The Fifth Network's director of marketing explains how to create video ads that attract eyes, and convey just the right amount of information.

Have you ever read an industry magazine about an industry other than our own? It's like drinking a Vanilla-NyQuil milkshake with crushed Ambien. Granted, I was reading an article about the best practices of the bedding industry, but jargon is tedious, especially when it includes such lullaby buzz words as "duvet," "down," "comforter," "throws," "shams" and "space-age memory foam."

The article was long-winded, and in the end, I was left picturing a bed so tightly tucked and adjourned with Egyptian-cotton accoutrements, that I couldn't imagine a user actually sleeping in it.

Yes, I refer to customers as "users," but the real parable here is that, when you're building your video creative, and including multiple commercials, in-unit games, SMS text messaging, zip code locaters and downloadable PDF whitepapers, the best practice to adhere to is: Remember the User.

Users do not go to websites to look at the advertising. As evidenced by numerous studies, video helps advertising get noticed, BUT, users would rather watch videos about comic-enthusiast directors talking about their latest movie and pole-enthusiast UNC sophomores practicing for bid night. The ad preceding and surrounding that content needs to respect that.

While most publishers require this, when it comes to in-banner video ads, units must include user-initiated sound, expansion and mouse-grabs. Innovative ways to interrupt a user's experience are creative, but they're the equivalent of solving an advertisers goal of connecting with users, by hitting their users in the face with a cinder block.

Another thing to remember is that the internet promotes ADD. The accessibility of content makes it very likely that users won't stay on a page for long. (Most people who started reading this article probably clicked to another story, minimized their browser to focus on AIM, or decided it was time to buy new bedding.)  If you're going to use video, hit hard and hit fast. Don't start your unit with a long flash animation. Video is your most powerful tool, so use it to grab attention before your audience gets lost in the content or clicks somewhere else.

Once you have the user's attention, don't forget about them. They noticed your beautiful creative and, due to brilliant media planning, have found that your advertiser's product matches a need for something they want or are interested in. Hizzah! BUT, they probably don't have a need for that product right now. As it is very rare that a user who needs a <insert noun> will see your ad at the moment they need a <insert same noun>, why take them off the website they've chosen to visit, especially after they've graciously interacted with your ad?

Provide as much information within the unit using tabs, hot-spots, email sign-ups and downloads. Again, users that need the product then-and-there probably went to your website directly. Users whose interests you've perked are info-gathering, so why not bring the info to them.

Lastly, video ads have to be high quality and fluid. For pre-roll ads, this means making sure that every site you run on has a video-player that consistently meets the highest playback standards. For in-banner ads, this means no more screens so pixilated that you're not sure if your watching Borat, the scourge of Kazakhstan, or Luigi, Super Mario's younger brother.

Users don't want to be bothered by advertising, but as marketers, it's our job to politely nudge them and remind them that they have needs, and our clients understand them and have reciprocal solutions. When we make ads that do this successfully, they are received better, and it's much easier to sleep at night, don't you think?

Bradley Werner is the director of marketing, The Fifth Network. Read full bio.