How to Use an Animated Marketing Video to Boost Conversions

Animated marketing videos are becoming one of the best marketing tools to increase web traffic and conversions. Research shows that consumers are up to 85% more likely to buy a product or service after watching a product video.

Those same viewers also visit twice as many pages and stay twice as long on your website, compared to visitors who aren’t offered a video to watch.

But with only a few seconds to capture the attention of your viewers, how to do you ensure that they watch your video until the end–and then feel inspired to take action? 

The answer is simple: through professional videos that tell a compelling story. Here are a few tips for creating and using an animated marketing video to drive conversions and promote your brand.

Here’s an infographic we created that helps to break down what the psychology of a great marketing looks like:

Start with a high-quality video

Great marketing videos are not only educational and actionable, but they are also entertaining.

If you’re not sure where to start when it comes to creating a high-quality video, the first step is to enlist the help of an animated marketing video company. They understand the “secret sauce” for creating videos that elevate your brand and send you soaring past your competition.

There are some fundamental steps that you can follow to ensure the quality of your finished video.

First, take the time to complete a creative brief before you begin production. It will serve as your guide throughout the process, keeping all parties aligned with your intended message.

Next, enlist the help of a professional script writer to create a clear, compelling script that will fit with your animations like a glove.

After you’ve written the script, use it to create a storyboard that will visualize the flow of the video. As you draw, refer to your creative brief frequently to ensure you haven’t veered off message or out of scope.

Now it’s time for the really fun part– illustrations and animations.

This is where a professional marketing video shines–taking your vision and forming into animations that practically leap off of the screen to tell your story.

The last step in creating a professional video is the voiceover and sounds effects. Do not skimp on this step.

Voice and sound will make or break your video. Enlist the services of a professional voiceover artist to bring your story to life.

Tell a story

You understand the importance of a creative brief and professionally-written script, but knowing what to write is a challenge in itself.

Thankfully, the solution is simple: tell a story. Storytelling is a universal part of human communication, from the time we are children and throughout our entire lives. Video is the ideal tool to capture audience attention.

Let your brand be the hero in the story, explaining how your product or service will solve a problem for the viewer.

How do you know what story to tell? First, you must know your audience and what will resonate with them. Take time to understand buyer personas for your brand.

Don’t worry if you’re struggling to find a way to use your products to pull at the heartstrings of your viewers. Good stories can take many shapes.

Your emotional connection may come in the form of saving time for a busy IT manager or saving money for a bootstrapped startup CEO.

The story may not always be warm and fuzzy, but there is an opportunity for emotional connection in every video.

As you build your story, don’t try to over-narrate it. Animated marketing videos offer nearly limitless possibilities for using characters to communicate the message. It is much easier to create context through visuals than through written text or spoken words.

Let the animations set the stage while your voiceover conveys only the key points of your message. After all, 63% of viewers remember a story.

Only 5% remember the statistics associated with it. Your job, then, is to create an emotional connection with your audience, rather than cramming your video full of statistics and data that they will never remember. Emotion elicits action.

Keep it short

A good marketing video should be short and concise. Research shows that viewer engagement declines as a video stretches past the two-minute mark in length.

An marketing video is designed to replace long blocks of text and complicated videos– conveying a clear message in a matter of minutes (or even seconds, in some cases).

To keep your video short, remember that you don’t have to explain everything at once. Stick to the message you outlined in your creative brief and use the “beginning, middle, and end” story format to stay concise and on target.

Remember to state the main point up front, to ensure that your viewer still gets the “meat” of your message even if they are not able to finish the entire video.

While there isn’t a perfect formula for the ideal length of an marketing video, aim for two minutes or less for optimal viewer engagement.

With the right planning before and during the production process, two minutes will be ample time to tell your story.

Make it visible

You may have the most compelling marketing video in the world, but it won’t matter if your viewers don’t see it. Make sure your video is front and center on your website or pinned to the top of your social media page.

Add an eye-catching headline and an interesting thumbnail to draw visitors in and encourage them to click.

If at all possible, place your marketing video above the fold on your website, so it’s the first thing a visitor sees when they enter your website.

You’ll catch visitors who are unlikely to scroll down, ensuring that they will see your video and spend more time on your site.

Include a strong call to action

One of the biggest mistakes that many companies make is to assume that their audience knows what action they want them to take. Don’t be afraid to include a strong call to action in your marketing video.

90% of consumers say that video helps in the decision-making process, but if you don’t tell them what decision you want them to make, they will never take the desired action.

In the case of animated marketing videos, that tell the story of how a product or service will solve a problem for the viewer, add a call to action to request a demo, or download a whitepaper– the options for pulling your audience into your marketing funnel are limitless.

The key is in asking them to take action.

An animated marketing video is an effective tool for grabbing the attention of your target audience to tell your story.

If you’re ready to boost conversions and promote your brand, contact the Explainify team to turn your vision into a video that gets results.