intros. They build credibility.

So Ali, being a YouTuber, has a pretty good intro.

The only problem is that when he says this

And apparently, according to my publisher, I’m also the world’s most followed productivity expert.

He doesn't seem confident in himself, which is a big red flag.

If you can't be confident in yourself, how would people be confident in you?

Final Revised Hook

You’re either watching this because you’re a huge fan of mine, you’re tired of procrastinating, you’re tired of putting in so much effort just to get mediocre results, or you’re really inconsistent with your goals

If you’re here for the last 3 reasons, then watch until the end of the video so you know what to do in the next few minutes to overcome whatever you’re going through

Hi, my name is Ali. I’m a doctor turned entrepreneur and the author of the New York Times and Sunday Times Besterseller - Feel Good Productivity.

I’m the world’s most followed productivity expert, and I’m the creator of Life OS

As we can see, I mentioned a pain point in the very first paragraph

Then, after that, I specifically state that a few minutes is all it takes to overcome what they want to overcome

And finally, I made the intro sound a bit more confident and gave it a bit more clarity

Obviously, this VSL hook is not perfect. I whipped it up in my video (you should check it out) in a couple of minutes.

If you guys have any questions, please let me know.

I had a really fun time writing this blog post and I hope you guys got a lot of value from it

If you want this in video form, check out the video here ->

Follow my socials on all platforms (please), and I hope you enjoyed reading this blog post.

See you next time