Template Reading — how to decode a static template before cloning it

A template is a proven ad (usually a competitor's or another niche's winner) that we will clone onto our product. Cloning fails when the template is not UNDERSTOOD first. This file is the reading method. It was built from nine founder review rounds on a real brand (Wildhorn bison organ capsules vs ~79 + 80 templates): run 1 validated 0 / 79; after the decode rules below, the next batch validated 6 / 10 on the first try, then 26 / 34. Every rule here exists because a specific ad failed without it.

Sources: /root/workspace/wh-remix/LESSONS.md (A = decode, B = copy, C = visual, D = production, E = what worked), /srv/blueprint/protocols.html (Protocol 0–4 + every review round), the blueprint rules R1–R14 (/srv/blueprint/index.html).

The reading has five layers. Do them in order and write each down; the generator brief is assembled from these notes, never from a glance.

1. WHY IT WINS       the scroll-stop trick, in one sentence
2. WHAT IT SAYS      angle carried, copy formula, text inventory, hidden reading
3. WHERE / WHAT      scene logic, props, people, body part, gesture, action (the verb)
4. HOW IT LOOKS      visual trick, shape equivalents, render style, shock level, text treatment
5. HOW IT WAS MADE   production method (photo + paste, illustration, screenshot, 3D, painted text)
        └──► KEEP / SWAP inventory, zone by zone, each with a reason

---

1. Why it wins (A1)

Write the scroll-stop trick in ONE sentence before anything else. If you can't, you don't understand the ad yet.

• "A body cut exactly in half: fat half vs lean half, navel on the line — the difference is instant."
• "The woman's face IS the product jar, painted: absurd, so you stop."
• "The headline is a guarantee ('+3 inches or money back'): the promise and the risk reversal in one."
• "A 'wanted' poster for a hormone: the enemy becomes a character."

Then ask: is the trick visual (the image alone stops), verbal (the line stops), or relational (the gap between image and text — the joke, the innuendo, the contradiction)? Relational tricks are the easiest to break in a clone, because swapping either side kills the gap.

---

2. What it says

2.1 The angle it naturally carries (A5, A6, R8, R11)

• Pick the angle the template already carries from our research angles. Not a forced spread. A libido template carries drive; a "lost my waistline" template carries the belly; a "vs 12 pills" template carries anti-waste.
• Same angle as ours → keep their words AND their visual mechanism. ("Step 1 Lose the beer belly / Step 2 Let no one hit": both lines kept word for word except the subject, and the same social mechanism — everyone wants you, your partner guards you.)
• Never invent a promise. If no research angle fits, rewrite the template until one does; never create an "other" group.
• Brand-specific default: if the brand has a king angle (Wildhorn = beer belly), templates carrying a different angle (GLP-1 face, libido, sleep, energy) are FUSED with it: their mechanism + our core pain. Pure-drive ads may stay, but must still make sense for the belly buyer. (A14)

2.2 Read the line AS OUR CUSTOMER (A19)

Before changing any line, read it as our buyer would. If it already works for him, copy it word for word. Evidence: S14 "Lost my waistline — last seen 3 weeks ago" was read as negative (bloat) and flipped; for our customer it already meant "I got slim". Flipping a line that already works = fail.

2.3 The copy formula (Protocol 0)

Identify the slots of their sentence and keep the slots, refill the values:

• "4 energy drinks a day just to clean my apartment" → "3 fat burners a day just to button my jeans".
• "Smoother poops" → "Flatter belly" (template formula + our blunt benefit, A18).
• "Bigger. Harder." → "Flatter. Harder." (one word carries our angle, #74).
• "Dad bod" → "bison bod" (the avatar's own phrase rhymed into our world, #29). Fill each slot with a clear rival product and a clear everyday problem (B5). Vague rival + vague problem = fail (#38).

2.4 Text inventory (B1, B13, R12, C9)

Count every text element: headline, sub-line, bubbles, labels, badges, stat lines, signature, footnote. Ours has the same count, the same hierarchy, the same spacing. Nothing added — no context line, no tagline, no disclaimer, no "tie-in" sentence, no deadline the template doesn't have (B6: "in 21 days" added to #65 was wrong). If the template is a signed review, keep a first name + initial; never add a signature it doesn't have (B12).

2.5 The hidden reading (A4, A7)

Decode innuendo, double meaning and social subtext on EVERY template:

• pineapple = vulva / taste joke (vaginal probiotic) · cream cake log = phallus · eggplant = penis · "drain him".
• Our version must be just as sexual AND tied to our angle. Never sanitize into something meaningless (#57, #61, #62, #69 failed this way).
• Every element tied to THEIR category must be re-derived for ours, innuendo objects included: a vaginal-probiotic pineapple becomes a male equivalent (banana "she calls it heaven"; a glazed donut ring with the jar through it, "dessert back on the menu").
• The visual must carry the same meaning as the text (#69: the visual didn't match the sexual line).

---

3. Where and what

3.1 Scene logic (A3, A12, A18)

Ask why the scene is where it is:

• shower → because hair falls in the drain (hair product);
• kid's bedroom → because the product is for kids' sleep;
• bed → because it's a sleep product (S33: bed copied for no reason). If the reason doesn't apply to our product, move to the scene where OUR problem is directly visible: belly in the mirror, belly on the scale, jeans that won't button, kitchen counter pushing a beer away. Never to an indirect consequence that could sell another product (S15: shoelaces — "could sell a shoelace brand"). Replace the template's setting props with props of OUR problem (beer cans, pizza, jeans, scale, game-night snacks) — not their furniture (#75 kept the kids' beds).

3.2 People (A11, C5)

Every person shown as the customer gets the avatar's age and look (45–60, greying for Wildhorn), sexual scenes included (#79: young man = fail). Remove the template's person and every leftover of their props (cowboy holding THEIR bottle; sequin skirt on our Ken).

3.3 Body part (Protocol 0, C1)

Their body part = their problem. Draw OURS (#2: an arm for a GLP-1 muscle-loss template while we sell the belly = off-angle). The image must SHOW the avatar's problem or result (#6: keep the format, rewrite the scene until the belly is visible — "lean man beats beer-belly man").

3.4 Placement and gesture (A8, C11)

Copy exactly how the product is held and where it sits: fingers wrapped around it (not floating on a palm), on the lounger, in front of the face. Check hands at full resolution (S33: phone badly held).

3.5 Copy the verb of the scene (A17)

The ACTION is part of the winner. If the template POURS the product into the drink he already has, ours pours the organ powder into his beer (S18 — capsules placed next to the beer lost the verb). Other verbs to look for: hiding, measuring, comparing, opening, falling into, melting, guarding.

---

4. How it looks

4.1 Copy the visual trick literally (A21, C3)

If the woman's face IS the product, our jar IS her face, in the same painted style (S11 failed three times as "photoreal with a jar on her head"). If the billboard is MADE OF the product, ours is made of our product AND made clear with labels (#35: "keep what made the template a winner AND make it clear — never trade one for the other"). If the product pours into a container, ours pours with our literal content in recognizable form (#39 organs falling into the jar with tags: "exactly what I was thinking").

4.2 Shape and function equivalents — look for these FIRST (E6)

Find an object with the same shape or function as OUR problem so the template's visual pun survives intact:

• S23: round moon ↔ round beer belly ("really great understanding");
• fruit metaphors map to the belly: bloated pear vs slim pear (S50);
• growing bananas (size) → shrinking belts (waist) (S1);
• hair ribbon (their symbol) → measuring tape (our result symbol) (#26);
• their "fat bottle" visual → our jar gets fat, label untouched (#58);
• a known reference they use (Ozempic, Minoxidil, coffee) → something our avatar already knows and uses (beer: "Keep your beer", #31 — "concede the pleasure, kill the side effect").

4.3 Structure types that must survive

• Before / after stays before / after: one problem state vs one solved state; never two solved states (S74 showed two lean bellies).
• Split body: ONE body cut exactly in half, same skin, same shorts, same pose, fat half vs lean half meeting at the centre line, navel exactly on the cut (#77 used two different bodies).
• Progressions read left → right toward the result; silhouettes and profiles FACE the result (S8 faced away).
• Quadrants / tables: name each quadrant by the problem; keep the template's words when it's the same audience (#52–#60).
• UI formats (arcade screen, app, dashboard): keep the whole UI and add our angle as one extra row (S28 arcade: "fusion without breaking the format").

4.4 Shock level (A15, B10)

Match it. If the template is gross or shocking (worms coming out of a belly), ours is equally shocking for our problem (belly melting like wax, bursting) — never a tame substitute (S7: a popping button was not as shocking as worms). Aggression = precision on the deepest pain (#47 "Leave the lights on": the bedroom shame, "the greatest").

4.5 Render style and text treatment (A10, C4, C10, C5)

Pixar stays Pixar, sketch stays sketch, watercolour stays watercolour (S62 validated as-is with the angle swapped). Follow the template's visual code on every panel, result included (#16 lost the orange glow on the result). Special text treatments (sunscreen bubbles, clay letters, handwriting, text painted on skin) are reproduced, never replaced by a flat font (#65). Product rendering quality = the template's: real 3D object, contact shadow, matching light.

4.6 Make the invisible visible (Protocol 0, C2)

The format itself should reveal what the product is made of in one second (a butcher-chart animal with its organs; organs visible inside a transparent capsule). Never a generic capsule. Our content must look premium and unambiguous: raw chunks look disgusting, a powder pile reads as dirt, brown dried organs looked like dung (S17). If the template shows its ingredient in a certain rendering, copy that rendering.

4.7 Product placement rules (C6, C7)

• Template has no product → add none (#23 jar added anyway).
• Brand-logo slot → our wordmark (small slot → icon only). Never copy the competitor's brand slot ("The Angry Nose Lab" → "The Wild Bison Lab" was a copy, not a swap).
• The product never covers the template's hero visual; it keeps real proportions.

---

5. How it was made — the production method (A25, D-rules)

Before re-prompting a failed ad, work out HOW the template was produced and use the same method. S11 was a real photo with the product pasted on as the woman's head (a simple composite); three rounds were lost regenerating the whole scene. The fix was: edit the template itself minimally (age the man, clear the text), swap only their jar for ours with a masked edit, add the text by script, keep the 9:16 aspect ratio.

Classify every template:

Note it in the brief as production_method. 2-make/ picks engines (2-make/engines.md); the analysis only names the method and flags whether the image model is likely to refuse (then: switch engine + composite, never water the ad down — D1).

---

6. The KEEP / SWAP inventory (A13 — "the #75 method", mandatory)

Before any prompt, inventory EVERY element of the template, zone by zone, and mark each KEEP or SWAP → our equivalent, with the reason. The brief is written from this inventory. "You could have done this from the first try."

Template:

Template: [id] · family: [concept family] · aspect: [1:1 / 4:5 / 9:16] · method: [production method]
Scroll-stop trick: [one sentence]
Angle carried → our angle: [A_] · mechanism (from map): [M_]
Hidden reading: [innuendo / joke / social mechanism / none] → ours: [...]
Shock level: [calm / cheeky / gross / shocking] → match
Text slots: [n]

| Zone | Element in template | KEEP / SWAP | Our version | Reason |
|------|---------------------|-------------|-------------|--------|
| Setting | kid's bedroom | SWAP | living room, game night | scene logic: their product = kids' sleep |
| Prop | bunk beds | SWAP | beer cans, pizza box | props of OUR problem |
| Person | tired mom, 35 | SWAP | tired dad, 50, greying | avatar age everywhere |
| Gesture | holds jar at chest, fingers wrapped | KEEP | same, our jar | placement + gesture |
| Light / camera | warm lamp, eye level | KEEP | same | render style |
| Headline | "Finally sleeping through the night" | SWAP | "[bank line]" | angle swap, same length |
| Sub-line | "…" | KEEP | word for word | already works for our buyer |
| Badge | "Doctor approved" | SWAP | "60-day guarantee" | no fake authority; our real proof |
| Product spot | bottom right, 20 % width | KEEP | our jar, same spot/size | placement |
| Logo slot | small, top left | SWAP | our icon only | brand slot |

Rules for the inventory:

• Every zone has a reason; "looks nice" is not a reason.
• Every KEEP placement of the product must exist in the final composite (D6: a fallback engine dropped the second jar placement on S11 silently).
• If the founder already validated a try, that try becomes the template (A20, A22): freeze it and change only what he named.

---

7. Copy rules applied while reading (B-rules)

• Name the customer's problem, not an age: "For stubborn beer belly", not "For men over 40". Say the full problem word ("beer belly", not "belly") (B2).
• Benefits = the result he wants vs what he already tried; never features (B3). No mechanism jargon ("conversion", "aromatase") (B4).
• Avatar hiding behaviours come from research (sucking in, baggy shirts, shirt on at the pool, endless diets) — not invented ones (compression shirts, B8).
• Proof object = something he's proud to see (old jeans fit), not a technical detail (one notch) (B9).
• Concede the pleasure, attack its consequence ("Beer is fun. Beer belly isn't.") (B11).
• Stranger test: someone who never heard of the brand understands WHAT it is and WHAT it does on first read (B14: "You can't farm this" was too abstract → name the thing: wild bison organs + beer belly).
• Simplest words win ("see your belt buckle again" → "a flat belly again") (B15).
• Stats phrased like the template's stat, as benefit claims with the survey footnote ("92 % reported clearer minds" → "93 % saw their beer belly shrink*") (B16).
• Never mention autoship/subscription in the ad; use the template's offer framing ("50 % off for life") (B7).
• Every headline and bubble names the core problem explicitly; anything that could read as hangover, brain or a generic win is off-angle (A24). A partner angle = HER desire tied to HIS problem (S57).

---

8. Evidence cases (what worked, what failed, the rule it created)

---

9. Concept families (for sorting templates before assignment)

The 79-template Wildhorn batch sorted into 9 families; reuse the list for any brand:

1. Us vs them / comparison · 2. Before-after / timeline · 3. Problem reframe ("X is not the problem") ·
2. Mechanism / anatomy / ingredients · 5. Origin / ranch / real food · 6. Offer / bundle / price ·
3. Bold claim + hero product · 8. Meme / humour / UGC · 9. Off-avatar, re-skin last.

Assignment rules (R1–R4, R8, R11): accept every template; sort into families first; one ad per template (volume = number of templates); spread the top angles inside each family so every family covers every angle — but each template still gets the angle it naturally carries; never a group outside the top angles.

---

10. The one-page decode sheet (fill per template)

TEMPLATE [id]  family [n]  aspect [..]  source [brand · days live · copies]
1 Trick (1 sentence):
2 Angle carried → ours (+ mechanism from map):
3 Read-as-our-customer lines kept verbatim:
4 Copy formula (slots → our values):
5 Text slots (count, hierarchy, treatment):
6 Hidden reading → ours (same intensity):
7 Scene logic → our scene (directly visible problem):
8 People → our avatar; body part → ours:
9 Gesture / placement / verb of the scene:
10 Visual trick + shape/function equivalents:
11 Structure type (before/after, split, progression, table, UI):
12 Shock level / render style / special text treatment:
13 Production method (+ refusal risk):
14 KEEP/SWAP inventory (table):
15 Compliance flags:
16 Missing facts ([MISSING]):