‘The New Normal’
How is the ‘New Normal’ working out for you? It’s been an ‘interesting’ ride of late, hasn’t it? As businesses across the board reassess priorities, tighten their belts and attempt to re-engage with customers, the importance of effective messaging has never been higher. Let’s not beat around the bush, in these turbulent times, any organisation that cannot effectively and dynamically communicate with its customer-base will struggle to survive.
Not to be underestimated
It’s in this unsettling new world, where only the most dynamic will prosper, that the distinct power of animation shines through. For too long, animation has been synonymous with entertaining children. While only a fool would criticise the classics created by Disney and the like, anyone who underestimates animation, seeing it as exclusively the province of talking mice and fairy-tale castles, does both themselves, and the medium, a huge disservice. Here are 6 reasons why you should use animation.
1. It’s a powerful medium
Animation is a versatile and intensely powerful method of communicating (often complex or sensitive) ideas in an engaging, memorable, way. Quite frankly, the medium’s ability to grab, and hold, our attention is almost magical.
How so? Animation stimulates both sides of the brain at once. As a result, the viewer remembers 58% more of any communicated message than if the same information were disseminated via the written word. Indeed, the brain processes text 60,000 times slower than visual images – so it can be of no surprise that, through adding motion to an image, animation becomes almost irresistible to audiences.
2. It has the the power to cut through ‘noise’
Today, video accounts for a staggering 80% of online traffic. To cut through all this noise, content must be designed to stand out from the pack. Well executed animation does this by getting to the heart of a narrative – telling a story in simple, yet memorable, terms. Like a single-malt whisky, powerful animation is all about distillation. Everything is boiled down to the core message, with irrelevant ‘noise’ stripped away. With animation, at its most powerful, the message is intensified – as clear and distinctive as the unmistakable peaty taste of a precious dram.
3. It’s an e-commerce essential
It is an amazing (but ridiculously little known) truth that animation doubles the amount of time a user stays on a webpage. In e-commerce, 90% of users admit that the medium has a positive impact upon their purchasing decisions. With undeniably impressive benefits like these to support it, it’s understandable that many have mistakenly assumed that animation is prohibitively expensive.
4. It’s not expensive
Animation is certainly an art, there is no doubting that. Unfortunately (somehow along the way) a myth has arisen that animation costs as much as a work by an old master, the truth is quite different. In fact, it’s difficult to think of a medium that offers a better return on investment. Animated content has longevity and a versatility that make it amazingly cost-effective.
5. It’s fundamentally versatile
Animated content is uniquely versatile. It can be reconfigured time and again to fulfill emerging messaging needs and priorities. Part of animation’s power is it’s never set in stone. Any piece can be re-edited, re-voiced, or re-contextualized to fulfill the dynamic needs of the moment. The same cannot be said of a glossy promo shot with the latest here-today-gone-tomorrow reality star.
6. So, what is the power of animation?
Animation grabs the viewer, holds their attention and provides (easily digestible) narratives that linger in the consciousness.
Ironically, it speaks to the power of animation that if this content had been animated (rather than written), you’d have engaged with, digested and acted upon my words some time ago!
Take a look at some of the animations we’ve created at Pushed over the last few years.