Creative Direction for Video Marketing
Creative Direction for Video Marketing: The System Behind Campaigns That Convert
Most brands do not lose at the production stage. They lose at the direction stage.
It is a recurring, costly mistake in the video industry. A company hires a crew, scouts a location, and spends weeks in post-production. They produce a video that looks like a masterpiece, but once it hits the market, it fails to generate a single dollar in revenue.
The problem is not the execution. It is the lack of a clear, strategic system guiding the message before the cameras even arrive on set. At Junction Lads Production, we see this constantly: brands spend heavily on production quality, only to discover that polished visuals alone do not create demand.
The Performance Engine
Creative direction is the strategic layer that determines if your content is a decorative asset or a performance engine. In a city like Los Angeles, where every brand is fighting for the same three seconds of attention, "looking professional" is no longer a strategy. It is the bare minimum.
Campaign performance is usually decided before the first frame is captured. This is where you determine whether the video will simply attract attention or move someone closer to a decision.
Beyond Moodboards and Aesthetics
Many mistake creative direction for choosing colors or making moodboards. In reality, it is the strategic control system for your entire message. It exists to answer three brutal questions that most marketing videos ignore:
What are we actually saying?
Why does it matter to the viewer right now?
Why should they choose you over a cheaper or more established alternative?
Without these answers, your video is just a polished version of something your audience has already ignored a hundred times. With them, your video becomes a dominant market position.
In the following sections, we will break down the "Creative Alpha" concept and the specific narrative architecture required to turn viewers into high-value leads.
What Is Creative Direction for Video Marketing?
Creative direction for video marketing is the strategic process of defining the message, positioning, audience angle, and conversion goal before production begins.
Why Most Video Campaigns Fail at the Direction Level
The majority of brands skip the direction phase entirely. They operate on a flawed workflow: Idea → Production.
This shortcut is where the budget begins to leak. By rushing straight to the shoot, companies bypass the critical thinking required to make the video actually work. At Junction Lads Production, we call this the "Execution Gap." It is the reason why a brand can spend five figures on a project and see zero return on investment.
When you skip the strategic direction, you lose the essential elements of a high-performing campaign:
No Clear Differentiation: You end up looking and sounding exactly like your top three competitors.
No Defined Audience Trigger: There is no specific psychological hook that makes your viewer stop scrolling.
No Market Positioning: You fail to explain why your solution is the only logical choice in the current market.
No Conversion Goal: The video looks great, but it doesn't tell the viewer exactly what to do next.
The "Static Brochure" Trap
The result of this oversight is a visually stunning video that performs like a static brochure. In a saturated market where audiences are hit with thousands of pieces of content every day, "generic" is a death sentence. Anything that feels familiar or safe is ignored instantly.
Creative direction exists to eliminate that risk. It ensures that before a single frame is filmed, the video has a specific job to do. Our Commercial Video Production process starts by identifying these missing links so that your project becomes an active sales tool rather than just another archive on your YouTube channel.
If you want to understand how to avoid these common pitfalls, you can see how we build Conversion-Led Frameworks that prioritize revenue over ego. Skipping the strategy doesn't save you money, it just hides the true cost of an underperforming campaign.
What Creative Direction for Video Marketing Actually Means
There is a common misconception that creative direction is about picking a color palette or curate a "vibe" on a Pinterest board. While aesthetics matter, true creative direction is the strategic control system behind your message.
At Junction Lads Production, we view direction as the bridge between your business goals and the final edit. It is the filter through which every creative choice must pass. If a shot or a line of dialogue doesn't serve the strategy, it doesn't make the cut.
Creative direction exists to answer three fundamental questions:
What are we actually saying? (The Core Message)
Why does it matter? (The Value Proposition)
Why should anyone care right now? (The Urgency)
Without these answers, your video is just a high-definition version of something your audience has already seen and ignored a thousand times. When these questions are answered correctly, your video stops being "content" and starts being a market position.
The Alignment of Action
The goal of our Video Production Services is to ensure that your visuals never outpace your strategy. Creative direction works by aligning four critical pillars into a single, focused idea:
Your Offer: The specific solution you provide.
Your Audience: The exact person experiencing the pain point.
Your Message: The unique angle that sets you apart.
Your Platform: The specific environment where the viewer sees you.
When these four pillars are out of sync, the campaign feels "off," and the viewer bounces. When they are aligned, you create a cohesive narrative that drives action. This level of intentionality is what separates a standard brand film from a High-Performance Marketing Strategy that actually scales a business.
Creative direction is the process of ensuring that every dollar spent on production is an investment in a specific, measurable outcome.Brands looking for this level of strategic planning usually start with our creative direction services, where message architecture is built before scripting or production begins. It is about moving from guesswork to precision.
If you are deciding whether your campaign needs deeper brand positioning or direct-response performance, our guide on brand film vs commercial video explains which format fits which business goal.
Messaging vs Storytelling: The Critical Difference
Many brands fall into the trap of trying to tell a story for the sake of storytelling. While that works for cinema, it often fails in marketing. There is a fundamental difference between a story that entertains and a message that converts.
At Junction Lads Production, we prioritize messaging because storytelling alone is not a sales strategy. Storytelling typically focuses on engagement and emotional resonance. While those elements are useful, they can be a distraction if they do not lead to a measurable outcome. A story can be beautiful, memorable, and widely shared, yet still fail to generate a single lead.
Messaging Focuses on Action
A well-engineered message is designed to do the heavy lifting of the sales process. While storytelling invites the viewer to watch, messaging compels the viewer to act. Creative direction ensures that your video is not just a narrative, but a functional tool that accomplishes four specific tasks:
Creates Urgency: It explains why the viewer needs to solve their problem today, not next quarter.
Clarifies Value: It removes the fluff and gets straight to the transformation your business provides.
Removes Doubt: It anticipates objections and provides the proof or logic needed to overcome them.
Drives Response: It leads the viewer toward a specific, predefined goal.
The Goal is Results
The objective of creative direction is not to make people watch your video until the final second. The objective is to change their state of mind so they take the next step in your GTM System.
When you focus on messaging, you stop worrying about "going viral" and start focusing on "going profitable." We help our clients build Strategic Video Assets that prioritize clarity over cleverness. By aligning your Brand Strategy with direct messaging, we ensure that your production budget is spent on content that actually moves the needle. In the world of performance marketing, a clear message will beat a complex story every single time.
Video Ad for Arc'teryx by Junction Lads Production. Arc'teryx is a Canadian company specializing in outdoor apparel and equipment headquartered in North Vancouver, British Columbia. This ad shows a clear Message in Action,
The Creative Alpha Concept
At the core of every high-performing campaign is a principle we call Creative Alpha.
In the financial world, Alpha represents the excess return on an investment above the market benchmark. In video marketing, Creative Alpha is the strategic edge that allows your content to outperform the "average" noise of your industry. It is the one definitive idea that frames your offer in a way that no one else can replicate.
Without Creative Alpha, your content is destined to be:
A copy of a competitor: You are reacting to the market rather than leading it.
A variation of a trend: You are relying on a fleeting moment that will be forgotten by next week.
A diluted message: You are trying to speak to everyone and ending up interesting to no one.
The Differentiator: Being Noticed vs. Being Chosen
Anyone can buy attention for a few seconds. However, Creative Alpha is what converts that fleeting attention into actual authority. It is the mechanism that ensures your brand is not just seen, but remembered and selected.
Creative Alpha creates:
Clarity: The viewer understands your value proposition within the first five seconds.
Authority: Your brand is positioned as the leader in the space, not a follower.
Memorability: The message sticks long after the video has ended.
At Junction Lads Production, we don't just aim for "good" videos. We look for the Creative Alpha in your business model that forces the market to pay attention. This is a critical part of our Custom GTM Systems, where we align your video assets with a broader architecture designed for market capture.
When you find your Creative Alpha, you stop competing on price or aesthetics. You start competing on the strength of your idea. This is the difference between being another option and being the only obvious choice.
Imagine two SaaS companies selling the same solution. One says: “We help teams collaborate better.” The other says: “We help remote teams cut project delays by 27% without adding more meetings.”
Same category. Same product type. Completely different market impact.
That second message is closer to Creative Alpha. It is sharper, more specific, and harder to ignore.
The Core Differentiator: The Message That Separates You
Every successful video campaign begins with one difficult question: Why should a prospect choose you over every other available option?
Most brands answer this by listing features. They talk about their years of experience, their customer service, or their technical specifications. This is a fundamental mistake. Features describe what you are, but they rarely explain why you are the solution.
At Junction Lads Production, we use creative direction to reframe your offer into a core differentiator. We move past the surface level to identify the specific elements that actually drive a buying decision. If this foundation is weak, no amount of high-end cinematography or expensive editing can save the campaign.
Moving Beyond the "Feature Trap"
Effective creative direction translates your business model into three distinct pillars:
What you do differently: This is not about being better; it is about being distinct. It defines your unique process or approach that competitors cannot claim.
What outcome you enable: You are not selling a product. You are selling the "after" state of your customer. Your video must make that future reality feel tangible.
What belief you challenge: The strongest brands take a stand against the status quo. By challenging a common industry frustration, you create instant alignment with your ideal client.
The Foundation of Every Asset
Once this differentiator is defined, it becomes the blueprint for every script, visual choice, and line of dialogue. It ensures that the Video Marketing Funnel Strategy is consistent across every touchpoint.
When your message is engineered correctly, the production phase becomes an exercise in reinforcing your market position. Without this core differentiator, you are simply paying for expensive footage that has no soul. We ensure that your Business Video Production is built on a message that makes your brand the only logical choice in your category.
Canada Dry is a brand of soft drinks founded in Toronto, Ontario, in 1904, and owned since 2008 by the American company Dr Pepper Snapple (now Keurig Dr Pepper). This Video ad by Juncation Lads Production is about their Ginger Ale Flavour.
The Competitive Angle: Positioning Against the Market
You are never creating content in a vacuum. Every time you release a video, you are competing for attention in a feed crowded with your direct competitors, industry giants, and endless distractions.
Most brands fail because they try to "fit in" with industry standards. They look at what their competitors are doing and try to do a slightly better version of the same thing. At Junction Lads Production, we believe that "better" is rarely as effective as "different." Creative direction is the process of defining your competitive angle so that you stand out by default.
Finding the Market Gap
To create a message that cuts through the noise, we look at the landscape through three lenses:
What others are saying: We identify the tired tropes and overused messages in your industry.
What they are not saying: We look for the "unspoken truths" or the pain points your competitors are too afraid or too lazy to address.
Where the gap exists: We find the intersection between what your audience desperately needs and what the market is failing to provide.
Contrast, Challenge, and Reposition
Instead of blending into the background, a well-directed video uses contrast to its advantage. Your message should not just exist alongside your competitors; it should actively challenge their narratives and reposition your brand as the superior alternative.
This strategy moves your company from being "one of many" options to being the obvious choice for your Ideal Customer Profile. By identifying a unique competitive angle, our Video Content Strategy ensures that your brand doesn't just join the conversation. It changes the conversation entirely.
When you stop trying to be everything to everyone and start leaning into a specific competitive angle, you gain a level of market authority that cannot be bought with a standard ad spend. It is about winning the battle for attention before the viewer even has a chance to scroll away.
Narrative Architecture: Building Psychological Momentum
While many agencies talk about storytelling, we focus on narrative architecture. Storytelling is often used for entertainment, but in a marketing context, entertainment alone is a poor investment. Narrative architecture is different. It is a structured sequence designed to move a viewer step by step toward a specific business decision.
We at Junction Lads Production, we use creative direction to build psychological momentum. We do not just want people to watch your video; we want them to feel a growing sense of intent as the seconds pass. This is about progression, not just engagement.
The Five Pillars of a High-Performing Narrative
A video that converts follows a specific blueprint to reduce viewer resistance and increase desire:
The Hook: You must stop the scroll and capture attention within the first three seconds. This is the visual or verbal "jolt" that earns you the right to the rest of the viewer's time.
The Problem: You must surface a real, felt pain point. If the viewer does not feel the weight of the problem, they will not value the weight of your solution.
The Shift: This is the most critical part of creative direction. You introduce a new perspective or a "new way" of looking at the challenge that the viewer hasn't considered before.
The Solution: You present your offer not just as a product, but as the only logical answer to the problem you just surfaced.
The Action: You provide a clear, direct next step. There is no room for ambiguity here. This becomes even more powerful when each video is mapped to funnel stage.
Our video marketing funnel strategy guide shows how TOFU, MOFU, and BOFU videos work together to move viewers toward a sale.
Engineering Intent
This structure ensures that each moment in the video serves a purpose. By the time the viewer reaches the end of the asset, they should feel that taking the next step is the natural conclusion to the experience.
This architectural approach is a core component of our Video Creative Services. We ensure that every script we write and every scene we film is contributing to this momentum. When you build your videos using this framework, you stop hoping for results and start engineering them. For brands looking to scale, this level of Strategic Content Design is what turns a one-off viewer into a long-term lead.
Platform Context: Why One Idea Doesn’t Fit Everywhere
Creative direction is incomplete without deep platform awareness. A common mistake is producing a single masterpiece and expecting it to perform identically across every channel. In reality, a message that thrives on a website landing page can easily fail in a social media feed.
The medium dictates the behavior of the viewer. Creative direction exists to adapt your core idea into multiple formats without losing its strategic strength. It is about translating the "Creative Alpha" into the specific language of each platform.
Adapting Structure for Performance
Different environments require different psychological approaches. Effective direction accounts for these nuances during the planning phase:
Short-Form Platforms: These environments demand immediate, aggressive hooks. You have less than two seconds to earn interest before a viewer scrolls. The focus here is on high-frequency impact.
Long-Form Platforms: These allow for a deeper narrative build and more thorough education. Here, the direction shifts toward maintaining engagement through a structured information flow.
Paid Advertising: Ads require a direct response structure. Every frame must be optimized to reduce friction and move the viewer toward a specific click or conversion.
Platform behavior matters more than most brands realize. If you want platform-specific guidance, see our breakdown of the best video ad formats for conversions across TikTok, Meta, and YouTube.
Consistency Across Formats
The challenge is maintaining a cohesive brand identity while drastically changing the delivery method. This is where strategic direction becomes essential. It ensures that whether someone sees a 15-second ad or a 10-minute documentary, the core differentiator and the primary message remains intact.
If you want to go deeper into these technical requirements, you can explore how different Video Structures perform across various channels. By designing with the platform in mind, you stop fighting against user behavior and start leveraging it. The goal is to make your content feel native to the environment while keeping the underlying Marketing Message focused on your ultimate conversion goal.
The Link Between Creative Direction and Conversion
Every conversion is the result of a decision, and every decision is the result of a message. In the digital landscape, your video is often the only salesperson your customer ever meets. Creative direction is what ensures that salesperson says the right thing at the right time.
When you invest in direction, you are not just paying for a creative concept. You are investing in the variables that dictate your campaign data. Creative direction directly influences the metrics that matter most:
Click-Through Rates: By engineering a hook that stops the scroll and creates curiosity.
Watch Time: By building a narrative architecture that maintains momentum and prevents the viewer from dropping off.
Engagement Depth: By creating a message that resonates so deeply that viewers feel compelled to share or comment.
Conversion Rates: By clarifying the value proposition and removing the psychological friction that prevents a purchase.
Engineering Belief
Conversion is not just about a button click. It is about a shift in belief. Creative direction carefully shapes this journey. It controls what the viewer sees first to grab attention, what they feel next to build connection, and what they believe by the end to justify the action.
Without strong direction, your video performance becomes unpredictable. You are essentially gambling with your ad spend and hoping that the visuals are enough to carry the weight. With a strategic framework in place, your campaigns become scalable.
When you know exactly why a video is working, you can replicate that success across other products and platforms. This is how you move from "one-hit wonders" to a Sustainable Video Growth System. If you are looking to see how these metrics translate into real-world results, you can view our Portfolio of Conversion-Led Campaigns. The goal is to move beyond guesswork and start building assets that are designed, frame by frame, to convert.
When You Actually Need Creative Direction
Not every video project requires an intensive strategic overhaul. If you are filming a quick internal update or a basic social shout-out, deep creative direction might be overkill. However, when the stakes are higher and the budget is significant, skipping this phase is a high-risk gamble.
For brands focused on growth, creative direction is not an optional add-on. It is the fundamental layer that determines the success of your investment. You should prioritize strategic direction if you find yourself in any of the following scenarios:
Running Paid Ads Without ROI: If you are spending thousands on ad platforms but your conversion rates are stagnant, the issue is likely the message, not the algorithm.
Scaling with Inconsistent Results: If one video performs well but the next three fail, you lack a repeatable system. Direction provides the blueprint for consistency.
Launching a New Product or Category: When you are introducing something new, you have to work twice as hard to build trust and clarify value. You cannot afford a generic approach here.
High Content Volume, Low Outcome: If you are producing content regularly but cannot point to a clear business result, you are likely creating noise instead of market position.
The Missing Layer of Growth
In these situations, the "Execution Gap" is usually to blame. You have the tools, the talent, and the budget, but you are missing the connective tissue that turns those resources into revenue.
Creative direction acts as that missing layer. It moves your brand away from "guessing" what might work and toward a Data-Informed Creative Process. When your business goals are high, the strategy must be equally robust. Our Video Production Services are specifically designed for these high-stakes moments where "looking good" simply isn't enough to reach the next level of scale. If the goal is a measurable return on investment, the direction phase is where that return is actually created.
Naked Wolfe is a global luxury footwear brand founded in 2017. Worn by Madonna, Hailey Bieber, Gigi Hadid, Bella Hadid, Rosalía & Sabrina Carpenter. This Video ad of Naked Wolfe perfectly represents that vibe,.
How Creative Direction Connects to Production
It is important to understand that creative direction does not replace the production process. Instead, it serves as the catalyst that makes production effective. Without a strategic foundation, even the most talented film crew is essentially flying blind.
At Junction Lads Production, we see production as the physical manifestation of a well-engineered plan. When the direction is clear, the technical execution becomes a precision strike rather than a series of expensive guesses.
The Cost of Guesswork
When a project moves straight into filming without a defined direction, the cracks begin to show almost immediately:
Production becomes guesswork: The crew spends time on set debating "cool shots" rather than capturing what is necessary to convert the viewer.
Edits become random: The post-production phase turns into an endless loop of revisions because there was no consensus on what the final message should achieve.
Results become inconsistent: Because the assets are not anchored to a strategy, their performance in the market is left entirely to chance.
Execution with Purpose
Conversely, when a project is led by strong creative direction, the entire workflow changes. Every member of the team, from the cinematographer to the editor, knows exactly what the goal is. This clarity transforms the process:
Every shot has a purpose: We prioritize visuals that reinforce the core differentiator and drive the narrative forward.
Every scene supports the message: Dialogue and pacing are tuned to build the psychological momentum required for a decision.
Every asset fits into a larger system: The final videos are not just isolated clips; they are functional components of your GTM System Architecture.
This is where planning meets execution. By investing in the Strategy and Creative Phase before the cameras are even unboxed, you ensure that every dollar spent on production is working toward a specific outcome. Direction provides the map, and production provides the vehicle. Together, they create a campaign that is not only visually stunning but fundamentally effective.
Once the strategy is locked, our video production services turn that direction into assets built for real-world performance.
The Real Cost of Skipping Creative Direction
Many brands believe that skipping the strategy phase will save them time and money. In reality, it doesn't save money; it simply hides the cost in your future losses. You don't see the price tag upfront, but you pay it through every underperforming metric.
When you bypass creative direction, you are essentially paying for "expensive silence." You pay through:
Underperforming Campaigns: High production value that fails to generate leads is just a high-priced hobby.
Reshoots and Revisions: Without a clear blueprint, you often realize the message is wrong only after the project is finished, leading to costly fixes.
Wasted Ad Spend: You spend thousands on traffic only to send it to a video that doesn't have a clear hook or a compelling reason to stay.
Lost Market Opportunities: While you are busy "guessing" with your content, a competitor with a better-directed message is capturing your market share.
A single misaligned campaign can cost more than the entire strategy phase combined. High-performing brands understand that direction is an insurance policy for their budget. By investing in the Video Strategy first, you ensure that your Production Investment is a calculated move toward revenue, not a shot in the dark. Skipping the brain of the project to save a few days of planning is the most expensive mistake a marketing department can make.
Creative Direction Is the Difference Between Content and Control
Anyone can produce content. In a world where high-end tools are accessible to everyone, "content" has become a commodity. However, very few can actually control outcomes.
Creative direction is the bridge between making a video and making a profit. It moves your brand away from the "hope and pray" method of marketing and gives you a repeatable system for growth. By prioritizing the strategy before the camera, you gain three critical advantages:
Clarity Before Execution: You stop wasting time and budget on shots or scripts that do not serve your bottom line.
Consistency Across Campaigns: Your brand voice remains dominant and recognizable regardless of the platform or format.
A Predictable System for Growth: You build assets designed specifically to perform, allowing you to scale your Ad Spend with confidence.
Instead of hoping a video works, you build it to work. This transition from "content creator" to "market leader" happens the moment you stop focusing on what looks good and start focusing on what drives results. At Junction Lads Production, we ensure that every project is a functional component of your GTM System Architecture, giving you total control over your brand narrative and your ROI.
The Bottom Line: Moving Beyond Aesthetics
If your videos look incredible but fail to deliver measurable results, the issue is not a lack of talent or a lack of tools. It is a lack of direction.
In a competitive market, creative direction is the invisible architecture that turns a creative idea into a business asset. It is the difference between a video that gathers dust on a server and a campaign that builds a brand. By the time production begins, the direction should make the outcome far more predictable.
How We Build Creative Direction at Junction Lads
Every campaign starts with four questions:
What does the buyer already believe?What frustration are competitors ignoring?What message creates immediate relevance?What action should this video drive?
Once those answers are clear, scripting, shot design, editing, and distribution become easier because every creative decision has a job to do.
Ready to Build Campaigns That Actually Perform?
If your last campaign looked polished but failed to move the business forward, the problem probably was not production. It was direction.
At Junction Lads Production, we build the strategic layer that gives every frame a job to do.
The brands that win with video rarely win because they have bigger budgets. They win because the message is clearer, sharper, and built to create movement.
If you want content that earns attention, builds belief, and drives action, let’s map the message before we roll cameras.
Frequently Asked Questions About Creative Direction
1. What is the difference between a Director and a Creative Director in video marketing?
A Director focuses on the execution of the shoot, including acting, camera movement, and the look of each scene. A Creative Director focuses on the "why" behind the video. They ensure the message aligns with your business goals and that the final product is designed to convert your specific audience.
2. Why should I pay for creative direction if I already have a script?
A script is a blueprint, but creative direction is the foundation. Even with a script, you need a strategic layer to determine the pacing, the visual hooks, and the psychological triggers that keep a viewer engaged. Without it, your script might be executed well but still fail to reach its conversion goals.
3. Is creative direction only for big-budget commercials?
No. In fact, creative direction is even more critical for smaller budgets. When you have limited resources, you cannot afford to waste money on content that does not work. Strategic direction ensures that every dollar spent on a smaller production is optimized for maximum impact.
4. How does creative direction improve Video ROI?
It improves ROI by aligning the content with the viewer's journey. By identifying the correct "Creative Alpha" and competitive angle, the video becomes a more effective sales tool. This leads to higher click-through rates and better conversion, which directly lowers your cost per acquisition.
5. Can a production company provide creative direction, or do I need an agency?
Many standard production companies only focus on the filming. However, a specialized partner like Junction Lads Production integrates creative direction into the process. This provides you with the strategic depth of an agency and the technical efficiency of a production house.
6. How long does the creative direction phase usually take?
Depending on the complexity of the project, this phase can take anywhere from a few days to two weeks. It involves market research, audience analysis, and message testing. Investing this time upfront prevents expensive revisions and poor performance later.
7. Does creative direction help with social media algorithms?
Yes. Algorithms favor retention and engagement. Creative direction focuses on building "Narrative Architecture" and hooks that stop the scroll. When your video is engineered to keep people watching, the platforms are more likely to promote your content to a wider audience.
8. What happens if we skip the strategy phase?
Skipping this phase usually results in "generic" content. You may end up with a video that looks professional but sounds exactly like your competitors. This leads to low engagement, wasted ad spend, and a lack of clear brand identity.
9. How do you measure the success of creative direction?
Success is measured through performance metrics such as average watch time, click-through rates on call-to-action buttons, and the overall conversion rate of the campaign. If the video achieves the specific business goal defined at the start, the direction was successful.
10. How involved should I be in the creative direction process?
As the brand owner, your input on your "Ideal Customer" and your core values is essential. The creative team then translates that business knowledge into a visual and narrative strategy. It is a collaborative process that ensures the final message is authentic to your brand.
11. Why do most video campaigns fail to convert?
Most campaigns fail because they prioritize "looking cool" over "communicating clearly." If the message is buried under too many special effects or a vague story, the viewer will not know why they should choose you. Creative direction solves this by putting the message first.
