‘Entertainment’ Doesn't Have To Mean ‘Comedy’

If a creative brief demands content that is “entertaining”, a lot of the time what a client means is: “make it funny”.

The problem with this is that comedy is but only one of the many emotional tools for entertainment. Excellent creatives reading that brief will question the routes that can be considered ‘entertainment’ and want to stretch their imaginations beyond one route.

The films, shows, ads and reels people actually love to watch don’t rely on a single emotional note. They pull us through many entertaining emotions such as tension, awe, intimacy, curiosity, horror and surprise. For brands trying to win in the modern attention economy, understanding this distinction and choosing the right tone for the objective and audience, is critical.

The Real Challenge For Brand Creative: Attention

The biggest challenge in modern advertising isn’t media efficiency. It’s earning attention that sticks.

Research from the LinkedIn B2B Institute and MediaScience found that 81% of video ads fail to generate meaningful attention or brand recall, with viewers paying attention for just 3.7 seconds on average.

Three point seven seconds. Barely enough time to process a logo, let alone land a punchline.

Which means the real job of creative is to create an emotional hook powerful enough to stop the scroll, skip or exit. That emotion doesn’t have to be humour. In fact, humour is one of the hardest to get right.

Tension

One of the most powerful storytelling tools in film is tension. The feeling that something big is about to happen.

A brilliant ad example is Volvo Trucks’ “Epic Split” featuring Jean-Claude Van Damme.

The film builds pure tension: two trucks slowly reversing while Van Damme performs the splits between them. The audience knows something dramatic is coming, the entire film is built around anticipation.

There’s no joke. Just suspense. It became one of the most shared ads in the world.

Emotionally engaging ads are significantly more memorable too. Research suggests ads that trigger emotional responses can be around 40% more memorable than those that don’t. Being memorable in a short amount of time is vital for pre-roll, digital, TV and paid social ads.

Awe

Another emotion advertising massively underuses is awe.

Cinema has always understood the power of spectacle, something visually or conceptually striking enough that the viewer simply wants to watch. When ads are shown in the cinema, awe is a particularly brilliant emotion to go after.

Apple’s product films are a masterclass in this.

Take their “Shot on iPhone” campaigns. They create awe through visual craft, cinematography and scale, turning a product demonstration into something cinematic.

“But Apple has MILLIONS of pounds in budget” I hear you cry. For brands, awe doesn’t require blockbuster budgets. Awe can come from ambitious ideas, beautiful filmmaking, or visual execution that feels elevated. Great stories don’t come from kit and gear, they come from imagination and experience. The most expensive camera is worthless in the hands of someone who doesn't know how to use it to tell a story.

Another thing to consider is that emotional alignment matters. Research into streaming environments found viewers are 2.4× more attentive when an ad’s emotional tone matches the surrounding content. Know where your content is going to sit and what it will be surrounded by so that you can feed those considerations into the emotional beats and tone of your content.

Awe is perfect for the big screen and hero film for brands. The scale and cinematic vibes can be fully appreciated in those formats.

Intimacy

From awe to intimacy. Loud to soft. Some of the most powerful brand films are built around quiet human moments.They stand out because they don’t get in viewers faces or pound in their ears.

Nike’s “Dream Crazy” campaign narrated by Colin Kaepernick feels intimate and emotionally charged. Personal stories unfold in a way that makes the viewer feel part of something bigger than the brand itself.

This type of storytelling builds connection and connection drives behaviour. Studies suggest 70% of viewers say they are more likely to purchase from a brand after experiencing a strong emotional response to a video ad.

When done well, these films feel like stories rather than ads and can be achieved well through long-form and social content.

Curiosity

Something unusual or unexpected is happening and we want or need to understand it. Curiosity is a skill that could be considered in decline. It certainly lessons as we age and so it makes for an underutilised approach in brand content and advertising. It also lends itself really well to episodic content so that you can pace the unveilings of a story and keep audiences coming back for more.

Guinness’ “Surfer”, is widely considered one of the greatest ads ever made and we think it’s a great example of tapping into curiosity in viewers.

The film slowly reveals its metaphor through striking imagery and narration. It’s hypnotic.

Viewers stay engaged because they want to see where the story is going.

That matters more than ever on social platforms. Research shows viewers typically watch social ads for around four seconds on average before deciding whether to continue watching.

Which means the first moments of a brand film shouldn’t explain the product. They should create intrigue.

Entertainment Doesnt Have To Mean Comedy

The comedy trap

None of this means comedy doesn’t work of course. Great comedic advertising can be incredibly effective and live in memories for generations. But humour is one of the hardest creative disciplines in the world.

It’s subjective.
It’s culturally specific.
When it fails, it fails loudly. Cringe.

The bigger risk is when brands assume entertainment must mean humour, because that collapses the emotional range of brand storytelling.

The real job of entertainment in advertising

Entertainment in brand storytelling is about making people feel something strongly enough to keep watching and then be part of a journey that turns them into a customer.

That emotion might be:

tension
awe
intimacy
curiosity
surprise
anticipation
joy

And those are only a few of the wide and miraculous range of human emotions that give advertisers the vehicle to speak to and move audiences. Starting a content strategy with audience-thinking first is as crucial as it’s ever been. (We’ve written a 3 part guide for how to find that audience)

You've got 3.7 seconds. What emotion are you going for? Work with us to answer that.