How Long Does It Take To Produce A Customized Explainer Video?
Are you planning to create a branding strategy for your business? Then this article is for you. Understanding what is an explainer video and its strategic role in brand communication helps frame realistic expectations for the production timeline. An explainer video is one of the primary components to include in your branding. Making a low-quality explainer video might not take up a lot of time. But is it worth it? In fact, a poorly made video can do more harm than good for your brand. It is worth getting the help of a professional animated explainer video production company to create your explainer video.
Creating template videos is your gateway to getting shamed and trolled by your viewers. You don’t want that. Not at all. It can be made in a day’s time though. A well-made explainer video can take up to 5 to 10 weeks based on the quality and availability of the animated explainer video company.
Top-quality videos vs Template videos:
Only when you know the difference in efforts in creating a custom video and a template video will you learn to appreciate the value of a good explainer video. Template videos can be a quick solution if your intention is to show it to a select audience during a presentation and you hardly have a day’s time to prepare something substantial. If you can allocate a budget, have time to create something strategic and are serious about winning the marketing game, then template videos are a big no-no.
A template video is created with a predesigned character with elements and graphics that are predesigned as well. There is nothing special about these videos. Worst case is that your viewers would have seen similar-looking characters and elements earlier in other videos as well. It will not represent your business.
On the other side, custom made explainer videos can take a maximum of 10 weeks (and more based on the scope of the project). Why? Because they cater to your needs. Even the requirements gathering phase might take up a week’s time. The whole point of hiring an animated explainer video production company is to create a video that speaks about your brand in the best way possible.
Let us explain why creating an explainer video takes time:
A custom-made explainer video isn’t a run-of-the-mill solution that can be conjured in a few hours. There is the hard work of different kinds of experts like animators, scriptwriters, designers, editors, illustrators and so on. Understanding the complete process of creating animated explainer video from concept through delivery helps set realistic timeline expectations for each production phase.
Let us explain each stage of the video production process.
Scriptwriting process:
The animated explainer video production company will want to know your goal, target audience, and get more information about the video you want. Based on these inputs, they will prepare a script which you need to ratify so that it is in line with your expectations.
Since this is the first step in the entire process, it can take up some time to ensure that the foundation of your explainer video is strong. For teams working with tight time constraints, understanding how to structure ultra-concise formats through guides like how to make a 30-second explainer video or how to explain complex products with a 90-second explainer video can help streamline the scriptwriting phase.
Storyboarding:
In this process, the actions are sketched on a board. It is a complicated process and can take a few weeks as the illustrators need to create sketch for each step. This will ensure that you will know how the end product will look like. With quality graphics, you can visualize the end product easily thus helping you give proper feedback to suggest changes.
The strategic thinking behind effective storyboarding is detailed in how SaaS explainer videos are made inside our storyboarding process, which reveals how professional teams translate scripts into visual sequences that drive engagement and conversion.
An experienced animated explainer video company will have storyboard illustrators who can ensure that this process is smooth for you.
Graphic Design:
Here comes one of the most important parts of your explainer video. Graphic design makes your brand’s explainer video as appealing as possible. Animated characters, video elements and designs are what makes an explainer video fun to watch. The graphic designers should be skilled enough to create characters that are a close resemblance to your target audience. Ensure that the colours you use for the graphics are also a part of your brand identity. If your aim is to create a terrific one, hire the services of an animated explainer video production company which understands your industry.
Animation:
Once the script, storyboard, characters and other video elements are ready, now is the time to bring it into reality. The animated explainer video company would animate the actions that were a part of the storyboard. The movement and gestures of the characters make a lot of difference in the way your target audience perceives the video, so make sure that it hits the right spots.
Understanding the animation process behind high-converting SaaS explainer videos demonstrates how strategic animation decisions, pacing, emphasis, visual hierarchy, directly impact viewer engagement and conversion performance.
Taking the services of a professional explainer video production company can give you terrific graphics that your TG would love.
Sound Mixing:
Adding sound and music effects is the final part of the process. A relevant soundtrack can engage your audience. Expect the audience to sit through the entire explainer video if they happen to find the music elements compelling.
For voiceover recording specifically, how to record voice over for explainer videos provides practical guidance on achieving professional audio quality that matches your visual production value.
The sound mixing process should take at least a week’s time. In fact, we believe that the difference between a great explainer video and a mediocre one (assuming that everything else is of the same quality) is the music.
Managing Revisions Without Derailing Timeline
Throughout production, feedback and revision cycles occur at multiple stages. Understanding the explainer video revision process and how to keep quality high without slowing delivery helps teams provide effective feedback that improves the video without endless iteration cycles that extend timelines unnecessarily.
Revision timeline expectations:
- Script revisions: 2-3 rounds (included in Week 1-2)
- Storyboard revisions: 2-3 rounds (included in Week 2-4)
- Animation revisions: 1-2 rounds (adds 1-2 weeks if extensive)
Conclusion:
The most important thing about this entire process is that if even one of these fails, then the entire project would be a disaster. All the elements of the animated explainer video should have to come in place to get the perfect result. Only when you hire the services of a professional animated explainer video company would you get results that will make you proud.
In this article, we have explained why it is better to hire an animated explainer video company instead of making boilerplate videos that will not have any effect on your potential customers. A world-class explainer video starts with a storyboard, script, graphic design, animation and sound mixing. This is why the entire process takes time. If you are strapped for time, template videos might give you a temporary answer, but it is certainly not the solution. A low-quality video will be a huge turnoff for your audience. It can have a huge impact on the way your target audience perceives your company.
At Motionvillee, we provide professional explainer video production services with transparent timelines and structured processes. As a video production company serving businesses across the USA, we’ve created hundreds of animated explainer videos. If you are looking for one too, do not hesitate to call us.
