# Longer Facebook videos with big text for seniors: +30% vs best ads

- Outcome: Won
- Page type: Ad (Lead-gen)
- Elements: Video
- Date shared: 2017
- Test run by: [HomEquity Bank](https://liftarchive.com/practitioners/homequity-bank/)
- Commentary by: LiftArchive (our analysis, not theirs)
- Original source: https://marketingsherpa.com/article/case-study/how-homequity-caters-to-seniors
- Page: https://liftarchive.com/test/homequity-facebook-video-longer-larger-text/

HomEquity 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.

## Result

**+30% vs best ads**

- +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)

- 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.

## How to run this test

- 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
- Guardrail: Click-through rate
- Guardrail: Video completion rate
- Guardrail: 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.

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Credit: HomEquity Bank ran this test and owns the result. Summary and commentary by LiftArchive (https://liftarchive.com/test/homequity-facebook-video-longer-larger-text/).
Usage: Free to use, quote and build on, with credit and a link: name the practitioner or organization that ran the test and link to its LiftArchive page. The results belong to the practitioners who ran and shared them; the summaries and commentary are LiftArchive's.