Thumb-stop rate

What thumb-stop rate means

Feeds are thumbs. If the first frame does not interrupt the scroll, nothing else in the ad runs. Thumb-stop rate is that interrupt. Hook rate (the share that stay through the opening seconds) asks whether they stayed. CTR (click-through rate: how often a view becomes a click) asks whether they clicked.

Let's take a drink brand as an example. They sell a low-sugar sports drink for active women over 50, mostly from their own website. The drink brand runs a 15-second Instagram video. Version A opens on the can in a 58-year-old runner's hand. Version B opens on a talking head. Both are shown 10,000 times in the feed (the scrolling list of posts). Version A gets 2,000 pauses (20% thumb-stop). Version B gets 800 (8%). The drink did not change. The first frame did.

The name thumb-stop is operator slang. You will not always find a platform column for it. Treat it as the first attention gate on mobile feeds. If your team already says hook rate for that gate, pick one definition. Two names for the same seconds will split the report.

How to read thumb-stop rate

Definitions of thumb-stop rate vary by platform. Treat it as a relative score inside one placement. A pattern worth acting on: thumb-stop holds, hook rate falls. Let's take a drink brand as an example. They sell a low-sugar sports drink for active women over 50, mostly from their own website. On the drink brand's winner, 2,000 people pause and only 1,200 still watch at three seconds. People stop, then bounce. The opening still works. The next seconds do not. The reverse pattern is creative fatigue on the first frame itself: even the pause dies because they have seen that can-open before.

Sound-off is the default in a feed (the scrolling list of posts). The first frame has to work without audio. A talking-head open that only makes sense with sound will lose the thumb-stop even if the script about the sports drink is good.

Common thumb-stop mistakes

• Using a desktop-shot first frame on a mobile-only placement. Let's take a drink brand as an example. They sell a low-sugar sports drink for active women over 50, mostly from their own website. The can gets cropped out of the vertical, and thumb-stop rate falls.
• Chasing thumb-stop with motion that has nothing to do with the drink. Cheap pauses from the wrong joke wreck the next step.

If thumb-stop rate is weak, change the first frame in these ways:

• Crop the first frame for a vertical mobile phone, so the product is not cut off.
• Put the product in shot. Let's take a drink brand as an example. They sell a low-sugar sports drink for active women over 50, mostly from their own website. Show the can, not a studio talking head.
• Add text that reads at a glance, because most people watch with the sound off.
• Use motion that belongs to the offer, not a random jump-cut that has nothing to do with the drink.

If thumb-stop rate is fine and hook rate is not, leave the first frame and fix the next three seconds. Those are two different ads.