Certain video types have particular superpowers.
For example, you’ll find that cartoon animation can easily evoke people’s nostalgia, because it resembles the TV shows they used to watch when they were younger. Behind-the-scenes videos make the audience feel like they’re part of a community because they get a peek into the inner workings of their favorite brands, and so on…
Whiteboard videos have a very interesting superpower as well: With meaningful visuals and interesting animations, they evoke the board-and-marker educational experience of classrooms, but with an engaging and entertaining bent that keeps audiences hooked.
Which makes them the ideal vehicle to make complex topics or products feel approachable and accessible to just about anyone!
They do such a good job of it that almost every skilled video company out there uses them to further their clients’ branding efforts. Today, we are going to talk a bit about why, and more importantly how that works!
A White Background, a Black Doodle, and a Drawing Hand… Is That All?
So, yes. The whiteboard video style brings a lot to the video marketing campaigns table, and a lot of it stems from its simple-yet-effective formula.
What’s this formula, you may ask? Well, for a whiteboard video to be recognized as one, it needs to have a white background (resembling a board… of course), black lines that resemble what could be done with a marker, and a drawing hand — which gives the impression that there’s someone (an artist) actually drawing on the whiteboard in real time.
And while sounding simple “on paper,” all those animated elements working as one deliver an incredibly effective, engaging medium.
That said, for whiteboard videos to truly work in a marketing setting, you’ll need a bit more than the baseline recipe. You need them to stand out from the crowd, and the formula is just the start!
Effective whiteboard pieces have to leverage the power of subtle content branding to have full effect and remain in their audience’s minds long after they are done watching.
How to (Effectively) Brand a Whiteboard Video
There are plenty of ways to introduce your brand’s unique tone and personality into the video without compromising the whiteboard format. Some are based around the graphics of the video, some to the story and how you build the script and characters as part of your brand.
Use Your Brand’s Color Palette to Generate Brand Awareness
I know what you are thinking: Wait, I thought whiteboard videos had to be black and white! And yes, you are not wrong.
However, even though the classic whiteboard video style is primarily black and white (and that shouldn’t be changed) that’s not the same to say you can’t use any color at all. As a matter of fact, great whiteboard videos should employ some of your brand’s aesthetic cues in ways that reinforce the message you want to get across.
Start by subtly incorporating your brand’s color palette. These don’t have to appear at all times, or in every shot – the primary ones will always be black and white – but you can use them to emphasize specific parts of the video and drive attention to certain elements of your message.
The rule of thumb here is, yes, use your brand’s colors… but not too much! Otherwise you the risk of steering away from the simplicity and streamlined elegance that’s core to the whiteboard video style.
Include Your Logo… Cleverly!
Another crucial way to turn the whiteboard style into something that’s unmistakably part of your brand’s aesthetics is to cleverly include your logo on the video.
What does that mean, exactly? Well, that you shouldn’t just plaster it randomly… or put it in the corner as a mainstay of the piece. Not if your goal is to brand effectively with your piece. Instead, make sure that you add your logo in ways that reinforce – consciously and subconsciously – the story that’s being told.
Have your logo represent something in the piece… have its presence make sense. THAT, is the best way to employ them on your whiteboard video, and get much more than just surface brand awareness.
Write a Captivating Script Tailored to Your Target Audience
If you want your video to remain on your audience’s mind, it needs a great story. By having one that speaks directly to your audience’s interest, your video is not only grabbing their attention and imagination, but also fostering brand love.
Having said all that, also remember that the primary purpose behind creating your piece is to guide your audience through your marketing message without losing them along the way. You shouldn’t have one without the other!
All these objectives should converge in your script, and for that, you need to truly understand your target audience.
If you know your audience enough, you’ll be able to create a story that speaks to them, because your video’s story will be their story too. Usually, whiteboard videos follow the same script structure as a regular explainer video, which is divided into three key stages:
- The What
- The How
- The Why
You begin with the “What,” so you can get to the problem that your potential client has. Let’s say that they are thirsty and they are bored of drinking water. Oh, no, what should they do now?
During the “How”, you’ll show how your potential client will solve their problem. So yes, they’re thirsty, they don’t want to drink water… but they’ve suddenly found something fantastic. Orange Juice™!
And in the end, the “Why,” you’ll tell your audience why Orange Juice™ is so great. It has a lot of vitamin C, it has a pretty color, and what’s more important… it’s not water!
That way, your target audience, which is also thirsty and doesn’t want to drink water anymore, will feel identified and will listen carefully to your message. They’ll end up wanting to put their hands on some of that Orange Juice™!
There’s a good reason why almost every video of this type follows the same structure: It works like a charm.
Have Your Characters Mirror Your Viewers
Your script should be focused on showing a problem (and a solution!) that your audience can identify with. But once you have that down, you should shift your focus to shaping your main characters using your audience as a model.
When it comes to whiteboard animations, that means you have complete creative freedom of how you can portray these characters. Gender, attitude, even movements and reactions! You can customize them to the tiniest little detail and make sure they closely resemble the people watching.
The character of a video aimed to c-level entrepreneurs should look, sound, and act very differently than those from a piece aimed at college students.
The Secret Ingredient to Brand Permanence: Fun!
Yes, whiteboard videos give you an excellent template to put viewers in a receptive frame of mind, and engage their attention long enough to deliver your marketing message. However, the only way that message is going to stay with them is if they walk away happy with having watched it!
Audiences are quick to relate the emotion they feel when engaging with a piece of content, to the piece itself – and, by extension, the brand it represents! If you successfully tied positive emotions like that to your piece, they’ll be far more likely to remember your video going forward.
It’s worth mentioning that you can accomplish the same thing by prompting other types of strong emotions in your viewers, but those rarely match the objective of most marketing pieces.
Don’t hesitate to make your video light, cheerful, and intriguing. If you are going after brand permanence, having short, fun, entertaining pieces will always work better than having long-winded, serious ones.
Let’s Wrap It Up!
When they first emerged as a format, whiteboard videos looked rather “homemade” — just charming pieces that seemed to have been made by people recording themselves drawing. Now, they have evolved into truly fantastic, carefully designed pieces with definite marketing objectives.
And they can indeed can be incredibly effective for brand building, if done right.
That means making professionally-looking pieces that add to your company’s credibility, with well-researched audiences’ backdrops for characterization, and the right tone to glue them to their minds!
If you haven’t already, it might be time you started taking advantage of the format, and added one to your video marketing strategy!
Take the advice we talked about to heart, and you’ll have a whiteboard animation that not only works to further your objectives, but also becomes impossible to forget to everyone that watches it. ☺
