the strange reason why JUMP SCARES are in every horror film

What do you get served on your YouTube feed?

Sports?
Business?
Politics?

I get comedy, and last week I watched this hilarious, yet important YouTube short…

The main character is an obnoxious film major.

(If you've ever met one, you know exactly who I'm talking about.)

So he’s insulting people’s vanilla taste in movies, and goes on to say his favourite film is "The Cabinet of Dr. Kaligari."

Being a curious person, I checked it out:

• Made in 1920

• Silent film

• Black and white

• Horror

But – this movie was so terrifying that there were reports of women FAINTING in theaters.

They almost pulled it from screens because it was too intense.

Intrigued? Here's a clip:

[link to YT vid]

...Yeah. I mean, the score is pretty good, but not really scary by today's standards, is it?

So what gives? Were those 1920s folks just scared easily? Did we all grow titanium balls over the last century?

Not quite.

What happened is the market (in this case, viewers) became more “sophisticated”.

Let me explain…

As people get exposed to more and more of the same thing, they become desensitized.

Almost like drinking coffee, eventually you need a bigger kick.

With horror, it means ramping up:

• Jump scares

• Gore

• Twists

…Whatever they can do to keep $$$ coming in. And the exact same thing happens with marketing.

If you didn’t adjust your "groundbreaking offer" to the sophistication level of your market, you might as well be showing The Cabinet of Dr. Kaligari to a bunch of horror nerds who love The Conjuring.

Translation: your offer will completely flop.

This is the idea of Sophistication Levels:

High Sophistication:

Watch VSLs from agencies and info businesses and you’ll see them throw in mechanisms, guarantees, and big claims.

Low Sophistication:

TikTok Shop affiliate marketing. Here it’s not about insane claims or the next big mechanism. It’s more about understandable, concise copy that is relatable and feels organic.

So, what's a marketer to do?

Well, you could get caught up in a figurative dick-measuring contest, making bigger and bolder claims...

"We'll deliver results or I'll give you my firstborn child!"

(Pls don't actually do this. I'm pretty sure it's illegal.)

Or... you could think differently.

The key is knowing where your market is at.

-Andrew

P.S… Last week I spoke to a huge CEO (you’ve probably heard of him), and he showed me his 30+ point VSL framework. He claims just the structure itself is “worth more than $10,000”. Wanna see it? The Sheet is inside this Google Doc: [link to doc]