Your brand’s logo talks to your customers before you start a conversation with them. In fact, by the time they observe your logo they already have an opinion about your brand. And it is by this one visual element that they will mostly remember your brand in the years to come. Or forget it completely.
So, it’s clear that your brand’s logo design plays a pivotal role in branding. But have you ever considered animating your brand’s logo? If you haven’t already, you should give it a try.
Let’s tell you why. Take a look at Google’s logo below. Compare the impact the static and animated logos have on you and then decide for yourself whether your brand needs logo animations.
Animated logos are fun, engaging, and easy to remember too. So, if you want to make your customers stop and notice your brand, a logo animation might be that one little push your marketing strategy needs.
When we talk about logo animations, it could be something as simple as a 2-second transition effect or a short video of up to 10 seconds. You can then use it directly as a video or as a GIF to add to your social media posts, marketing videos, YouTube content, emails, digital display loops, and more. Before we get into all those details, let’s talk about the benefits of using an animated logo.
Reasons why your brand needs logo animations
Win the war for consumer attention
As you scroll through a web page with static content, if a moving object catches your attention, would you not be tempted to take a closer look? That’s the power of adding motion or animation in some form to your website or app interface. And if this motion is in your animated logo, it can be a boost to your branding as well.
See more: https://www.kimp.io/our-work/video-samples/
You can use animated logos to hold customers back a bit longer in your business blog or have them pay attention to your social media post. We’ll talk more about the many ways in which you can use your logo animations later. But for now, you should understand that logo animations are great scroll-stoppers.
Bring your brand’s story to life
There is almost always an interesting story behind every brand. And the ones that successfully convey their stories to the people they connect with make the most impact. By telling your customers your brand’s story, you make an emotional connection with them.
Your logo animations could be useful in telling your brand’s story with regards to:
- How your brand was created
- What it’s all about
- What your brand values the most
With this, customers get to know your brand a little more, and in turn they will be able to trust your brand a little more too. Using animated logos in storytelling changes the branding game for your business. So, you don’t just earn new customers but also manage to retain them longer.
Better brand awareness
There are so many brands out there. And many of them offer the same services and products as you do. And almost all of them have professional logos as well. If you want your branding efforts to be successful you need to get creative.
Creative logo designs are essentials in branding. But to really make a difference, essentials are not enough. You need to surprise your audience and move them emotionally. And that’s precisely what a logo animation can do.
You can improve brand awareness by using your logo animation to leave a lasting impact on your customers. It can also be used to show them how your brand does things differently and why they should choose you over the others.
Animated logos that convey your brand’s strengths and showcase its competitive advantage will make it easier for customers to remember the brand. In fact, the logo animation will strengthen the impact created by the brand’s static logo itself.
Embrace trends with animations
You notice a new logo trend in the world of design. But you had only designed your logo a few months ago. Or, you are afraid that changing your logo frequently might be bad for your brand identity. You are absolutely right.
A brand’s logo should not be drastically altered unless there is a pressing cause that calls for a logo redesign. This could be when the brand adds new products or services or changes its business goals or target audience. So, you cannot keep changing your main logo. But you can always play with your logo animations to keep up with the changing trends.
You can also keep adding fresh new animations to your logo to keep up with seasonal trends. For example, to show customers that your brand is all prepped up for the holiday season with the Christmas sales lined up, you could have a simple logo animation that shows your logo putting on a Santa hat.
When you use the same animated logo across all the posts pertaining to that particular season, customers will start connecting with the campaign better. Such small creative tweaks to give your logo a seasonal makeover through animation will improve your communication with customers.
The many ways to use your animated logo
Now that you know the benefits of animated logos, you should also understand where and how to use them. The concept of using animation to draw attention to a logo is not new. Does the roar of a lion remind you of the logo of Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer aka MGM studios with its roaring lion? You are not alone! That’s the impact of accenting your logo design with animations. You leave a lasting impact.
Here are a few ways to use your animated logo to make a mark that lasts:
1) Bring your emails to life
Email design trends come and go, but there is one aspect of your email that will always make an impact and that is your email signature. Using powerful brand signatures can help improve the impact of your branded email designs.
Animated logos in the form of GIFs will be creative email signatures in branding. This one little animation can make most customers stop and look at what is in the email. You can use seasonal animations or animations that complement the campaign you are announcing through your email.
2) Begin business presentations with a bang
When you are making a business presentation to your investors, a strong logo animation right at the beginning will ensure that you have their full attention. The ability to creatively tell a story in a few seconds can paint a good picture of your brand in front of your investors.
In such cases, a crisp animation that showcases the strengths of your brand will also show your investors how serious you are about executing your idea.
3) Set a style for your social media videos
If you look at most of the successful YouTube channels, most have a standard intro or outro animation, or both. This helps in creating familiarity for your viewers. Using your logo animation as this opening or closing element in your video will strengthen your brand. In fact, you can use this concept almost everywhere you use videos in marketing including video ads.
4) Make your websites more engaging
Statistics show that most users spend 88% more time on a website that has video content in it. This means that your logo animation video can work in two ways for your brand.
An animated logo helps in capturing and retaining customer attention, which means that they will be spending more time on your site. When the visitors spend more time on your site, it starts performing better in search engine ranking as well.
The other benefit is that customers will remember your logo better when they see the logo animation on the website. So, the next time they come across an ad or a social media post from your brand they will be able to recognize your brand instantly. Brand recall would thus be possible, and substantially improved, even in a few impressions.
FAQs
- Are logo animations a must in marketing? Some brands do well even without logo animations. But knowing how tough branding can be in a competitive market, you always need something creative to make your brand stand out. Dwindling attention span, brands getting more and more creative in their marketing efforts and a whole lot of other things can make your branding efforts irrelevant in no time. If you do not want your marketing efforts to look outdated, incorporating logo animations and refreshing them periodically will be useful.
- Can small businesses and startups benefit from logo animations? There is a common misconception that fancy logo animations are only for big brands. But the truth is that even small brands can benefit a great deal from simple animated logos. These animations added to your logos can give your marketing efforts a strong foundation. They will also help you establish your stance amongst the competition right from the beginning. When your brand is still new, you can use logo animations to show customers what your brand actually does and why it deserves their attention.
- What is the ideal duration of a logo animation? There is no hard and fast rule but the key is to keep it as short as possible. Shorter videos make smaller and easier-loading GIFs to use in emails and more. Try to keep your logo animations shorter than 10 seconds. If the thought of compressing your brand’s message into a short animation sounds intimidating, work with professional designers who are experts in logo design. You might also get a fresh perspective on the ways to animate your static logo.
- Are logo animations expensive to create? Well like every other marketing creative you’ll work on, there are pricey solutions and more budget-friendly options. Of course, the sweet spot is where you find those design solutions that are budget-friendly while still serving up professionally designed creatives.