---
title: "Shape two, the Q&A cutdown"
description: "Question, turn, answer, land. For the hotline, the fake pod, workshops and any podcast where someone asks."
canonical: https://tomsharman.com/playbooks/clip-anatomy/shape-two-the-q-and-a-cutdown/
updated: 2026-10-25
---

# Shape two, the Q&A cutdown

> Question, turn, answer, land. For the hotline, the fake pod, workshops and any podcast where someone asks.

Playbook 7, Clip anatomy. Animation: /playbooks/clip-anatomy/shape-two-the-q-and-a-cutdown.mp4

For the Creator Hotline, the fake pod, workshops, live Q&A and any podcast where someone asks a question. The shape Alex Hormozi runs from his workshops.

| Beat | Time | What it does | Test |
| --- | --- | --- | --- |
| Question | 0 to 3s | The asker's question, burned on screen as text, with their numbers. | Is the question specific? If it is vague, open on the answer's best line and keep the question as text. |
| Turn | 3 to 8s | The answer restates or corrects the premise. | Does the asker turn out to have the wrong problem? |
| Answer | 8 to 45s | One idea, as a list, steps or a story. | One idea only. Two ideas are two clips. |
| Land | last 2s | The maxim. | Cut straight after it. |

## How do you pick the moment from long form?

Run every candidate through three filters, in this order.

1. **It stands alone.** If it needs more than a sentence of setup, it is a segment.
2. **It has one of Hormozi's seven.** Recency, relevancy, celebrity, proximity, conflict, unusual, ongoing. Conflict and unusual clip best, because they carry the turn.
3. **It is clip shaped.** A contrarian take, a specific number, tactical advice, a candid admission, or a real person's question and the answer to it.

Then use the data. Cut where the long form retention graph spikes. Clip events the same night and post the next day.

## What numbers are worth aiming at?

| Measure | Aim | From |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Viewed versus swiped, Shorts | 70% to 90%. Under 60% rarely works. | Paddy Galloway, 5,400 Shorts, 3.3 billion views |
| Retention, under 60 seconds | 90% or more | Jenny Hoyos |
| Retention after the first 3 seconds | 70% or more is a banger. Below 50% is a huge problem. | Kallaway |
| Outlier | 3 to 4x the channel average is worth studying | Paddy Galloway |
| Thumbnail text | 3 to 5 words, capped at five | Seb Losardo |

Retention figures are guides. Hoyos had a Short at 70% retention reach 10 million views off returning viewers.

## Questions

### What are the beats of a Q&A cutdown?

Question, turn, answer, land. The asker's question on screen with their numbers, the answer correcting the premise, one idea, then the maxim.

### Does the asker have to be real?

The proximity and the social proof come from a real person asking. Written callers are fine for rehearsal, and are framed so nobody mistakes them for real people.

### How do you pick the moment from long form?

It has to stand alone with a sentence of setup at most, carry one of Hormozi's seven (recency, relevancy, celebrity, proximity, conflict, unusual, ongoing), and be clip shaped: a contrarian take, a number, tactical advice, a candid admission or a real question and its answer.