Motion Design for Increasing Conversion
Not many entrepreneurs know about the unique possibilities of motion design and how to revive their business with it. Some people perceive motion design as a tool for the film industry, something that is far away from their activities. Some people think that investing in website animation or video ads is a waste of money. Someone thinks their site is serious, and animation doesn’t belong there. They imagine Mickey Mouse jumping around on their serious page with tables of stock exchange quotations. God forbid! Someone doesn’t mind using motion design but thinks that it will wait.
And it’s wrong. “Not to hurry” in today’s market means the risk of losing it. Motion design is actively replacing outdated static interfaces and advertising from the market. It works miracles for businesses, recovering costs, and generating profit fantastically fast.
As cynical as it may sound, the main goal of motion design is commercial profit. Mickey Mouse has not only generated and continues to generate colossal profits for Disney. This character is more recognizable in the world than Santa, he’s loved and considered a symbol of American pop culture. This is not a product of fleeting fashion — in 2021 Mickey Mouse will turn 93 years old!
Did you know Mickey Mouse has 10 marketing commandments? We’ll cite some of them here. Mickey Mouse knows how to breathe life into a business and give joy to users with the help of motion design!
After familiarizing yourself with the possibilities of motion design, you can choose for yourself what will make exactly your interface (or advertising offer) more effective. The information is relevant to any entrepreneur or company. We hope it will also be interesting to web designers and marketing specialists.
For overview:
Applications of motion design
10 advantages of motion design
Motion design allows you to:
1. Stand out from competitors
Mickey Mouse is a symbol of uniqueness. He’s special, he cannot get mixed up with someone else. Now the mouse is at an unattainable height, but let’s not forget that his creator started from scratch. Mickey Mouse owes everything not only to the talent of the author but also to the motion design and marketing.
Mickey Mouse’s (more precisely, Walt Disney’s and Marty Sklar’s) advice:
“Public needs to know who you are and what differentiates you from other institutions they may have seen.”
Motion design has many tools in its arsenal that work for:
- uniqueness of the brand;
- uniqueness of the trade proposal;
- uniqueness of UX/UI;
- making an impression;
- awaking the interest.
Professionally made motion design will make your proposal unique, the presentation of information — special and memorable. Uniqueness is, first of all, new clients who become regular and return to the brand again and again.
In an increasingly competitive environment, motion design helps a company or entrepreneur to stand out from competitors on the Internet, expand the audience, increase conversions, and therefore profit. To a beginning entrepreneur, motion design will help make a name and an impression.
2. Draw attention
People instinctively notice everything that moves. You have an important business on hand, but as soon as the fly flies by, your glance will automatically follow the trajectory of its flight, and you’ll be distracted from work. Any movement instantly grabs our attention. This is why motion design is a powerful marketing tool. With its help, it’s easy to interest the user, to emphasize the main thing, to direct attention in the right direction.
Knowing what to focus users’ attention on, you can use the animation “pointwise” and focused, highlighting the most important.
3. Improve UX/UI, create unique user experience
Motion design improves and enriches the user experience. When a part of the software has sequential animation, it feels natural to interact with. Animation makes contact with the interface clearer and easier. People more quickly understand the relationships between elements, determine the availability of their actions, and the results of actions. The animation is needed when changing screens, for microinteraction with elements, in waiting mode. By creating connection points at each stage of the user’s journey, keeping them interested, animation leads the user to the desired action.
Dynamic “communication” is perceived by users as lively and responsive, and the interface seems smarter. People reflexively transfer these qualities to the brand itself.
Mickey Mouse’s advice not only applies to amusement parks but is also actual for interfaces:
“Lead visitors from one area to another by creating visual magnets and giving visitors rewards for making the journey.”
The interface is basically the same park. Motion design helps to:
- improve navigation
- draw attention to the most important things
- speed up the information perception
- create a unique user experience
A static illustration cannot capture a person’s attention for a significant time and motivate them to “walk through the park” in the right direction. Only dynamic images can hold attention for a considerable time and control it. Moreover, motion design literally draws in and “immerses” the user into the content. It’s possible to “get stuck” on a website or in an application only thanks to the motion design.
4. Make information perception easier
As they say, a picture is worth 1000 words. With motion design, you can create a kind of “visual story”. It also helps to structurize complex information and convey a message in a simple, clear, and compelling way.
Mickey Mouse also talks business here:
“If you have a lot of information divide it into distinct, logical, organized stories, people can absorb and retain information more clearly if the path to the next concept is clear and logical.”
Motion design is essential when it’s necessary to:
- Save time
In advertising and infographics, shortness and clarity are key parameters due to time limitations. Motion design speeds up the delivery of any information.
What is explained in a 1,500-word article can be shown in a minute.
- Educate
Educational videos or animated drawings help to understand information quickly and easily and remember it better. Motion design is able to instantly show the very essence, making it interesting and colorful.
- Explain the process
“How does it work?”, “How the process goes?” or “How is it made?” — animation demonstrates any processes in a simple, clear, and comprehensible way. Users have neither the time nor the desire to read walls of explanatory texts.
- Visualize data
Any message that abounds with numbers, terms, and facts can be conveyed to viewers in a few seconds. Animation helps create visual hierarchy, organize data, and make it easier to understand.
- Create gamification
Using game mechanics outside of games improves user experience and motivation and significantly increases website conversions as well.
“Give people plenty of opportunity to enjoy themselves by emphasizing ways that let people participate in the experience and by making your environment rich and appealing to all senses.”
5. Present and sell
People tend to buy a product which they can examine from all sides and quickly form a clear picture of it. Motion design will help to present any product, service, project, or information in the most effective, beautiful, and fast way, dynamically show its features and benefits.
Even watching a video less than 10 seconds can help raise brand awareness and build a purchase intent. According to Tubular Insights, 46% of users made a purchase after watching a brand video on social media.
6. Tell the story of the brand
“Use good story telling techniques, tell good stories.”
With help of motion graphics, you can start telling the story of your brand from the first second of interaction with the user. You can broadcast brand values in a matter of seconds.
Mickey Mouse’s valuable advice:
“Resist the temptation to tell too much, to have too many objects, don’t force people to swallow more than they can digest, try to stimulate and provide guidance to those who want more.”
7. Emphasize the logo
Motion design allows you to emphasize anything. Emphasizing the logo to draw attention to it is one option. Animating a logo is a small but effective trick. Animation instantly attracts eyes to the logo, motivating people to look upon it and unwittingly remember it.
50 Best Motion Logos | Cool Logo Animations
8. Engage users
Motion design helps to engage users both interactively and passively.
Active experience most typically is interaction on websites and applications.
Watching video content is a passive experience. Most consumers like to watch, not read. People spend over 6 hours a week watching videos on social media. Many users don’t want to read the content and are more willing to turn into viewers and listeners.
“Keep it up — people expect to get a good show every time.”
Mickey Mouse knows what he’s talking about.
9. Evoke emotions
Emotional contact with users not only inspires confidence and sympathy for the brand in them. Emotions are a trigger that motivates people to take a targeted action (make an order, purchase, subscribe).
Motion design has no peers in creating engaging emotional triggers. It has many tools for emotional involvement. Music, offscreen voice, and visual effects can create an impressive story. You can animate a character or mascot, and they will become a favorite and friend of your users. The character can take any role — be a guide in navigation, assistant, teacher, storyteller, broadcaster of any information. You don’t need to be Disney to create such a character. It may be a small and uncomplicated animation, but the benefits from it are fantastic.
10. Be best remembered
We have already mentioned that video materials are best remembered. However, this topic is worth separate mentioning.
Human short-term memory stores about 7 bits of information during the processing of text information. People don’t memorize texts if their brain doesn’t generate corresponding images when reading them. These “artificial” images are forgotten faster than those actually seen.
Images, especially those supported emotionally, go directly to long-term memory. Dynamic images remain in our memory for a long time, sometimes for life. You can imagine what kind of perspective motion opens up when used purposefully.
Weird and Wonderful Motion Design + Animation
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