How Animation Can Become a Part of Your Digital Marketing
Digital marketing evolves with each passing year. Today’s efforts are vastly different from when the internet became a home staple 20 years ago. Technology is significantly more sophisticated and accessible, allowing businesses of all sizes and industries to compete through refined digital marketing efforts.
Unlike the internet, animation has been present in our daily lives for over a century. Despite the passage of time, animation remains a strong connecting point for artists and marketers to spark an emotional reaction and connection with their target audience.
Here’s why you should use animation in your digital marketing strategy and how to execute your plan through each medium.
Types of Animation in Digital Marketing
There are many forms of animation in the world, but when used in this context, there are only a few that apply to digital marketing. While many consider animation to be synonymous with cartoons, it actually indicates photography or art in motion, falling under the broader umbrella of video marketing.
Modern marketers typically rely on one of two animation types in marketing: GIF animation and SVG animation.
GIF Animation
The term GIF has evolved from industry jargon to a colloquial word in our cultural vocabulary. While most consumers associate the term with a small audio-less video clip— a moving meme— the acronym actually stands for Graphics Interchange Format. GIF files aren’t actually videos; they’re a collection of sequential images brought together to create a scene (hence why there’s no audio).
Using GIF animation is beneficial because anyone can create a simple GIF to use in their marketing efforts. For example, a personal trainer can take a longer video of them displaying proper lifting form and turn it into a simple gif to drop into an email, so their client can save it on their phone.
There are two significant downsides to GIFs. One, these files are quite large and slow down page loading rates when used in digital marketing campaigns. Second, they’re offered at a set size and will become pixelated if you try to scale them up. You can watch anime online on kissanime
SVG Animation
SVG stands for Standard Vector Graphic and has become a revolutionary device in the digital marketer’s toolbox. Rather than being image0based, SVG is text-based and can be edited through coding. SVG files are sharp regardless of the sizing and offer a smaller file format for better loading times.
As SVG animation has become more commonplace in the past decade, there are several tools that allow designers to integrate SVG animations into marketing materials, apps, and other web-based formats to create an appealing user interface and engaging marketing collateral.
Benefits of Animation in Digital Marketing
Standing out against the competition is vital for success— especially for freelancers and contractors competing with big companies. Here’s an exploration of the many benefits of incorporating animation into digital marketing.
Eye-Catching and Visually Stimulating
The primary reason for using animation in digital marketing is that it stands out in a way stagnant imagery never will. For those in creative industries, the power of visual stimulation in building a brand and attracting clients is reason enough.
Well-placed animations present color and movement that are impossible to ignore. As mobile internet use increases with each passing year and quick scrolling has become the norm, an animation that can stop someone in their tracks is a powerful weapon.
Increases Retention
In 2007, UPS changed the marketing world with their whiteboard animation— an advertisement that revolutionized animation in digital marketing. This monumental event took place on the cusp of the social media revolution, going viral before the term existed.
This style of animation increases memory uptake and retention by 15%. While standing out from the competition is a benefit on its own, staying top of mind is even better.
Cost-Effective
Creating branded visuals is costly and time-consuming— especially for video marketing purposes. Creating animations or having a designer make them for you is more affordable than putting together a video shoot or photo session.
Quickly Conveys Information
Using video animation allows you to convey information more efficiently than text alone. As the data is also easier to digest, your target audience is more likely to consume it. This medium is an excellent alternative to text-heavy content.
Creates a Brand Identity
Many brands build an identity around animations and graphics. The meditation app, Headspace, is well-known for its colorful characters and bold brand presence. Similarly, Slack has perfected the use of the whiteboard animation strategy and has built a brand based on colorful graphics and animation.
Appeals to Algorithms
Video and animated content appeals more to the various algorithms online, from Google to Instagram. Incorporating this type of visual component into your content will help improve your reach and rankings.
No Limits in Presentation
Finally, there are no limits to what your animations can present to your audience. You may envision an animation of a rocket launching into space to signify that the stars are in reach when trying to help your clients attain their vision. Unfortunately, hiring an actor and sending them to space in a rocket isn’t feasible; creating an animation, however, is.
How to Use Animation in Online Branding
Before looking at the various methods for using animation in digital marketing, it’s best to take a step back and look at the overarching branding umbrella. Incorporating animation into your brand strategy opens opportunities to include these visuals in various aspects of your digital marketing.
Creating a Signature Look
Some businesses and entrepreneurs build their brands around animation and illustrated graphics. Headspace, mentioned above, is a prime example. In some industries, there are only so many relevant photos you can share. For Headspace, sharing visuals of someone’s thoughts or mindfulness practice is intangible; creating a brand based on illustrations and animations brings it to life.
Creating an aesthetic and visual brand elements, like style, color palette, and tone can be hard to communicate in digital marketing. Relying on imagery and stylized shoots for fresh marketing content requires ample resources. Dropping content into a colorful on-brand social media template with animations does not.
Consider whether building your brand around animations and illustrations is right for your business. Many designers and freelancers opt to go this route to showcase their skills and share information in a visually-stimulating way.
Personifying Characters
Some of the most memorable brands have a character that personifies the company. In other words, it gives a human element to non-human characters or components to spark an emotional connection with the target audience.
A prime example would be The Geico Gecko. Lizards have nothing to do with insurance. As a consumer, you’re more likely to connect with and remember the gecko, so when you need insurance, Geico comes to mind. M&Ms are another example of brands successfully leveraging personification via animation.
Consider how you can incorporate personification into your brand to connect with your audience and how animation can make it possible.
Animated Logo
Many brands leverage animation as a way to bring their logo to life. The 99designs logo uses animation to add motion and color, imprinting the brand in the viewer’s mind. This approach is particularly fitting for a business focused on design and innovation and encourages emulation by the design community.
Google is also renowned for its use of animation to bring the homepage logo to life. Whether it’s showcasing the features of the G Suite toolbox or highlighting an important day in history, if Google is doing it, it must be right.
How to Use Animation in Social Media
Social media is often viewed as a pillar of modern digital marketing. Instagram alone generated $13.86 billion in ad revenue in the US in 2020, and those numbers are expected to keep climbing.
So how can freelancers and entrepreneurs hope to compete on such an overwhelming platform? Leveraging animation is a start.
Creating Video Graphics
Animated images and graphics upload into social media platforms as a video. As mentioned before, this appeals to the algorithms, ensuring your content gets more organic reach than it would otherwise. Even out-of-the-box design tools like Canva are offering simple animations to take advantage of this opportunity.
Create simple graphics that offer scrolling text or moving design elements. While it might seem superfluous, a few moving squiggle designs can make a significant impact on social media algorithms.
Increasing Engagement and Reach
Engagement is measured differently across the various platforms, but the key component is the amount of time spent on a post. For Instagram, someone must pause on your post for three seconds to count as an engagement. While that amount of time may seem insignificant, it’s a long pause in a fast-paced digital ecosystem.
As people are more likely to stop and watch a video rather than read a block of text, using animation can help increase your engagement and reach by finding that sweet spot between the algorithm and human behavior.
Animated Posts as Ads and Lead Generators
Finally, animated posts and graphics make fantastic advertisements and lead generators to help you capture data to drive future campaigns. For example, pairing an eye-catching graphic with a link to your email list will help feed prospects into your sales funnel. Then, you can nourish those relationships and push conversions through email marketing efforts.
How to Use Animation in Blogging
The concept of blogging may seem like ancient history, but long-form content still plays a pivotal role in Google rankings and web content. Here are a few ways you can effectively use animation in your text-dominant blog posts.
Effectively Repurposing Content
Repurposing content is the key to long-lasting success in the digital marketing landscape. If you’re a designer who crafted a great blog piece on how your target market can improve their website design, you have everything you need to make a great animation. Put together a simple animation with the key takeaways from your article, and post it. You can add it as a graphic within the blog post to drive organic traffic from Google or use it as a social media grab to capture people in your funnel.
Creating animations of existing content is an effective way to keep content fresh. Don’t reinvent the wheel; animate it.
Enhancing SEO
As mentioned previously, incorporating visual content in your website helps improve Search Engine Optimization (SEO). You can enhance the effects by using SEO best practices when uploading your image. For example, adding alt text, using relevant keywords, a title, and a description as needed.
Two technical components Google looks for when ranking results are load time and image size, as they go hand-in-hand. Using SVG animations will help minimize load time and image size while presenting high-quality graphics and appealing to the Google crawler.
Improve User Experience
User interface (UI) designers play the vital role of incorporating responsive design into websites. It’s this aspect of web design that makes buttons “click” when you press them and shows that the actions you’ve taken are actually doing something.
Animations play an important role in creating a compelling user interface, which subsequently impacts the user experience. The better the user experience as someone navigates your website, the more likely they are to stay and come back.
How to Use Animation in Email Marketing
Email marketing is still incredibly effective, especially when paired with a robust social media marketing strategy. Using animations and video elements can help improve your click-through rate and conversions. Here’s how.
Captivating Hero Videos
The hero image refers to the photo depicted at the top of an email. It’s typically the first thing someone who opens the email will see and sets the tone for everything else. Using an animation or hero video can create a more engaging and eye-catching first impression that demands attention.
Make Text Pop Out
Using animation throughout the email to highlight important information can also improve conversions. For example, if you have text that highlights a sale, animating that text so it flashes or changes color will draw the viewer’s attention to where you want it to go.
Display Numerous Products
One challenge with email marketing is that you rely on the viewer to scroll down and view the whole email. You can use animation to create a “one-page” experience that doesn’t rely on the viewer scrolling to see the entire offering. For example, a clothing company could have a single animated image that cycles through five different products in the hero image.
Create an Immersive Experience
Finally, you can use animation to create an immersive experience that elicits an emotional reaction. For example, if you’re celebrating your ten-year anniversary as a freelance designer, you could incorporate confetti into your email.
Final Thoughts
When it comes to using animation in digital marketing, there are endless opportunities. Consider how animation aligns with your brand, and create a measurable, sustainable strategy to leverage this powerful marketing tool.