An animated explainer video is a fast, fun, and direct way to promote your company’s products or services to potential customers. Within the span of a few minutes or less, you can: 1) tell an engaging story that describes a pain point your customer may be facing, 2) present your business as the solution, and 3) win over your audience with your knowledge and flair for style.
Easily the most important part of the video isn’t actually the fancy visuals themselves, believe it or not – it’s the script. A script is like a map. In it, you’ll develop the goal for the video (i.e., attract new customers, promote a new product) and what story elements you need to reach it.
Below, we’ll take you step by step through the process of how to write a powerful script for your animated explainer video.
1. Research, Research, Research
The first step in writing a script is research.
Before any writing begins, you’ll need to understand your audience on a deep level. There are an infinite number of ways to do so. You can take a survey, visit forums your audience would visit, check social media, read product reviews, etc. There are so many avenues you can take to gather intel.
Ideally, you should be performing as many of these as possible to ensure you really nail down what’s going on inside your audiences’ minds.
You’ll need to answer questions about your audience. Questions such as: What are they looking for? What would make them stop and watch this video? More importantly…
2. Identify The Pain Points
…what are their biggest pain points?
A pain point is a problem that the customer faces. It can be emotional, physical, or mental. Come up with a list of all the pain points you can think of that they may be facing. Then choose one or a few to focus on in your script. Be sure to not focus on too many, otherwise your video script will lose focus and be too long for a short animated explainer video.
Simply by addressing their pain points you’ll build a ton of rapport and trust with your audience.
Empathy is a powerful tool when it comes to selling. By identifying their pain points without them having to tell you, they’ll see you truly “get them”. And we all want to be around people who get us.
This is how you create engagement with your viewers.
3. Craft A Story Framework
Step three is to craft a story framework through which you’ll show your customer’s pain points and your business’s solution to those pain points.
A story framework is simply the term for the story that frames the goal. It presents your product or service in a story that is easy for the audience to digest and compelling enough to want to stick around for.
No one wants to listen to a dry presentation about a product or service. They want it weaved into a story, a story they can be invested in. One that has a clear beginning, middle, and end.
One story framework you can create is presenting a cast of characters that act out the pain points and solutions in a made-up scenario, like a movie scene.
Get creative here. Take inspiration from shows, movies, or great commercials that have stuck with you. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel. Understand what makes that show, movie, or commercial impactful and use it as a framework for your own explainer story.
4. Show The Solution To The Pain Points
Now that you’ve lured your audience in by identifying their pain points and introducing your story, it’s time to show the solution. Remember, this is why they started watching the video in the first place. It’s the whole reason you’re creating an animated explainer. So, don’t mess this part up!
The most important thing to consider is how you’ll be talking about your product. What will you focus on? When you present your solution, it is critical that you highlight product benefits over features. Benefits are more relatable and help your audience see exactly how their life can change.
When it comes to presenting the solution, another thing to keep in mind is your audience’s attention span. So, get to this part quickly to avoid boring your audience with a drawn-out story that doesn’t seem to be getting anywhere. They may stop watching!
Ideally, present your solution within the first 30 seconds of the video.
5. End With A Call To Action
End your animated explainer video script with a call to action. A call to action is when you urge the audience to perform an act, such as contacting your business or signing up for a free trial – whatever it is you want them to do This is an opportunity for you to generate more engagement and more sales for your business.
Need Help With Your Animated Explainer Video Script?
At Explainer Sidekicks, our expert storytellers are here to help you write an amazing script for your one-of-a-kind animated explainer video. Contact us to get started on your next great video project.