FT going long and short with videos

The Financial Times plans to push hard at both ends of the video scale this year, from the 20-minute documentary to the 50-second Facebook clip, writes Lucinda Southern of Digiday.

Southern writes, “In October the FT launched the first of its long-form video series, FT Features, a 22-minute documentary on the illegal wildlife trade, ‘Big Game, Big Money‘ on YouTube. It’s since had over 325,000 views and is one of the FT’s top ten best performing videos. The second FT Feature, ‘The End of the Chinese Miracle,’ reporting on the economic impacts a shrinking rural workforce has on the country, will land in the next few weeks.

“These longer-form videos with deeper analysis are what you would expect from the Financial Times’ content, so it’s of little surprise that it’s making this one of the hallmarks of the brand.

“But the FT can’t just play in YouTube, and like other publishers has had to adapt to offer much shorter-form videos. ‘It’s playing at those two ends, the shorter-form social video and the longer end with more in depth analysis,’ said Kayode Josiah, head of commercial development, video and audio. ‘These are the two ways we can win.'”

Read more here.