Pocket TVC

The “Pocket TVC” term was invented by Facebook who saw the challenges many brands faced in adapting their video content to social media formats.

TV commercials and advertising traditionally runs in a “forced audience” environment. That simply means if you watch TV and advertising comes on, there is nothing you can do about it except wait for it to be over. Because of that, in the traditional way it can make sense to put the most important brand information at the end of the commercial….. as people have to watch to the end anyways. On mobile devices though that is not the case anymore. Here it makes more sense to put the important information into the first seconds of the video. 47% of a video’s value is in the first 3 seconds and by 10 seconds it’s at 74%. After that engagement already declines typically (with some exceptions such as videos with a viral structure).What to watch out for when doing Pocket TVC video content:

• Include your brand message as early as possible.
• This needs to be balanced properly between showing the brand message early enough while not having a negative effect on the creative direction.
  Also be aware that many Pocket TVC videos and other mobile videos underperform because the message is not clear enough, the branding is not good enough, or the call-to-action is not visible so people do not know what to do next.
• Branding is much, much more than just a logo. Think of what parts of your branding are unique and recognizable such as colors, fonts, shape, graphical elements, etc. Implement these aspects where you can. Use visual reinforcements to communicate information and your brand message without words only. Motion graphics, infographics, editing style etc.
• Set the scene fast. A lot of commercials take too long to create a context in the beginning. This does not work well with a Pocket TVC mobile video. You absolutely need to catch people’s attention in the first 10 seconds.
• Formats: On mobile, the best performing formats are usually square and vertical video. Now we do not want to say they are the only good performing ones but they do have advantages but 4:5 ratio for Instagram and 2:3 format ratio for the Facebook feed has been proven to work better than 16:9 horizontal.
• Smartphone screens are small, so if you can fill the whole screen with your video is certainly an advantage to a vertical video.
• Another tactic to reap the maximum benefits of mobile video is to play with different lengths. Try shorter against longer edits of your video content and compare the results.
• Always look objectively at your TV Commercial content. You can take your video assets and re-create it into something new in many different ways.