The six second challenge

You have a smartphone and precisely six seconds to communicate a meaningful message about your brand. Mission impossible?

US home improvement giant, Lowe’s, took the challenge, and created a series of oddly mesmerising and engaging six second stop-motion videos with DIY tips for customers.

Called ‘Fix In Six’, the initiative is billed as “a collection of clever improvements that make life at home a lot easier”.

Posted via the looping short video service, Vine, and publicised via a Twitter hashtag, Fix in Six is evidence of the changing nature of retail marketing communications.

As a young copywriter, I grew up in an era when launching a retail campaign meant a 60 second television commercial on prime time on a Sunday night, ‘road-blocked’ across three networks.

The campaign would likely be anticipated by small space teasers in daily newspapers and backed up with a catalogue inserted in Sunday press.

While mainstream media is still an important part of putting (and keeping) brands on the map, retail campaigns today are likely to include a myriad of communications touchpoints, and increasingly short form video distributed via social media is a key component.

Besides the Lowe’s example, brands like Nike and Burberry are utilising Instagram’s new 15 second video tool launched just a month ago.

And they’re not using high end video equipment to make expensive productions.They’re shooting short grabs on smartphones in that distinctive “sepia-toned, artfully out of focus aesthetic that characterises much of (Instagram) photography”, as America’s Ad Age puts it.

This is disposable advertising. Shoot it. Post it online. Connect with customers. Move on.

Is this an effective form of communication?Certainly, it’s worth the experiment if your customer includes Generation Y’s who are hungry for innovation and have short attention spans.

And just as definitely, video is set to dominate online into the future.The challenge to retailers is to constantly re-evaluate your communications mix in the second decade of the 21st century, question traditional forms such as catalogues and mainstream media, and include one or two of the new tools in your armoury.

And that’s worth more than six seconds’ thought.

*This article first appeared in Inside Retail’s Digital Weekly, to subscribe click here.


* Jon Bird is chairman of specialist retail marketing agency IdeaWorks (www.ideaworks.com.au), and also of Octomedia, publisher of Inside Retail. Email: jon.bird@ideaworks.com.au Blog: www.newretailblog.com Twitter: @thetweetailer

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