Long gone are the days of tedious PowerPoint presentations to explain never-ending content. Explainer videos are a practical and effective tool that will help the growth of your organization, and potentially one of the main strategies of your marketing campaigns. However, creating a video project is not easy. In this article, you’ll find some tips that will help you organize your ideas to make an explainer video.
Know your target audience
When you started your business, it’s very likely you did a lot of research about who is your target audience or you probably even did a «buyer persona». However, many companies forget their target audience when selecting the right message and style for their animated video. Remember, your video must be pleasant to your customer not to your eyes.
Have a Clear Concept
You need to clarify the topic or concept you want to develop. Ask yourself: What is the main message I want to deliver with this video? What do I want my viewers to think / feel while and after they watch the video. All these questions should be answered in your mind before contacting a video provider.
Have a (Valid) Reason
There are tons of reasons to produce a video. But you need to know before starting what exactly will you use it for and if the reasons you have respond to your main marketing objectives, and if they’re rooted in the philosophy of your organization. Having a purpose, or a reason, will help you get the most out of your video, increase its ROI and avoid mistakes and confusion in the planning process.
Do some research about styles
Finally, once you have both a clear message you want to convey and a purpose, you need to decide what style explainer video you need: a whiteboard video (great for educational purposes), animated characters (recommended for storytelling), or infographics (usually used with more serious target audiences). You’ll then have to evaluate how you’re your video should be, and if the type of animation chosen is akin to the audience you want to reach. We did this instagram post to explain this idea in a more creative way, you can watch it here.
If you are not sure which style works best for you, feel free to send us a message and we will try to give you a recommendation based on your product and target audience.
Ok, I have my ideas clear. Now what?
Once clear with these three elements, you can begin to conceptualize your explainer video. This will be a continuous creative process that will give you a unique opportunity to adapt your message to what your clients want to see, with creativity and efficiency. After creating more than 500 explainer video projects, we have created a 15 questions brief that provides us all the information we need to create an animation. You can download it here.
Now, if you plan to make a video on your own, there are different programs or applications in which you can use templates, and they can be of some help to your process. However, if what you’re looking for is something much more professional and holistic, then ideally you should look for a creative agency that can capture your vision and take charge of the integral development of your explainer video.