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Hey - I'm Drysen, a content strategist at Made by Things with a deep background in animation and motion graphics. But, video marketing is only a small part of the marketing industry. From email campaigns to digital ads and OOH, there's a ton to learn, and I want to learn it from my marketing peers.
So, I'm determined to have a daily 10-minute conversation to learn everything I can and become a better marketing person, and I'm inviting you to be a fly on the wall to learn alongside me.
Each episode is sponsored by the Made by Things Discovery Workshop—a collaborative workshop where Made by Things designs a custom 'à la carte' style menu of fresh ideas of content and solutions to help you deliver a more robust customer journey and experience.
Learn more at Madebythings.com/discovery.
Matt Vojacek (00:03.223)
Welcome to another episode of Dreyson learns things. I'm Dreyson. Great to meet you. You might notice again. I am today I am solo I am rocking my Statesville haunted prison out of Chicago sweatshirt. And if you don't know me, I am I am a sucker for a good haunted house. Hands down. My favorite thing and then it's October tomorrow's October. So this is a season. I'm in my happy place.
I thought today we'd talk a little bit about A-B testing in video production. And I know that a lot of people are familiar with A-B testing and like, this is not gonna be, let's be real. I am talking to experienced marketers. Y'all know what A-B testing is. What you might not know is how to do that in the video world because that's something I think we don't think about a lot. We typically say, we need a video for this thing.
and we don't try to maximize the value, the content, everything else. And so that's what I want to talk about today. Now there was a quote I read a long time ago that was basically, the worst thing you can have is a little bit of success. Because if it works, if it's good, you can double down on it and you can run with that success. I think a prime example of that is the Dilly Dilly Bud Light campaigns from a few years ago, where they did one for the Super Bowl ad and then they have like,
30 minutes of 30 second clips of commercials that they doubled down and had success because they they knew it was working
But on the flip side, if you fail and something does not work, that is still a gift because you know to stop doing the thing. The worst thing you can have is a little bit of traction, a little bit of success that it keeps stringing you along of maybe it's working, maybe it's not, maybe we keep going, maybe we're getting ROI, maybe it's profitable. You don't know.
Matt Vojacek (02:03.948)
Being able to A-B test things in the video world is really, really powerful because it allows you to know what does and does not work. You can refine that message and make sure you're finding the best, just the best combination of things to make sure you're actually making it work. And the reason I think motion graphics is the most powerful way to do that is because you can iterate. You're not bound by the constraints of reality. For example, let's think of a live action scene. If you shoot a live action commercial,
with real people, but you want to have multiple takes. So the editor can do different things. Maybe you can come up with three, four different versions of this ad to see what actually works. You still have to write multiple scripts. You still have to film it multiple ways, which means more time on set, more day of production. But then after all those extra resources and things you invest into, you're still stuck with the voice of the same actor.
that's delivering those lines. Assuming you're not talking about a voiceover, that is the caveat here. Whereas in motion graphics, if you're going abstract, you can try a voiceover one way, and then for not a lot of money, try it a different way, with a different person. Maybe a male voice versus a female voice. Maybe an accent, maybe a different delivery, different read, to see what is resonating with your audience from an auditorial level. The other side about that,
is maybe we can try different visual languages. You know, I think a lot of the times we don't realize how much power can be given to something just through color, design, visual language. From a color perspective, for example, I believe that red is supposed to be like, you know, get your blood flowing, almost like an aggressive response or a threatening response, a danger, bold in your face. Whereas yellow is very energizing and you want to get things done, you want to go and go and it's...
It's happy, it's positive energy, where blue is a little more soothing and calming and relaxing. And then your purples and your blacks are luxurious and have a hint of elegance to it. And just by changing the color of your video, of your characters, of your assets, you're able to invoke different emotions to see what actually resonates. So maybe you do a yellow version and compare that
Matt Vojacek (04:30.008)
to a blue version. You can do that a lot easier in animation and motion graphics than you can live action. Maybe you want to go one step further and try a 2D flat vector simple cutout characters. Contrast that with a full 3D depth. You can reuse the same voiceover on both of them to see what audience, you know, where's our weak spot. Is the weak spot in the audio? Is the weak spot in the visuals? Is it the style? We can try different things, different combinations.
to find what resonates. And then once you do find what resonates, you can double down on that success. This is a great way to try different things via social media, because again, I am a personal believer that social media is almost like cannon fodder. It almost doesn't matter what you put out in the world, as long as you're putting stuff out into the world so people can resonate. But as you start to play with different styles, maybe 2D versus 3D,
Maybe different colors, palettes, different shapes, even different character shapes can make different emotions. know, triangular is very immobile and stubborn and doesn't move. Even aggressive or dangerous at some points. Squares are very just burnt, they're more immobile and don't move. Circles are flexible and happy and you know, just there's character design that goes with it, is what I'm trying to say. But anyway, if you find a visual style that connects on social media, you can double down on that.
on your website and say, okay, this is a style of our brand films. This is how we're gonna do all of our case studies. This is what we're gonna use for a style for our product reviews, for our explainer content, for everything else, our onboarding campaigns, anything we're gonna be putting out in the world, we're doubling down on this style because we're able to A-B test it through social media. And I think that's something we don't talk about nearly enough. What else do wanna talk about today?
There was a couple things, but that's kind of the big ones. It's just making sure you have a style in general, try different creative risks, see what resonates, and then test it with micro content. And then, of course, make sure you're using data and analytics to actually back things up and make sure you're actually using good data. There was a podcast I was a part of a while ago where...
Matt Vojacek (06:50.662)
I was instructed as a consultant to go in and look at the data to find what was working, what topics do we want to talk about, and how do we double down on this? And from the quick glance of the downloads per episode, there was one episode that stood out four times as many downloads as every other episode. And so the theory was that either that person on camera or that guest we interviewed was fantastic, maybe it was that topic we talked about, but we needed to double down and we need to do
that. In reality, as I was going through the website and all their online content, I realized that that was the only episode that was easy to watch on their website. So in a new traffic, new people, new audience would attend the website, they looked at the podcast, there was only one episode they could look at. And so that's the one everyone downloaded. And it had been online for three, four, you know, there's a lull, and they hadn't updated anything new since that episode.
And so everyone was watching that one episode. And so it skewed the data. So it's really important to A-B test, to try new things, to see what works, but don't put your blinders on. Make sure that you're giving everything a fair shake down. Try to poke holes into why things are actually working. Don't just assume it's a gut reaction because I think a lot of times we say as marketers, well, I feel this way, therefore everyone should feel this way. I think this, so therefore everyone should think this. And the reality is we are such a small subsection
in the marketing world that we really have to take our egos aside and say, you know what? I don't matter. What matters is what the data is actually showing for the people that actually want to buy our products. So that is my soapbox for today. Animation and motion graphics is the best, the most powerful, the greatest tool we have for connecting an audience to a brand, to educate, to inspire curiosity, to build trust, and to convert somebody from I've never heard of you to I am a raving super fan.
And I genuinely believe that because if you watch the first five minutes of the movie up, I don't think there's a single person out there who didn't cry the very first time they watched it. And that's because emotion is powerful and animation is a great tool for invoking emotion. Because we can do visual languages, because we can design colors and characters and everything else to make sure we're subconsciously feeling these things.
Matt Vojacek (09:16.33)
not just, you know, looking at them. But anyway, that's my soapbox for today. Today's episode is brought to you by Made By Things and their Discovery Workshop. It is a brainstorming workshop where we collaborate with you to come up with the content you need to build a better customer journey. Reach out at madebythings.com slash discovery to learn more and I'll see you tomorrow. Goodbye. Dreycen Learns Things is brought to you by the Discovery Workshop from
Made By Things. If you are looking for a content partner to help you brainstorm, set goals, and create content that truly resonates with your audience, check us out at madebythings.com slash discovery.