Ad Hooks Brief
for home gardeners
Prepared for: a garden brand
Garden brands say healthy, thriving and grow. Home gardeners say dead, yellow, brown and "something is eating my…".
Out of 10,409 recent public posts from home gardeners, 864 say dead, dying, died or dies. 155 say thrive, thrives or thriving. None of the 15 garden brand homepages we read says dead or dying. All 15 say grow, grows, growing or growth.
We read 10,409 recent public posts where home gardeners describe a problem with their plants, lawn or veg patch, in their own words, before anyone sold them anything.
Why the words matter
A gardener standing over a tomato plant with yellow leaves knows "yellow leaves" the second they see it. "A healthy, thriving garden" asks them to picture an end they can't see yet.
Every one of these posts is someone looking for an answer. The problem is what's on their mind, and its words are the ones they reach for when they go looking: 624 posts simply ask "what is this?". Your ad meets them in that moment, or it doesn't.
The gap is concrete against abstract. Brands describe the result. Gardeners describe the scene: the colour of the leaf, the bare patch by the fence, the holes in the lettuce.
Concrete words in buyers' language are easier to believe and make people feel understood. Four peer-reviewed studies back this up:
- Concrete claims are believed more. The same statement was judged more likely to be true when worded concretely. Hansen & Wänke, 2010, Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin ↗
- Concrete words make people feel listened to, and they buy more. When staff spoke concretely, customers were more satisfied and spent more, because they felt heard. Packard & Berger, 2021, Journal of Consumer Research ↗
- Writing the way your buyers write lifts sales. Reviews that matched the buyers' own style of language raised conversion rates. Ludwig et al., 2013, Journal of Marketing ↗
- Concrete, familiar words hold attention. Across 600,000 reading sessions, easy concrete words kept people reading. Berger, Moe & Schweidel, 2023, Journal of Marketing ↗
The words buyers use
Posts is how many of the 10,409 posts use at least one of the word forms listed under each word. Brand word counts are out of 15 garden brand homepages. Gap marks the biggest distances between the two.
| What gardeners say | Posts | The usual brand word |
|---|---|---|
| weedsweed or weeds | 1,2561 in 8 | "weed control", on 3 of 15 homepages |
| dead, dyingGapdead, dying, died or dies | 8641 in 12 | "grow", on all 15; dead or dying on none |
| leavesleaves | 8231 in 13 | "plants", on 11 of 15 |
| patchy, bareGappatch, patches, patchy or bare | 8161 in 13 | "lush" or "thick", on 1 of 15 each |
| new to thisnew to gardening, new to this, new to lawn, beginner, first time growing, first time gardening, first year, newbie, first garden, first lawn, first house, first home or new homeowner | 7581 in 14 | "easy", on 9 of 15 |
| yellow, brownGapyellow, yellowing, yellowed, brown, browning or browned | 7531 in 14 | "healthy" or "health", on 7 of 15 |
| the bug or animal, by nameGapbug or bugs, beetle(s), caterpillar(s), worms, aphid(s), grub(s), slug(s), snail(s), squirrel(s), deer, rabbit(s), bunnies, mole(s), vole(s), gopher(s), birds, raccoon(s), groundhog, chipmunk(s) | 7271 in 14 | "pest control", on 6 of 15 |
| what is this?what is this, what is it, what's this, what are these, what is happening, what's happening, what happened, what's wrong or what is wrong | 6241 in 17 | "guide", on 11 of 15 |
| eaten, holeseating, eaten, eats, ate, chewed, chewing, munched, hole or holes | 3801 in 27 | none, in that sense |
| brown spotsbrown, yellow, black, white, dead or bare spot(s) | 3121 in 33 | none, in that sense |
The three biggest gaps
The big number is how many of the 10,409 posts use the gardeners' word. The second is how many use the brand's word.
Gardeners say dead. Brands say thriving.
Dead, dying, died or dies: 864 posts. Thrive, thrives or thriving: 155, and gardeners sometimes use it for what the plant used to be: "Lawn was thriving after summer." Every one of the 15 homepages says grow, grows, growing or growth. None says dead or dying.
Gardeners say yellow and brown. Brands say healthy.
Yellow, yellowing, yellowed, brown, browning or browned: 753 posts. Healthy, healthier or health: 296. Seven of the 15 homepages say healthy or health. Four use yellow or brown, all as a flower colour or in a product name. None uses them about a sick plant or lawn.
Gardeners name the bug or the animal. Brands say pest control.
727 posts name what's doing the damage: bugs, beetles, aphids, grubs, slugs, squirrels, deer, rabbits, moles and the rest. "Pest control" appears in 5. It's on 6 of the 15 homepages, mostly as a menu heading.
Your buyers already wrote the headline. It says what they can see: a yellow leaf, a bare patch, a hole in the tomato.
The worries that stop them buying
What gardeners say right before they scroll past an ad. Answer these in their words.
"I don't even know what it is."
624 posts ask some form of "what is this?"
"Something is eating my sunflower and I don't know what it is."public forum, June 2026
"Can it be saved, or do I start over?"
221 posts say worth saving, salvageable, salvage, is there (any) hope, hope for, start over, starting over, rip (it) out, give up or be saved.
"Do I need to kill this entire thing and start over?"public forum, August 2026
"I tried that. It came back."
46 posts say keeps, keep or kept coming back, comes back every, came back with, still coming back, back year after year, didn't work, did not work, doesn't work, nothing works, nothing worked or tried everything.
"I tried weed killers but it just kills it but does not remove it and it keeps coming back."public forum, July 2026
"Is it safe for the dog and the kids?"
34 posts name a dog, pet, cat, kid, child or toddler and also say safe, toxic, non-toxic, poison or chemical(s).
"I do have a toddler and two dogs so would definitely prefer a non-toxic approach if one exists."public forum, July 2026
Most of these gardeners can't name the problem yet. Help them name it, and what to buy comes next.
Ten hooks in their words
Ready to test. Each one is built from counted words, with the post it came from.
This sample is 10 words, 3 gaps, 4 worries and 10 hooks. The full Brief is built around your shop.
Same method, run on your buyers and your products.
- Every word, rankedEach word and phrase in more than 1 in 200 posts, with its count and the brand word it beats.
- Your homepage and ads, read against the listWhich of your words land, and which ones your buyers never use.
- Every worry, by product lineLawn, pests, plant feed, seeds: each with the buyers' own words.
- 20 hooksEach built from counted words and tied to the post it came from, ready to test as ads.
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How we counted: 10,409 public posts from gardening, lawn, orchard and homestead communities on forums, communities and review sites, 1 June to 13 October 2026. Original posts only, replies left out. A post counts once for a word if it uses any of the listed forms, matched as whole words, with British and American spellings counted as one word. We store posts as excerpts, so the real counts are, if anything, higher. Brand words come from 15 UK and US garden brand homepages read in October 2026; uses as a colour name or inside a product name were checked by hand and left out where noted. Counts under about 50 are a hint, not proof. Quotes are lightly trimmed, with names removed.