AMPERAGE Marketing & Fundraising

One-Minute MarketerHow Long Should You Make Your Digital Video Ad?

Subscribe to AMPERAGE Marketing & Fundraising

How Long Should You Make Your Digital Video Ad?

We all know that video is the king of the content world. The hard part is knowing what will entice and resonate with viewers. Now that you can use virtually any length, it can be hard to decide what is best. Mobile is also changing the video landscape and your decision-making.Online learning

Google has done a lot of research around best practices for video production. Google’s Unskippable Labs works to test ads to find the best content connection with people. Unskippable Labs did a test with a Netflix launch of “Orange is the New Black” in Singapore. They showed viewers the “Trailer” 30-second TrueView ads (YouTube’s skippable ad format), the “Teaser” ad which was a 15-second TrueView ad, a “Bumper” ad (6-second ads that are non-skippable) and no ads at all for the control group.

All three ads provided product awareness lift. But the Bumper ad provided the best awareness lift. The Teaser ad provided the best overall brand ad recall lift. However, the Bumper provided a 300% lift in search inquiries. So the shortest ad drove the best actions compared to the others.

Google recommends:

  • Tease a brand announcement with Bumper ads
  • Amplify a brand with longer-form videos and Bumper ads for incremental reach
  • Echo a brand by telling a full story with longer videos and re-target with Bumper ads

The Google white paper says, “Now that audiences have access to content anytime, anywhere, prime time has become all the time. This means brands have unprecedented opportunities to connect with their audiences in more meaningful ways.” So make your digital ad in all lengths to ensure you achieve optimized viewing and results.

Written by:

Mark wrote his first direct-mail fundraising letter in 1981 for the University of Iowa Center for Advancement. The effort raised a few million dollars in undiscovered wills and legacy gifts. From that day forward Mark discovered a love of the big idea that moves the needle. After 12 years at KWWL, Mark became a business owner as a co-founder of ME&V — rebranded as AMPERAGE in 2015. After 25 years of leading creative teams in video production, graphic design, PR, writing and web development, Mark transitioned out of ownership in 2021. Today he serves in an employee role as special projects consultant. He is creatively ambidextrous — son of an artist and engineer — and famous for distilling complex ideas down to a few words and a few visuals. Mark is a writer. When he found that many nonprofits struggled with complex branding puzzles, he wrote the book, “NonProfit-NonMarketing .” He also wrote a novel called “Reenactment.” Mark is an active blogger OneMinuteMarketer® with nearly 1,000 readers each week on LinkedIn, Facebook, Twitter. One of his most popular YouTube videos is on “How to Look Good on Zoom.” One of Mark’s fondest business memories was being named to INC 500 two times and attending the INC 500 conference with other winners. Mark is considered by some a Civil War expert (and that explains his novel). Mark also served as an adjunct professor in the business and in the communications departments at Wartburg College. Mark is a graduate of the University of Iowa and is currently vice president of the University of Iowa Journalism and Mass Communications Advisory Board. Mark is married to state Sen. Liz Mathis, and the two love to travel, even when it means being trapped by a volcano in the Czech Republic for three weeks.