Sometimes, it’s not what you’re doing but why you’re doing it - like skydiving. Many committed fans of feet on soil might look up at a skydiver and feel immediate vertigo at the very thought. But the ‘why’ changes everything, when we learn that it’s for charity - even the biggest respecter of gravity can’t help but be impressed by this brave act for a good cause.
The ‘why’ can change everything, not just when it comes to instant anxiety-inducing activities like skydiving, but in the way we shop or relate to our job. When it comes to the business world, our ‘why’ goes beyond simply being our purpose and becomes the reason why people choose us - whether as customers, stakeholders or prospective employees.
Having your ‘why’ is one thing, but often communicating the ‘why’ can be almost as essential. Whiteboard animation is an ideal way to do this, packed with features and primed for uses that will capture your ‘why’ in the detail it needs and take it far and wide.
Why is having a ‘why’ important?
We’ve touched on this already, but ‘whys’ are a wonderful thing. All at once, a ‘why’ is the plane, the skydiver and cause they are face-planting clouds for.
‘Whys’ create the purpose that drives a business forward, creating an overall goal in which all the work done, even if it seems unrelated, contributes to. This ‘why’ then inspires and harmonises your team to give their best effort to their role in order to make the goal a reality. Then, people on the ground (so to speak), whether they are potential new team members, clients or customers, or investors, see your ‘why’ in action and respond to it.
This places your ‘why’ at the heart of your business and makes you stand out from the crowd. Today, people don’t just buy your product, they buy in to your purpose. More than just some fad, The British Academy’s 2020 Future of the Corporation - Purpose Summit looked at the important role purposeful business can play as we face new challenges and develop new technology.
How to find your ‘why’
All this makes finding your ‘why’ or purpose an important consideration. We love this set of questions from Keyhole Marketing founder Joe Dudeck. For anyone thinking about their ‘why’ or purpose, they are a great way of focusing and zeroing in:
What inspired your business idea?
What’s interesting about your founding story?
What is unique about your business?
What problem is your company trying to solve?
How has your business evolved?
What’s your business purpose? Why does your company exist?
Is there a specific cause your business is supporting?
What do you believe in—personally and professionally?
Communicating your ‘why’ with Whiteboard Animation
Once you’ve found your why, whiteboard animation videos are bursting with ways to capture it and communicate your why to the world. We’ve listed seven strengths here, but the creative freedom that comes with whiteboard animation means it is very adaptable to your needs.
1 - Storytelling
One of whiteboard animation’s greatest strengths is its ability to draw on the art of storytelling. Beginning with a script that captures your essence and values, studios transform these words and ideas into rich and engaging visual storytelling. This storytelling is important because it is the vehicle for your messages, information and calls to action. Storytelling isn’t just any vehicle however, it’s the perfect medium to connect with people at a deep level and present information in a meaningful way.
The power of storytelling is highlighted by this Content Marketing Institute interview with Joe Lazauskas, Contently's Head of Content and co-author of The Storytelling Edge. He explains, 'as human beings we are programmed for stories. They’re part of who we are. It’s how we evolved to understand our place in the world.’
2 - Connecting Ideas
An early stage blueline from our animation for Octopus Communities.
When it comes to communicating the ‘why’, there can be several parts, which at first glance may not seem closely linked with each other. Whiteboard animation videos can also help here. Through visual storytelling and visual devices such visual metaphors, icons and centerpieces, whiteboard animation can connect different ideas together and show how they relate to each other.
This allows you to link together the different parts of your ‘why’ and your different processes for making it a reality, all the while making the explanation engaging and understandable. We enjoyed doing this for a charity called Octopus Communities, adapting their logo to show and connect the values that underpin their work.
3 - Showing the bigger picture
One of the most amazing things about a ‘why’ and a purpose is that it combines small scale ideas and activities into one big vision, uniting staff, inspiring clients and guiding the organisation. With this in mind, it’s as important to show the big picture as it is to show the small steps that make it possible.
Whiteboard animation is well placed to do this, partly through storytelling and whiteboard animation’s creative freedom, but also through its ability to layer information. This allows ideas to develop and grow over the course of the video, reflecting the origins and key details but also the bigger picture of who you are and what your purpose is.
4 - Explaining the complex and the abstract
This point sees the return of our friend, the visual metaphor. As ideas get more complicated or abstract, it can become harder to visualise them and present them on screen in a way that engages viewers and explains them well. Using visual metaphors, whiteboard animation videos can translate the most complex idea into a more understandable visual metaphor.
This makes the information more engaging and memorable and is especially useful when the ideas cover a wide array of different subjects or are hard to capture through shot footage.
5 - Combining rich illustration, voiceovers, scripts and animation
Time and attention are commodities that are only getting more valuable, so it’s important to make the most of them. Whiteboard animation videos make the most of these by using multiple information streams. Beginning with the script, a visual narrative is created, full of informative and charming illustrations.
This script goes on to be read out by the voiceover artist and appears visually on screen as text, so it really is the gift that keeps on giving. When animation is added, that gives your whiteboard animation four streams of communication at once, allowing you to communicate a lot of information about your ‘why’ in a short amount of time.
There is another benefit to all these communication streams. Whether it’s visual, auditory, kinesthetic or something else - everyone has a preferred way of receiving information. By including four in your video, you increase the chances of people engaging with the information and reacting well.
6 - Making information understandable, entertaining and memorable
We helped pioneer the whiteboard animation medium while creating the RSA Animates series. Today, the series has had over 100,000,000 views. The views and the comments showed that people were finding the video informative and entertaining, and as its early success became clear, we wanted to find out more about the way people related to whiteboard animation.
Working with Richard Wiseman, Professor of the Public Understanding of Psychology at the University of Hertfordshire, we carried out some whiteboard animation research. Together we compared ‘talking head’ videos and whiteboard animation videos, and found that compared with the ‘talking head’ video, the whiteboard animation was:
66% more likely shareable
Resulted in a 15% increase in information retention
33% more entertaining
Our findings highlighted the ability of whiteboard animation to make information understandable, entertaining and memorable - all key factors in communicating the ‘why’ of a business. There is more to whiteboard animation’s capacity for this, however. Illustrations and visuals are designed uniquely for your message and audience - ensuring they tell your story in the ideal way, and in a way your audience will enjoy and relate to.
7 - Versatile comms that work on every device, social channel and website
Crafting your message into a format which is engaging, memorable and informative is one thing, but how can you be sure it will reach the biggest audience? Whiteboard animation can help here as well; it is able to perform well whether viewed on a smartphone or a smart TV.
The need for this versatility is highlighted in research by Google and Ipsos, who found that 3 out of 4 adults reported watching videos on a mobile device while at home. Further, Nielsen found that in an average week just on mobiles, YouTube reaches more adults 18+ during prime time than any cable network does. These highlight the reach of videos and prevalence of mobiles in the way people access content. It’s important that the experience here is as good as it would be on a tablet or desktop.
Whiteboard animation videos don’t just work well at informing people across different devices, they’re also great at communicating your ‘why’ in a whole range of digital settings. These include:
YouTube, the internet’s second biggest search engine, which reached 3 billion searches a month back in 2017
Social media networks, which have 4.33 billion social users around the world
Homepages and landing pages, which have a 2.6 times longer dwell time when a video is used
Understanding our ‘why’ can take time, but once we know it, it’s important to share that. Whether it’s members of the team, clients or customers, stakeholders or the public at large - getting our ‘why’ out into the world lets everyone know who we are and what we’re here to do.
Whiteboard videos offer a lot of tools that can help with this, from embracing the art of storytelling to taking your message across devices and platforms. As whiteboard animation pioneers, seeing whiteboard animation used for the sharing of important messages and ideas like this is an honour. If you are considering whiteboard animation as a way of sharing your ‘why’ with the world, this blog post on storytelling techniques for business has more tips and tools.
We’d love to bring your ‘why’ to life through whiteboard animation, book a discovery call today!
If you could pin down the essence of truth, could you draw it? That’s the question that lingered in my mind after speaking with Dan Ariely for my RSA Animate documentary—a project allowing me to reconnect with some of the most compelling thinkers of our time.