17 Secrets Behind the Best SaaS Explainer Videos

Explainer videos are perfect for SaaS products. They have numerous benefits that SaaS products take full advantage of. Plus, animated explainer videos are particularly good at selling technology. In the following blog, we’ll look at 17 videos for SaaS products and pick out some of the key tricks they’re using.

As much as I’m pleased with some of the videos Bullseye has made for SaaS companies, I’m deliberately not mentioning any of Bullseye’s work here to remain as objective as possible. Anyway, in the following blog, we’ll take a look at some of the best SaaS explainer videos and unpack what makes them so effective. Enjoy!

The friendly familiar tone used by Dropbox

There are lots of great things about this video. There’s the empathy it builds by outlining such a common issue. And there’s the focus on real-life situations instead of getting too caught up in product features and other technical aspects. But what I particularly like is its friendly, unthreatening, and familiar tone.

There are very few SaaS explainer videos using stop motion animation, let alone this style of stop motion. So at the very least Dropbox is standing out from the crowd and making itself easier to remember. 

More to the point the quirky ‘handmade’ illustrated vibe makes the product feel more like a wholesome mom and pop shop and not a corporate tech giant. Nothing wrong with being a corporate tech giant but sometimes it pays more to appear small and friendly. Plus, when selling software there’s always the risk of coming across as cold or abstract – the last thing you want to do. This distinctive style certainly did the job, generating millions for Dropbox in revenue and thousands of new users.

How TripCase overcomes objection

For every great thing you can say about your product there will always be one or two questions and objections that a skeptical prospect might have. In the above video, it’s uncertainty over the product’s effectiveness when a user’s travel plans are changed. The video has a confident rebuttal. It states how TripCase is powered by a technology that’s synced up to the latest travel data and can respond to travel plans in real-time. Easy-peasy.

Med Mart’s engaging way of depicting app interaction

To show how the app works, instead of showing the app screen or animating the UI step by step, this explainer video just illustrates the ideas behind the on-screen actions. It tells you what the app will do from a broader perspective. A perspective that the prospect is much more likely to understand and care about at this stage. No need to show what the doctor selection screen looks like when there are more visually interesting ways of depicting that task.

Detailed UI depiction from Tacklebox

In the complete reverse of the above, we have one of the most screencast-heavy SaaS explainer videos out there. Clearly, the Tacklebox creators were confident in how well the tool’s UI and processes would sell themselves when given a demo. Unlike the Med Mart example above, the outcomes of this tool come to fruition within the tool, not in real life. Hence the need for detailed screen demonstrations of Tacklebox’s UI and its capabilities. 

Brutally succinct visual communication from Trainline

I’ll admit this example is bending the rules of a) what SaaS is and b) what an explainer video is. It’s a television commercial that is a bit thin on the explaining front and it’s for an app that’s more of an online portal than a typical SaaS subscription. That said I felt I had to include it as anyone making SaaS explainer videos can learn from this piece of work.

The problem the product solves, the kind of situation it could be used in, how easily the product can be used, and the results it can achieve are all illustrated in 30 seconds with minimal speech. This is all thanks to its super tight visual storytelling that ensures it doesn’t take a second more than it needs to.

Mailchimp’s hypnotizing movement 

Like with the Dropbox video there are all sorts of things that are brilliant about this. The graphic design being a particular favorite of mine. The standout element for me though is the sleek movement and the way each visual element develops and morphs.

Giant Ant, the studio behind this video is one of the best animation studios in the world and they’re masters of crafting graphics that you can’t help but watch. Yes, the script is on point. Yes, the design is pretty. But for me, the way the visuals dance and smoothly flow from one formation into the next makes this video impossible to ignore, which in marketing, is half the battle.

Single-minded visual storytelling from MailChimp

I’m a sucker for anything Giant Ant makes. Guilty as charged. And this second piece of MailChimp work had to be included, this time for other reasons. The quality of the animation is, once again, grade A. However what this video achieves that the previous MailChimp video doesn’t is a sense of cohesive continuity.

It does this by basing the entire video around one character and a central visual metaphor; a cat. The cat represents the fickle, easily distracted audience that you’re trying to target with Google ads. Various other graphic additions and visual metaphors like birds (tweets) and metaphorical balls of string support the story. 

The result is a concept and message that is so cohesive and single-minded that it’s very memorable and persuasive. It should be noted that whilst the visuals are nothing short of impressive, this video’s real brains are in the cat = audience metaphor. And that was formed in the scriptwriting.

Hootsuite depicting multiple functionalities

The Med Mart explainer video from earlier did a great job of depicting how the app can be used without getting caught up in the on-screen details. This explainer video does exactly the same, only here, there is an added challenge; multiple functionalities and use cases need to be depicted. The Med Mart video illustrates how users can use the app to do one thing; book a cosmetic surgery procedure. Meanwhile, this Hootsuite video has found clever visual depictions for multiple tasks. These are: scheduling content in advance, joining brand conversations, boosting posts, tracking trends, and viewing your analytics. 

I’m not saying that the Hootsuite video is better. It just has a different challenge to the Med Mart video and has, understandably, a very different execution style.

The raw sales power of Chatbooks

The best SaaS explainer videos don’t just introduce you to a new product, they hit you with so many benefits and arguments for buying that you can feel like a fool if you don’t. This video from Chatbooks is the perfect example. 

It kicks off with a hilarious and engaging hook that builds empathy and highlights the very real, funny problems and impracticalities of creating family photo albums. It then introduces the product, highlighting the benefits and pitching it with an epic strapline: “it’s like getting a magazine subscription to your own life.” It then spends the rest of the video hitting the viewer with classic sales tactics. 

• Reasons why Chatbooks is better than the alternative
• Objection busters, 
• a money-back guarantee
• THE OPTION TO INSTALL THE APP DIRECTLY FROM THE VIDEO 

Like any good salesperson, it makes purchasing appear incredibly attractive. When you shower this enticing script with boatloads of humor you barely notice that it’s nearly four minutes long! Proof that good explainer videos don't need to be brief.

Crazy Egg’s no BS intro hook

From the get-go this SaaS explainer video tells you what this product will do for the user. By delivering the line “the heat map tool that shows why your visitors aren't converting” any viewer that might be remotely interested in what Crazy Egg does will want to continue watching.

With the audience bought in, the video then goes on to build trust and empathy by illustrating the problem users face, giving detailed demos around how Crazy Egg can solve that problem, and overcoming objections. Again, many of the classic sales tactics that the Chatbooks video uses.

IBM doesn’t need audio

So much of the video we consume is watched without audio. The best and only solution we really have for this is adding subtitles to explainer videos. Whilst that can do the job, communication can be much more efficient and powerful if the viewer isn’t constantly looking at the subtitles along the bottom of the screen.

This video from IBM puts the text front and center. The text is also used sparingly meaning that all written messages are given the breathing space they need to be read and understood. Ideal for when your audience is say, watching your video in a distracting environment.

Adobe using extreme problem agitation and exaggeration

One of the ways some of the best SaaS explainer videos build empathy and trust with an audience is by outlining the problem the audience faces. A common tactic is to then ‘agitate’ that problem: illustrating just how serious that problem can be for the prospect. 

This video from Adobe addresses the problem and agitates the problem to such an extreme that it’s hilarious. This humor builds further trust and understanding by making the humor about an issue all audience members can empathize with. More importantly, though, this extreme humor helps the viewer feel the problem they’re facing to the max – in this case, ineffective marketing.

Grammarly taking us on a hero’s journey

Or in this case, heroine’s journey. The hero/heroine’s journey being one of the most tried and tested story mechanisms ever. Hero/heroine faces challenge → hero/heroine overcomes challenge → hero/heroine rides off into the metaphorical sunset. 

Grammarly uses this framework to demo its product perfectly. Instead of adopting the usual sales pitch, they show instead of tell and demonstrate the ultimate scenario in which their product will be of most use. The result is an uplifting little tale and zero doubt about the product’s utility.

Beezer with an unforgettable visual style 

One of the greatest lessons I ever learned about advertising and marketing was when I was in ad school. My tutor drew a series of crosses on the board.

x x x x x x x x x x x x x

“Everywhere you go, advertising and marketing is doing this”. Then he made one small change.

x x x o x x x x x x x x x

He went on to say “our human brains are designed to ignore the usual and focus on what stands out. It’s a basic survival mechanism.” For any marketing or advertising to work, it has to be noticed. And if it blends in with all the other communication out there, people will just see it as wallpaper and ignore it.

Being different and standing out is essential. Beezer is clearly aware of this and has very wisely chosen a design style for their video that is so different you can’t help but remember it. Beezer zigs whilst many other SaaS explainer videos zag.

Buckets of social proof from Waze

Waze is an app many of us are already familiar with and this video capitalizes on that familiarity. To bolster the familiarity and trust that Waze has built up over the years, this video hits us with numerous stats and facts that prove that it’s been well received. 

Boasting things like its 130 million active users, the contributions the users have made to the software, and the number of times users thanked each other, all demonstrate just how popular and useful Waze is. It’s one thing to make a claim about your product. It’s another thing to back that claim up with social proof.

Dubai Real Estate Blockchain making the complex less intimidating

Blockchain is the tech that’s on everyone’s lips. However, few people could actually explain what the technology does. Understandable, it’s not the easiest thing to explain. This video is well aware of the issue and is sure to handle this intimidating technology with the necessary care and humanity.

The video starts making you feel at ease by using a friendly tone of voice and warm inviting graphics. But where it really does its job is how it tackles the explaining and selling of blockchain technology. It touches upon how the technology works but it doesn’t get too technical: no jargon. It also makes sure it brings everything back to benefits and outcomes to the consumer. In this case, it talks about how you’ll experience less of the typical stress that people endure when they buy a house.

Pure showmanship from Panorama9

A perfect example of a blurred line between branded content and an advertising/marketing video. This brilliant and ridiculous video from Panorama9 blends all sorts of jazz hands. Storytelling, memorable design, and classic sales tactics like the problem-agitation-solution framework mean that this video is as much a show as it is a marketing video.

Final thoughts

All of the above videos combine more than one of the 17 tricks and techniques that the best SaaS explainer videos employ. And it’s hardly surprising when you think about it. A good SaaS explainer video should have a distinctive design, a strong sales message, a clear and engaging depiction of the product, etc. 

Whilst every project we work on at Bullseye Motion is different, we always try and incorporate elements like these into any video we make. Sometimes we’ll have to work within a specific design guideline. And sometimes there may not be any social proof to work with. But wherever possible, we’ll use as many of the 17 tricks outlined above as we can and create the best SaaS explainer videos possible.

If you’re ready to make a video that explains, sells, and shows your audience just how great your product is, click below to book a meeting with me, Bullseye’s creative director.

P.S. all comments and feedback on this blog are appreciated! If there’s any way you think it could be improved, then feel free to shout and I’ll see if I can work them into a redraft. xx