Latest / Video Marketing with Fexingo: Short Form, Long Form, and Video-First Strategy / Why Video Marketers Should Test Vertical Video First
Transcript
- Lucas: If you're still treating horizontal video as your default format and vertical as an afterthought, you're probably leaving money on the table. And I've got numbers to back that up. Luna: I mean, we've been hearing 'vertical is the future' for years, but a lot of brands still shoot everything in 16:9 and then just crop it down for Stories. Lucas: Exactly. And that's the trap. Cropping horizontal to vertical is not the same as shooting vertical-first. A DTC brand I've been following — let's call them 'Bare Home' — ran a pretty clean test earlier this year. They'd been doing 60-second horizontal YouTube ads, and they switched their primary creative format to 9:16 vertical for Instagram Reels and TikTok. Same budget, same offer, same length. Luna: What happened? Lucas: Over three months, their click-through rate went up about 40 percent, and cost per acquisition dropped 25 percent. That's not a marginal shift. That's a format-level advantage. Luna: Forty percent is huge. But is that because vertical is inherently better, or because their horizontal creative was just bad? Lucas: Fair question. But they were already running decent horizontal ads — above average CTR for their category. So I think the improvement is real. The psychology is pretty straightforward: when you hold your phone vertically, a horizontal video takes up maybe 40 percent of the screen. Your thumb is right there, it feels like an interruption. A vertical video fills the entire screen. You're immersed. Luna: Right. The phone becomes the medium, not just a window into it. But I've also seen data that says vertical retention drops off after about 90 seconds. So is it only good for short-form? Lucas: Historically, yes. But that's changing. YouTube just reported that vertical uploads over three minutes now have retention rates almost identical to horizontal for the same content. The key is that the content has to be designed for vertical pacing — faster cuts, tighter framing, on-screen text that doesn't require full width. Luna: So the production approach has to change. You can't just shoot the same talking head and hope it works. What are the actual trade-offs in the studio? Because I feel like a lot of marketers don't think about lighting and composition when they switch. Lucas: They don't. And it matters. In horizontal, you have width to play with — you can have a subject on one third, a product demo on another third. In vertical, you're working with height. So you have to stack elements vertically. That changes blocking, lighting position, even the type of background. A wide bookshelf looks great in 16:9. In 9:16, you see mostly ceiling and floor unless you zoom in. Luna: Exactly. And if you're using a teleprompter, the text needs to be narrower. I've seen productions where they just shrink the horizontal template — and suddenly the talent looks tiny in the frame. Lucas: That's the classic mistake. You actually want the subject's face to occupy a slightly larger percentage of the frame in vertical, because you have less peripheral context. The eyes need to anchor the viewer. So head and shoulders in horizontal becomes tight head and shoulders in vertical, or even just the face and upper chest. Luna: So more intimate, basically. That works for a lot of DTC and lifestyle brands. But what about B2B? I've seen some B2B companies try vertical webinars and it looks awkward. Lucas: B2B is actually an interesting case. For thought leadership and executive interviews, horizontal still has advantages — you can show two people side by side, or include a presentation. But for social distribution of B2B content, vertical is winning. LinkedIn now prioritizes vertical video in the feed. HubSpot's social team told me their vertical posts get about double the engagement of horizontal posts, even for the same topic. Luna: That's because LinkedIn's algorithm is essentially copying TikTok. So the platform itself is forcing the format. But let's talk about cost. If you're a small team, does vertical-first actually save money or cost more? Lucas: It can save money, actually. You can shoot vertical on a smartphone with a good tripod and a decent lav mic, and the production value can be high. The trade-off is that you need more frequent, tighter edits because vertical viewers have shorter attention spans. So post-production might cost more per minute of output, but the raw capture is cheaper. Luna: And you can repurpose. We've talked about repurposing long-form into short clips before, but it's worth mentioning that if you shoot vertical from the start, you avoid that awkward crop where you lose half the frame. Lucas: Right. And you can still extract horizontal versions by placing the vertical clip inside a wider background — like a blurred or branded backdrop. That's becoming a common technique. But the whole point is to design for the primary platform first, not to retrofit. Luna: So what's the concrete recommendation? If someone's listening and they're still mostly horizontal, what should they do tomorrow? Lucas: Run a 30-day test. Take your next campaign — could be a product launch, a lead magnet, whatever — and create a vertical-first version of the creative. Same offer, same length, same targeting. Put it on Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube Shorts. Keep your horizontal control running on YouTube and Facebook. Measure CTR, CPA, and retention. I'd bet the vertical outperforms on the platforms where it's native. Luna: And if it doesn't? If your audience is older, or you're in a very technical B2B niche, maybe horizontal still wins? Lucas: Then you have data. And you go back to horizontal. The point isn't to abandon one format — it's to stop assuming. Test, learn, and let the numbers guide you. But I think for most marketers in 2026, vertical is the format that aligns best with mobile behavior. The phone is the primary screen now. Luna: It really is. And honestly, that kind of testing is exactly what we try to encourage on this show — not just following trends, but actually measuring what works. Lucas: Yeah. And on that note, I'll say this — we keep the show ad-free because we want these conversations to be purely about what actually moves the needle, not about selling you something. If you find value in that approach and want to support it, you can find us at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. Luna: It's a small way to keep this independent. And we appreciate it. Lucas: So back to the test — if you try vertical-first for 30 days, I'd love to hear what you find. Drop us a note or tag us. We might feature your results in a future episode. Luna: Alright, Lucas. Next week we're tackling a question I get all the time: 'Should I use ai generated video or human-created content?' Spoiler: it's not binary. Lucas: Looking forward to it. See you then.