October Reels for the holiday discovery phase: five clips from photos

Meta's holiday guide says the discovery phase runs from October to early November and that its goal is to "plant ideas and not push purchases", using short-form Reels for product inspiration. You can build that kind of idea-first Reel from product photos you already have with Sume's Timeline 1.0, which holds each still on screen and renders a 1080x1920 MP4.

The planning facts come from Meta's Win over shoppers with ad formats they're engaging with, read on 2026-10-03. The page does not give Reel lengths, file specs or a performance number for the discovery phase, so this post covers the creative plan only.

What does Meta say the discovery phase is for?

The guide lays out four phases. October to early November is Discovery. Black Friday and Cyber Monday is the Deal phase, with price comparisons and countdown Stories. December is Gifting, and late December into the new year is Fresh Start. For Discovery, the guide says to use short-form Reels to show product inspiration rather than push a purchase.

It also lists context numbers from Meta: 86% of global holiday shoppers use social media for inspiration, and 73% begin shopping before November. Those are Meta's figures, quoted from that page, and they do not predict your own results.

What five idea-first Reels should I make?

Idea-first means no price, no urgency and no discount in the picture. Each concept below can be built from three to five stills.

How do I build one from photos?

Timeline 1.0 needs one audio spine and ordered video slots, and stills are static holds. If you have no voiceover, audio.mode: "silence" declares a length with no spine file. Every URL must already be on the Sume media host, so import first with POST /v1/media-imports. The docs say a transition can be fade, dissolve, wipeleft, wiperight, slideup or slidedown, at most 1 second.

Run POST /v1/timeline-1.0/plan first; it is unbilled and returns the duration, segment count and estimated cost. The render is priced at $0.10 per output minute per the docs, so a 12-second Reel rounds up to one minute.

curl -X POST https://api.sume.com/v1/timeline-1.0/render \
  -H "Authorization: Bearer $SUME_API_KEY" \
  -H "Content-Type: application/json" \
  -H "Idempotency-Key: oct-gift-idea-001" \
  -d '{
    "audio": { "mode": "silence", "duration_seconds": 9 },
    "video": [
      { "source_url": "https://media.sume.com/artifacts/artf_demo/a.jpg", "start": 0, "duration": 3 },
      { "source_url": "https://media.sume.com/artifacts/artf_demo/b.jpg", "start": 3, "duration": 3,
        "transition": { "type": "fade", "duration": 0.25 } },
      { "source_url": "https://media.sume.com/artifacts/artf_demo/c.jpg", "start": 6, "duration": 3,
        "transition": { "type": "fade", "duration": 0.25 } }
    ]
  }'

Can I add a moving clip too?

Yes. The Video Router page lists seedance-2.5 at 4 to 30 seconds with a 9:16 aspect ratio, and its own example prompt is a vertical UGC-style product clip on a desk in natural light. Generate it, then use the result URL as one slot in the timeline. Read capabilities from GET /v1/video-router/models rather than assuming limits, since they differ per model.

A generated clip is not footage of your real product. If the clip will show a product, check every detail against the real item before it goes out, and read the platform's AI-label rules for the placement you use.

What does Sume not do for the holiday plan?

Sume does not buy the placement, choose the audience or tell you which concept will win. It makes the files. Meta's guide also points out that effective creative does not need expensive production, which fits a stills-first build.

Render all five, upload them to your ad account or post them organically, and keep the Deal-phase assets (price, countdown) as a separate set so the Discovery clips stay free of urgency.