Here’s everything you should know about explainer videos
What are Explainer videos?
Let’s start at the core. Explainer videos are 1-2 minute videos that explain and/or promote a business, service or idea. The general approach to communicating with potential customers and clients is either through meetings, calls, websites, documents or presentations and most of the time, these are quite lengthy and formal. An explainer video is different in that it’s almost always animated, combines visuals with a narration and is often a little more relaxed. They’re also a lot less time consuming (the ideal time for an explainer is 90 seconds). Below is an average explainer video that uses motion graphics and characters to help get the point across. Not all explainers use characters and not all are cartoonish either but it’s a proven way to engage and connect with an audience.
What are the benefits?
There are a few numbers that are often given as the average time that a person will remain on a webpage if nothing immediately grabs their attention. The two I see most are 6 seconds and 8 seconds. A video does away with that average almost every time. If people see a video on the page that offers to explain everything in one go and with little to no effort required, people will click play and stick around for a minute or two to hear the full pitch, especially if they’re being entertained while they watch.
Sharing is another huge benefit. People share video on the web all the time as it’s as simple as clicking a Facebook or Twitter icon. If you offer someone something that is useful and fun to watch, they might share it with their friends, family and colleagues.
On average, conversion rates are boosted by anywhere between 15-50%. When dropbox started using an explainer video, they picked up 5 million new customers and made over $24 million in additional revenue. I’m not saying that you’re going to make $24 million if you have an animated video created (though, who knows?) but if you increase your conversions, even by 15-20%, isn’t that worth it? Remember, this wouldn’t be a one time deal, the video will help on an on-going basis.
Using video boosts your google ranking. Keep in mind, google owns YouTube and will almost always try to feature video on the page 1 results. Something else to think about, if you’re uploading your explainer to YouTube, then the fact that YouTube is the world’s #2 ranked search engine, just behind google itself, should interest you.
Product clarity is another big one. Sometimes web pages and long documents lose people’s interest or don’t explain the concept clearly. A video not only tells a viewer what the product or service is, it shows them. People retain information to a much higher degree watching and listening than if they’re doing just one or the other. And if you’re currently relying on text, get this – people process visuals 60,000 times faster than text.
How much do they cost?
That depends on style and duration. Tell us what you want, and we’ll send you a quote within 24 hours (usually a lot faster than that).
How do I use one?
First thing to do is upload it to YouTube, Vimeo and wherever else you want to host it. Then, make sure you get it seen. Embed it on your website and make sure it’s not hidden. It should be front and center on your home page so make sure visitors don’t have to scroll or click through links and pages to find it. Share it on your social channels. Tweet it, post it, blog it, email it, link to it, your job is to get it in front of as many eyes as possible. Adding a link to it in your email signature is also a great idea. In addition, you can use animated explainer videos at presentations, trade shows, meetings, in stores and pretty much anywhere that has the tech to play it.
Do Explainer Videos Work?
Facts and figures
Portfolios, quotes and great scripts mean nothing unless the explainer video works, right? They’re a hard thing to gauge, especially if you’re not sure how to quantify their success. So, do they work? Let’s take a look at some facts and figures we found while researching the matter.
- A video is 50x more likely to show up on page 1 of google search results than text based web pages. (ReelSEO, Forrester)
- Part of Google’s algorithm for search rankings considers the amount of time visitors stay on your website, which is one reason online video is seeing explosive growth.
- The average explainer video is watched on average for about 2.7 minutes, compared with 28% of website text shown to be read on average. (Statisticbrain)
- Visitors continue navigating your website for an average extra 2 minutes after viewing a video (Diode Digital)
- Buyers and sellers can typically visit an average of nearly 5 websites before deciding which product to purchase. When you add video to your website, this number decreases to less than 2 (AgentImage)
- 18 Million Words – The value of 60 seconds of video, or the equivalent of 3,600 average webpages. (SMK)
- 100 Million – The number of people watching at least one online video each day
- 64% – How much more likely website visitors are to buy a product on an online retail site after watching a video
- 60% of users watch video content before reading text on the same page (Diode Digital)
- Video constitutes 50% of all mobile online traffic and over 90% of internet traffic (Diode Digital)
- 20% of people share videos on their cell phone and 41% watch videos on their cell phone (Pew Center)
- 72% of people watch YouTube or Vimeo Videos (Pew Center)
- 90% of information transmitted to the brain is visual, and visuals are processed 60,000X faster in the brain than text. (3M Corporation)
- Photos are liked 2x more than text updates, while videos are shared 12x times more than links and text posts combined (SproutSocial)
- Not only do videos provide a 74% increase in your visitors’ understanding of your product or service compared to pictures, but they also increase the likelihood of your visitors purchasing your product or service by 64%. (Quicksprout)
Visual and verbal learning
A recent study of 221 undergraduate students showed that 105 were visual learners, 105 were bimodal (meaning no preference), and only 11 were verbal. Explainer videos take advantage of this by offering visual and verbal cues for learning. This appeals to all three groups. It’s also been shown that people retain over 50% more information through the use of visual and verbal learning cues.
Forced simplification
Explainer videos force you to compress your product offering into 60 to 120 seconds and 150 to 300 words. This exercise requires businesses to find the best way to clearly and quickly convey the benefit of their product or service. Video scripts limit the number of words, requiring more to be said with less text.
Conversions
On average, conversion rates are boosted by anywhere between 15-50%. When dropbox started using an explainer video, they picked up 5 million new customers and made over $24 million in additional revenue. I’m not saying that you’re going to make $24 million if you have an animated video created (though, who knows?) but if you increase your conversions, even by 10-20%, isn’t that worth it? Remember, this wouldn’t be a one time deal, the video will help on an on-going basis.
Explainer videos increase conversions, sales and revenue greatly. It just works… However, there is a little more to it than that. You can find out what to do with your explainer video to get the most out of it in this blog post: You’ve got yourself an explainer video… Now what?.
Interested in having an explainer video produced? Got a question? Feel free to shoot us an email!
