Hannah Ricketts - Click Bait Thumbnails Gotta Go


Hannah Ricketts visits London's most exclusive hotels, posh stores, and celebrity restaurants, but also occasionally fast food spots, reviewing them all. She has a natural personality—there’s nothing exaggerated about her. She doesn’t scream and shout like many YouTubers, nor does she drag things out by being unnecessarily slow, as some creators do just to fill time in their videos. In other words, her presentation is natural, and she delivers well with her comments, showing what’s essential, i.e., not lingering the camera on unnecessary things (or just herself). The video quality is also good and clear, although sometimes there can be that flickering light effect which happens in some videos due to fluorescent lighting (I think that's the cause). This is quite common in Christmas-themed videos in general. There are no annoying sounds or light effects in her videos, either, which I appreciate.

Her thumbnails usually feature a shocked or deeply suffering expression, regardless of the content. The biggest problem I have with Hannah is that she uses clickbait titles a lot, where the title itself often is very negative. For example, in her latest video, "I stayed at the Ritz London... THE SAD TRUTH!" As a viewer, you’re expecting something to be seriously wrong with this hotel, so you watch with curiosity, wondering what it is. You spend 43 minutes only for her to say at the end that the sad truth is that there’s nothing wrong with the Ritz. Really? So, I go to Google Maps reviews and get a different picture. While many have given the hotel 5 stars, there are also quite a few one-star reviews. One visitor mentions that his outfit wasn’t deemed fancy enough for their afternoon tea. Another says that his wife had been looking forward to visiting the Ritz for weeks, but when they arrived, an influencer was there filming and using light effects that ruined the entire experience. Those kinds of reviews are very interesting to me as a regular visitor. But Hannah doesn’t mention any of that; everything is just fantastic. It WAS probably amazing for HER, but I think the Ritz and many other hotels and restaurants know very well who she is. They know she can be a great promotional tool for them, so they go the extra mile.

She is also always well-dressed and has a look that fits the upper class without being over the top. That’s just a fact, so there’s no reason for them to be rude. But how would it be, for example, if a very overweight person in poor clothing filmed and stayed there? It doesn't even need to be poor clothing—maybe just someone overweight with an outdated haircut but still wearing whole and clean clothes. How would the experience at the Ritz be then?

I hope that Hannah starts using titles that actually match the content. In other words, don’t lie to your viewers. If your experience was fantastic, say that. Your credibility is what people remember, and if you constantly mislead your audience, they will lose interest. People want to see what they are prepared to see, not be surprised that the video is about something completely different.

Hannah´s Youtube Channel

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