He finished a good video. He explained his subject in order, gave examples, answered an objection before it was raised. Then came the last forty seconds:
"And in the end, I hope you enjoyed the video, and if you did, don't forget to like and subscribe to the channel and hit the bell, and I'll see you in the next video, take care."
Forty seconds that gave the viewer nothing. No idea to carry away, no step to try, no reason to stay. All of it a request from someone who had stopped giving.
An ending is not thanks, it is an answer
The reason an ending exists is that the video opened something at the start which has to be closed: a question, a promise, a problem.
So if your opening was "why does your audio sound bad even with an expensive mic?", your ending is the answer in one sentence: "the problem is not the mic, it is the distance and the room. Move the mic closer and kill the echo, and your sound changes today." That satisfies the viewer, so they trust you.
Writing the opening and the ending together is the practical rule, because they are two halves of one sentence: anyone who writes a strong opening and then discovers at the end that they have no answer has a problem with the opening, not the ending. Writing the opening is covered in how to write a strong opening hook.
Why "don't forget to subscribe" does not work
Three reasons, all of them in the wording rather than the idea:
It is a general request. "Subscribe" is not as clear an action in a viewer's mind as "watch this video" or "tell me your answer to this question". A vague request gets ignored.
It is at the wrong moment. Viewers decide to subscribe in the middle of a video, when they understand something they did not understand before, not at the end while they are already leaving.
It has no reason attached. "Subscribe" with no "because" reads as a personal favour. But "I publish a video on exactly this every Wednesday" is information the viewer can decide with.
The three jobs of an ending
Make every ending do these three, in this order:
1. Close the loop. One sentence answering the opening question.
2. Give a line that travels. The sentence the viewer will say to a friend tomorrow. Do not say ten things at the end; say one carryable thing: "the room before the mic", "don't film what you don't know the ending of". A short, well-made line is what survives of the whole video.
3. Make one specific request. One only.
Four endings that work
The single answer. Restate the opening question, answer it in two lines, and stop. The cleanest ending and the shortest.
The practical step. "Before you close this video, open your camera and turn auto white balance off. One minute." A request that can be done now binds the viewer to the video for real.
The real question. Not "what do you think?", but something narrow people can answer: "which of the two methods do you use, the first or the second?" A narrow question fills the comments; a general one gets no reply.
The bridge to the next video. "This video was about sound in a room; outdoors the story is completely different, and I covered it here." That is the strongest format when you have a video that continues the subject, and its practical side lives in the end screen, which we covered in the last thirty seconds of your video.
Five things not to do in the last thirty seconds
Do not summarise what they just watched. A summary tells the viewer that what came before was unclear. If you need one, make it a sentence rather than a paragraph.
Do not apologise. "Sorry the video was long", "the audio wasn't great". An apology at the end leaves a bad final impression.
Do not thank at length. One sentence is enough.
Do not make four requests. Like, subscribe, bell, comment and share equals zero, because a viewer cannot do four things, so they do none.
Do not end on music and graphics alone. Ten silent seconds at the end mean people leave without hearing your one request.
Where to ask for the subscription, if you want to
If you want to ask, do not ask in the final second. Ask in the middle of the video, right after you have given something of value, in one sentence with a reason attached: "if that was useful, I publish things like it every Wednesday."
Then at the end, make your only request the next video. Subscribing itself is the result of a second view rather than a request, and that depends on how your page and playlists are arranged, as in your channel page and playlists.
Write the ending with the opening
In the script, write the opening and the ending in one sitting, before you write the body. Three reasons:
The two meet and have to match: the promise and the answer. You are not writing the ending while exhausted from ten pages. And you find out early if you have no answer at all, so you change the idea before filming rather than after.
From the stock line to your own
Take your current ending and replace every part of it:
| The stock line | Replace it with |
|---|---|
| "I hope you enjoyed the video" | the answer to the opening question |
| "Don't forget to subscribe" | "I publish about this every Wednesday", said mid-video |
| "Write your thoughts below" | one narrow question |
| "See you in the next video" | "the video on screen continues this one" |
| "Take care" | your own closing line, which becomes your signature |
Three sentences to end with today
Try this on your next video: the answer in one line, the carryable sentence in one line, the single request in one line. Three lines, ten seconds.
And the difference between that and forty seconds of thanks and requests is the difference between a viewer who leaves with something and a viewer who leaves with nothing.