Everything You Need to Know About Whiteboard Animation: How Marketing Has Evolved in Recent Years

As traditional marketing strategies have fallen by the wayside in favor of modern marketing strategies, companies have begun altering their campaigns. Certain marketing strategies, such as social media marketing, have been leading this change with over 90% of companies being expected to integrate marketing strategies via social media. 

With newer forms of marketing such as social media marketing taking over the field, advertisements have become shorter. Given the smaller time, marketers need to figure out unique ways to get as much information across in as short a time as possible. As a result, animation has become the forefront of marketing, with whiteboard animation leading the charge. 

What is Whiteboard Animation?

For those unfamiliar with this style of animation, whiteboard animation is a video style where it appears as if a hand is drawing illustrations on a screen. These illustrations could be words, visuals, and much more. Typically, it is drawings of stick figures with speech bubbles that are accompanied by a voice over that speaks the lines. 

Most of the time, accredited whiteboard animation companies develop a script similar to a commercial script that outlines what the message of the advertisement should be. In most cases, this process will follow the below steps:

1. A whiteboard animation company will work with a company to understand the point of the ad
2. Using the above information, the whiteboard animation company will develop a script for the animation
3. The initial script is written out and drawn to create a story from nothing
4. The crude drawing for the script will be officially animated and voice will be matched to the art
5. Finally, the crude drawing will be converted into fully rendered drawings with a drawing hand that appears to be creating the images
6. Sound effects will be added to add extra ambiance to the animation

Benefits of Whiteboard Animation

When considering integrating whiteboard animation into your current marketing strategy, there are a number of key benefits to consider:

• Unique advertising style that shows a product or service in a unique way
• Whiteboard animations often have an uplifting feel to them that makes the video appealing
• Whiteboard animation is versatile and can be applied to a number of different types of fields
• Whiteboard animation can help to reduce the bounce rate from your website
• Whiteboard animations can often show smaller points in an advertisement that normally wouldn’t have been covered

Drawbacks of Whiteboard Animation

However, before making the dive into partnering with a whiteboard animation company, there are a number of drawbacks to keep in mind: 

• Whiteboard animations can quickly become boring if they run too long
• Whiteboard animation relies on a great script
• Whiteboard animation is not character driven as it is with commercials
• Whiteboard animation can be expensive for certain types of advertisements

How Much Does Whiteboard Animation Cost?

The price for a whiteboard animation project can differ depending on complexity, length, and a number of other factors. With a price of around $1,500 per minute on average, though, whiteboard animation projects can be relatively cheap as most advertisements do not last longer than this amount of time. This means that companies of all sizes can find use out of whiteboard animation 

Common Use Cases for Whiteboard Animation

In most cases, whiteboard animation is used as an explainer video to sell a product or service. While the actual uses for whiteboard animation can vary drastically based on this, some of the most common uses are for:

• TED Talks
• Unique music videos interlaid with actors
• Book promotions
• TV advertisements
• Product advertisements
• Messages regarding a service

How to Know if Whiteboard Animation is Right for Your Organization

Understanding whether or not whiteboard animation is the right marketing choice for your organization can be difficult, but there are a few guiding questions to consider:

1. What is the budget you have set for the individual marketing project and does whiteboard animation fit into that budget?
2. What is your product or service, and can it be accurately portrayed via a whiteboard animation project?
3. Will you customer base get any value from a whiteboard animation project or is the topic serious enough to warrant a different form of marketing?

Whiteboard animation marketing can be applied to a number of different businesses, but it isn’t the right choice for every organization. Consider the needs of your business and what type of marketing would be most effective prior to partnering with a whiteboard animation company. 

Alternatives to Whiteboard Animation to Consider

As mentioned, animation is a growing form of marketing due to how versatile it is. If whiteboard animation isn’t the right form of marketing for you, however, there are a number of alternatives to keep in mind:

• 2D animation for websites or social media marketing purposes
• 3D animations for social media marketing or commercials
• Combining live-actions commercials with animation to bolster the message of an advertisement

Tips for Bolstering Your Overall Marketing Strategy

There are a few general tips you can use to bolster your overall marketing strategy. Use some of the following to bolster your marketing success:

• Identify your target niche to ensure your advertisements are more applicable
• Stay on brand with your product or service to remain relevant
• Focus on enhancing the search engine optimization on your site
• Study data from your consumers to better optimize your marketing campaigns
• Poll your customers to see what topics would be most useful
• Develop the ROI for your campaign

Grow your organization today

Whether or not your organization has utilized whiteboard animation in the past, integrating it into your current marketing strategy can give you a unique way to get the word out about your product or service. Beyond this, focus on developing your digital marketing campaigns to target specific niches of people who would be most interest in your product. Build out your digital presence and brand awareness as a whole to start enhancing the success of your marketing.