Animation has the power to move; not just literally but emotionally. One well-crafted piece of animated mastery could bring a whole audience to tears, make them laugh for days or even awaken feelings film simply can’t.
Recently, we chatted about how animation can be used to convey grown up emotions and essentially, that’s the essence of thoughtful marketing. Understanding the emotions of your audience is the key to any good marketing campaign and sometimes, the strongest message isn’t communicated through words. Explaining a product or service in a simple, engaging way, using vibrant, relevant visuals is a fresh take on the traditional sell.
“Animation’s ability to engage with an audience on a deeper level is unique and creates a much more meaningful connection with the brand.”
Animation’s ability to engage with an audience on a deeper level is unique and creates a much more meaningful connection with the brand. By harnessing an innovative animation conception and standing out from the marketing crowd, you’re more likely to find yourself with an audience ready and raring to interact. With this in mind, we scoured the web for our favourite animated marketing videos, to kick start your creative juices.
Lyft – Colour
Taking the humble brand story and turning it into a tumbling tale of colour and character, Lyft’s ‘Origin story’ is a great example of how animation can be used to tell a surprising story. Utilising almost every colour in the rainbow, the animation transitions through modern, vibrant scenes – fit for the millennial generation – and adds a touch of emotion to the brand. Harking back to a neon, 80’s world, swirling with modern technology and hyper real scenes, it’s a perfect example of how animation can create brand loyalty and empathy.
Kapersky – 3D
Moving from the modern to the dizzying heights of the future, Kapersky Lab’s ‘Cybersecurity movie’ has all the hype of a Hollywood blockbuster with an incredibly real message. Inspired by the likes of ‘The Matrix’ and ‘Bladerunner’, it dips into a 3D mapped world where the digital networks around us fuse into a reality protected solely by Kapersky. Crafting impressive cityscapes, streamlined highways and server rooms even the most seasoned hackers could only dream of, it demonstrates how 3D animation can be used to convey key features of a product, in a much more relevant, engaging way.
Nexmo – Design
Lead by illustrative design, Nexmo’s marketing film for their messaging app is made for modern life. Recognising their audience lives out their life online, Nexmo uses bold, stylish design to tap into the socially connected world and play with the mixed media format to craft a unique animation. From blocky search bars to Insta-perfect plates of brunch, it’s a lesson in design led animation and how you don’t have to stick to just one style of animation to create a great piece of content.
E*Trade – Photoreal
So, animation can only be abstract, right? Wrong. If you want to transcend the realm of the screen and bring animated elements to the real world, this mind bending piece from ETrade is a good place to start. Showcasing how animation doesn’t need to be graphic or cartoon-like to be effective, each part of the photo-real picture lines up perfectly to give the audience a bigger picture of the brand. Breaking apart what ETrade does in the day to day, it’s a fluid animation which shows how you can think differently about your marketing.
Nike – Textures
From photo real to the surreal and sublime, Nike’s ‘What’s your Air Max’ is a walk on the abstract animation side. Crafting a variety of different textures to market their Air Max Day, it’s both simple and effective in execution. Keeping the product at the centre, Nike uses its signature colours to construct a swirling, factory world where the Max is king and each texture pops out of the screen. Perfectly made for the social world, the animation works hand in hand with the message and delivers it in bright, bitesize, format.
So there you go! Now you’ve seen some suitably bright and bold animations which flip marketing on its head, why not have a read of some of our top tips for making brilliant animated marketing videos and think about making some of your own.
- Audience – Your audience is much more likely to remember content which demonstrated original thought in an engaging and innovative new way. Think about how and where they see content.
- VR – Why does your marketing film need to be a video? Why not craft an animated VR experience to thoroughly immerse your audience.
- Story – Harness the emotive power of video to tell a story that relates to your audience and communicates a message in a real, human way.
- Formats – Think about what animated format would best suit your video. Cartoon, photo real, abstract, mechanical? There is no limit with animation.
- Original –Don’t just convert your blog into a video. Create a unique piece of content which works with your copy or campaign