Longer Facebook videos with big text for seniors: +30% vs best ads
Commentary byLiftArchiveOur analysis, not theirsHomEquity Bank lengthened its short Facebook videos past the usual six or seven seconds, made the text bigger and built them to work without sound, and they beat its best-performing Facebook assets by 30%.
The Canadian reverse-mortgage lender ran the test for an audience of homeowners aged 55 and older.
It was published as a MarketingSherpa case study.
- +30% versus the best-performing Facebook assets at the time. The source does not say which metric (clicks, inquiries or cost) this refers to.
- The team scaled up its use of these videos after the result, so it held up well enough to keep spending on.
- No sample size, duration or confidence level was shared.
Control
HomEquity Bank's best-performing Facebook ad creative at the time.
Variant
Short Facebook videos made longer than the common six-to-seven-second format, with larger text, and designed to make sense with the sound off.
Why it likely won
Our reading of the result, not the practitioner's claim.
- Older viewers may need more time to take in a message, so a few extra seconds can help the point land.
- Bigger text is easier to read on a phone, especially for people with weaker eyesight.
- Many people watch Facebook video with the sound off. Making the video work silently means the message still gets through.
- The team expected longer videos to fail. Tailoring a common best practice to the real audience seems to have mattered more than following it.
Caveats: The metric behind the 30% figure is not named, and the source does not describe how the comparison was set up or how long it ran. Data is from 2017.
Who ran it
HomEquity Bank ran this test and published the results (MarketingSherpa case study). The numbers are theirs; the summary and commentary on this page are ours.
Read the original case study on HomEquity Bank →
How to run this test on your site
- Hypothesis
- If we make our social video ads longer, with larger on-screen text that works without sound, then our older audience will respond better because they get more time and an easier read.
- Primary metric
- Cost per lead (or lead-form inquiries) from the video ads
- Guardrails
- Click-through rate
- Video completion rate
- Lead quality, such as contact rate by sales
- Who should test it
- Lead-gen businesses that sell to older audiences on Facebook or other social feeds, such as financial, health or home services. It matters less if your audience is young and used to very short clips.
Questions
How long should Facebook video ads be?
Many guides suggest very short clips of around six seconds.
This test suggests the right length depends on your audience, so test a longer cut rather than assume shorter wins.
Should video ads work without sound?
Yes, it is a safe default. Many people scroll with the sound off, so captions or large on-screen text keep the message clear.
Do seniors respond to video ads?
In this case they did. HomEquity Bank found its 55-plus audience engaged well with video, as long as it was easy to read and follow.
MarketingExperiments