Woot!
Comedic Pre-Roll Ads
The crazy cats over at Woot! approached us with a funny idea and a limited budget for a campaign of comedic pre-roll spots. To be honest, we were scratching our heads a bit at the beginning trying to figure out a way to make it work. After digging into the brand, listening to the thoughts floating around, and a fair amount of brainstorming, we came up with an idea that would be augmented by a lo-fi production solution. Woot! and TNB came together and collaborated as a tight-knit team and developed a campaign that exceeded performance expectations, hitting all the benchmarks while staying within budget and calendar realities.
When comedic pre-roll meets lo-fi goodness!
Direction: John Jeffcoat
Editorial: John Jeffcoat
VFX: John Jeffcoat
Executive Producer: Andrew Kobliska
Executive Creative Directors: Bobby Hougham + Sevrin Daniels
Client: Woot!
Chief Marketing Officer: Arsalan Ahmed
Sr. Writer / Brand Manager: Kirk Anderson
Writer / Production Manager: Matt Klan
Social Media Manager: Rei Biermann
Craft Services: Jeff Bezos
Direction: John Jeffcoat
Editorial: John Jeffcoat
VFX: John Jeffcoat
Executive Producer: Andrew Kobliska
Executive Creative Directors: Bobby Hougham + Sevrin Daniels
Chief Marketing Officer: Arsalan Ahmed
Sr. Writer / Brand Manager: Kirk Anderson
Writer / Production Manager: Matt Klan
Social Media Manager: Rei Biermann
Craft Services: Jeff Bezos
The Process
Woot! is a scrappy little company with an extraordinary sense of humor, both attributes we could relate with. On the surface the budget was a significant obstacle but after a little thought and closer examination we figured there would be a solution that could make everyone happy. As it turns out, we were right!
We love a good opportunity to get weird and laugh, and this was right up our alley.
These guys were willing to roll up their sleeves and get into the muck and mire of the project and didn’t just go along for the ride, we collaborated from brainstorming through production and post production as though we were all in the same room on the same team and that is saying something in this Covid-19 world.
This comedic pre-roll campaign led by “Hi, We’re Woot!”, the witty t-shirt-meets-Bob Dylan spot, followed by “Skippy, the Ad Skipper” and “Falls Apart” utilize smart humor and prat falls to entertain viewers while overtly encouraging them to skip knowing that if hooked, they will stick around to see what else funny was going to happen. Adding in the skills of talented comedic director John Jeffcoat (Outsourced, Big In Japan), the strategy worked!
Despite being owned by Amazon, Woot! is a small company and this was a significant investment in funds and manpower on their end, so we worked hard to make sure the effort and investment would be successful. That said, it looks like it has beaten all expectations. After only 1 week of play they broke 2.5 million views on YouTube alone, with a plethora of likes and ZERO dislikes, something almost impossible or at the very least, incredibly uncommon. As a result, it would be a good prediction to expect “Greg” to have more funny misadventures in advertising in the future.
Featured Words
Woot Woot! Low-Fi Campaign by The New Blank Welcomes Massive Views
February 23, 2021 in LBBonline
What do you get when you mix a first-time advertiser and an irreverent sensibility from both a brand and its production partner? Woot! and production company The New Blank have the answer in Woot!’s YouTube ads that have earned over 20 million views…
Woot! campaign earns massive YouTube views
February 22, 2021 in Reel360
Irreverent and quite frankly, ridiculous, the new campaign from Woot! and production company The New Blank is our Reel Ad of the Week. What do we like about the work from a first-time advertiser and its production partner? Did we say the two spots are ridiculous and irreverent? And pretty effin’ funny to boot. Which rhymes with Woot!

Just wanted to thank you for a fantastic two days of shooting. You guys were super supportive and handled all aspects absolutely masterfully despite multiple curve balls thrown at you! …hiring The New Blank was hands down my best decision in the whole process. I know this was a smaller job for you, and I really appreciate you believing in the project enough to come on board and make our dumb ideas come to life. Very much looking forward to working with TNB a lot more.
Matthew Klan
Woot!
maybe the bar is a bit lower than we thought?!?
I have never liked a commercial so much that I searched it up. Until now…
*{Cupcake}*
Congrats, this is the first ad I didn’t skip that was long. Fun Fact: Other ad’s need to learn from this. Now this is how you attract customers. Make the ad funny.
Masterful Moonlighter
This is how you advertise correctly!
Lynda
I LOVED how his facial expression changed at the last shirt!! 😂😂😂😂
killer9000
Imma be honest this trailer is the only one i came back to after seeing it
Chrome_NovaYT
I love every second of it 😂
Anthony Betancourt
Okay now this is a sure fire way to get me to visit your site. Your man needs a raise because this commercial was beautiful and also your writers.
Abstract Friends
This ad brought me so much joy
Don M
helloooooooooo nurse!
Chris Race
My favorite part was when we found out that Snape killed Dumbledore.
Ralph H.
This ad is stupid and i love it.
*{Cupcake}*
@Woot! When an Ad channel actually has a sense of humor: We have seen jesus again.
Luke Chandler
Yeah this was the only ad that ever wanted me to skip, ironically it’s the only ad I’ve never skipped……Good job guys…
J_ B
i cant believe i just watched an entire youtube vid that was nothing but a vid of a youtube ad that appears in front of other youtube vids. ….. And i did it On Purpose!
Dusk Phoenix
This is the best ad I have ever seen.
MozHD
When I saw this i couldn’t help but watch the whole thing. Great marketing idea
crazy
what if you are watching it as a video and not an ad hmm?