/ The format
Street interview ads for DTC brands, with the ad accounts to match
Really filmed. No AI. Real strangers, signed releases, cut into 20 to 40 ad variants from one shoot day.
Stradvert produces street interview ads for DTC brands running paid social on Meta, TikTok and YouTube. We script the questions, film the reactions and edit a batch of concepts and hooks for your buying team to test. We put the account data first. Read the client ad accounts before you read a word of copy from us.
The framework, on video
Ryan on the Pulse of Potential shoot in Manchester: twelve ads filmed in one hour, seven switched off, five still running.
Book the shoot day
Two minutes of questions about your ad account. If it fits, the calendar opens straight away.
Get a free conceptA written concept for your brand: the question we would ask on the street, four hooks, and the angle we would test first. Yours within two working days, free, whether we work together or not.
If you are unhappy after a fair test, we film again for free.
What a street interview ad actually is
A street interview ad starts with a real crew, a real camera and a real stranger on a real street. We pick high footfall locations, stop people who have never heard of the brand, and ask them a genuine, unscripted question about a product or the problem it solves. Their answer, on the spot, is the ad. Nobody reads from a card. Nobody is briefed on what to say.
Everyone who appears signs a release before the footage goes anywhere near an edit. You get full paid usage rights across Meta, TikTok, YouTube and any other platform you run on. This is not stock footage and it is not an actor reading lines that sound like UGC. It is a member of the public answering a question they have never seen before, on camera, in front of strangers.
The question is scripted by us. The answer is not. That distinction is the entire format.
Why it holds the first three seconds
A feed is built to be skipped. A studio script, a paid actor and a set are all things a thumb has learned to scroll past before the first word lands. A stranger's face, mid sentence, mid street, doesn't pattern match to an ad in the same way. The viewer doesn't know what the person is about to say, so they watch to find out. That small gap between question and answer is where the thumbstop happens.
It also means the ad doesn't need a hook line written by a copywriter. The hook is a person's honest reaction, and honest reactions are hard to fake and hard to skip.
The Real Mad Honey allocation: a third of an €864,000 account
Over the last 365 days, reported in Motion on a 7 day attribution window and published with Martijn's permission, the Real Mad Honey Meta account spent €863,979.71 and returned €2,306,295.04 on 31,809 purchases, a 2.67 ROAS. Five of the ads in that account were Stradvert street interview ads.
Between them, RMH603, RMH103, RMH291, RMH604 and RMH032M carried about €289,525 of spend and returned about €790,000, a blended 2.73 ROAS, roughly a third of the entire account. RMH603 alone has run since April, still live, at €107,958.82 spend, 2.77 ROAS, €25.84 CPA, 2.28% CTR, 62.69% thumbstop and 22.81% hold. The client's other video creative in the same account earned between €225 and €372 each in comparison.
Nobody at Real Mad Honey chose to send a third of the budget to five ads. Meta's algorithm did that on its own, because those five ads kept earning spend against every other creative in the account. In Martijn's words:
"Meta decides where spend goes. If it pushes spend only to the street interview, we have to raise the budget until the rest of the ads get spend at all."
RMH603 is still running, and it is used as a top of funnel ad, which means the numbers above understate what it actually does for the account:
"It's still running and used as a top of funnel ad. The purchases done by other ads and Google as bottom of funnel aren't measured, so the impact of this is actually much higher."
Concepts and hooks, not just "videos"
A concept is a distinct idea: a different question, a different angle, a different setting, filmed with different people. A hook is a variation of that same concept, where the opening question or the first few seconds change and the rest of the ad stays the same. Concepts tell you which idea works. Hooks tell you which opening earns the attention. Testing both separately, rather than lumping them together as "creative", is what makes a batch of ads readable once the numbers come in.
This is also what lets you refresh a tiring ad without a reshoot. If a concept is still converting but the specific hook has fatigued, you cut a new hook onto the same body of footage instead of booking another shoot day.
What one filming day delivers
One shoot day produces 20 to 40 finished ad variants, depending on the number of concepts and hooks you scope. That includes organic engagement cuts and direct response versions with an end card, so you leave the day with a batch built for testing, not a single hero video you're hoping performs.
Concepts, casting on the street, filming, editing and delivery all happen inside that one day of production. What you get back is a set of ads ready to upload, cut into the hook variations you agreed on the call.
Where we film
London and Manchester are our default production locations, covered in full on our UK page. Other locations are available with additional production arrangements. We've also filmed in Birmingham, New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Las Vegas, Bangkok and Sydney, and any other city is quoted separately on the call.
Want the format explained from first principles, or set against creator UGC filmed at home? Read what are street interview ads and street interview ads vs creator UGC.
If you're unhappy after a fair test
We agree the testing period with you before launch. After that test, share your performance data, including CPA. If you're unhappy with the results, we'll use your package's included reshoot to film again for free. Test and Scale include one reshoot. Premier includes two.
Meta moved the money on its own
Real Mad Honey's Meta account spent €863,979.71 over the last 365 days, reported in Motion on a 7 day attribution window and published with Martijn's permission. Five Stradvert street interview ads carried about €289,525 spend and about €790,000 revenue, 2.73 blended, roughly a third of the account. The client's other video creative got between €225 and €372 each. Meta allocated the budget automatically, nobody chose it.
"Meta decides where spend goes. If it pushes spend only to the street interview, we have to raise the budget until the rest of the ads get spend at all."
One filming day, reported purchase events
One day shoot in a UK city. Meta Ads Manager, published with permission. About 15,000 reported purchase events, over 1.3 million impressions, about 40,500 link clicks, about €21,000 spend, €1.41 blended cost per event. Ad A: about 4,000 purchases at €0.86, €0.44 per link click. WordStream's 2025 Meta benchmarks put the average cost per click for finance and insurance at $1.22, the highest of any industry. This ad's was €0.44. Client name withheld.From the client's Meta Ads ManagerSource ↗
The UK's highest ranked street interview agency.Source ↗
The Brand Hopper ranked Stradvert 3rd of 8 worldwide in September 2026, above every other UK agency on the list. Down Social, listed.Source ↗
- The Brand Hopper, No. 3 of 8
- StoryLab, listed
- Down Social, listed
As featured in
- The Brand Hopper
Source ↗- StoryLab
- Down Social
/ Questions
Questions
- What is a street interview ad, exactly?
- A video ad built from real members of the public, stopped in a high footfall location and asked genuine, unscripted questions about a product or a problem. Everyone on camera signs a release. Nothing is scripted for them and nothing is AI generated.
- Why do these ads hold attention better than a studio script?
- A stranger's honest reaction is harder to predict than a script, so people watch to see what they say. That unpredictability is what earns the first three seconds on a feed where everyone else is skippable.
- What's the difference between a concept and a hook?
- A concept is a distinct idea: a different question, angle or setting, filmed with different people. A hook is a variation of the same concept where the opening changes and the rest of the ad stays the same. Testing both separately tells you which idea works and which opening earns the watch.
- How many ads come out of one filming day?
- 20 to 40 variants, depending on how many concepts and hooks you scope. That includes organic engagement cuts and direct response versions with an end card.
- Where do you film?
- London and Manchester are our default production locations. Other locations are available with additional production arrangements. We've filmed in Birmingham, New York, Los Angeles, Miami, Las Vegas, Bangkok and Sydney before, and any other city is quoted separately.
- What happens if the first batch doesn't perform?
- We agree the testing period with you before launch. After that test, share your performance data, including CPA. If you're unhappy with the results, we'll use your package's included reshoot to film again for free. Test and Scale include one reshoot. Premier includes two.
Book the call, not the pitch deck
A 30 minute call with Ryan about your current creative, the first test and the right scope.
Get a free concept