Explainer Video vs Demo Video: Which One Does Your SaaS Need?

Whether you are a startup, or a bigger company looking to build the brand for your new SaaS solution – there comes a certain point when you start asking yourself:

Do we need an explainer or a demo video?

With this article, we are going to take a look at key differences between explainer videos and demo videos – so that your video marketing strategy can use them better.

Explainer Video: Your Showroom Tour

As mentioned, explainer videos are designed specifically for quick understanding of what the product is all about, and they thrive when you need to catch attention quickly, or pitch the solution fast. These types of videos are typically short, with the best practice being a 60-90 second video – focusing less on the deep dive details, and more on the problems and how your solution brings the customer to their dream state.

As these videos need to do a lot of heavy lifting, they normally have a bigger budget and more time spent on it, to make sure it meets the prospects at crucial conversion points, with a solid messaging.

In terms of style, it ditches more realistic views of the actual software, and uses more simplified motion graphics, kinetic typography and different types of animation – to make sure it explains concepts, as opposed to providing a hands-on experience.

Example:

Our video for Supahub is a stellar example of a solid Explainer Video – 57 seconds, thousands of views – and one solution that’s easily digestible and clearly communicated.

When to Use Explainer Videos:

• Use it at the top of your sales funnel, specifically website hero/landing page, LinkedIn, Pitch Deck and other.
• Explainer Videos help prospects get up to speed with your offering, and bring clarity. All of this ends up in higher conversion rates, and more sales.
• When you absolutely need to simplify your solution, and do explain it quickly, without getting in the weeds.

Demo Video: Your Test Drive

Now with Demo videos, here’s where you go deeper than doing just a high level overview, and start providing a deeper dive into how the solution and its workflows actually work around your SaaS, AI or other tech solution.

These videos can be around 90-120 seconds, as you normally need more time for a detailed look and to show off some steps on how to use specific features. Demo videos are more practical, and show a closer look at how your product works, showcasing real-time use cases, and often work as a guided walkthrough in the actual software environment.

Example:

Univer is a really practical demo video that shows how the actual software is, in action – and on full display.

When to Use Demo Videos:

• These are great for prospects deeper in the buying journey, who are on-board with your message (if you have a solid video marketing strategy, they’ve already seen some of your top of the funnel content). So having a well-placed demo video helps a lot at the decision-making stage.
• If you have a winner workflow that can be really appealing to the prospects – put it front, right and center in a demo video.
  Also, if you don’t have a big sales team to do a ton of demos with interested users – this offloads the burden, as you can send out a solid demo video to answer some of the questions.
• Definitely – if your product is complex, and to make sure objections don’t arise even before prospects reach out to you – having a solid demo video helps.

Which One Does Your SaaS Need?

The thing is – for an efficient video marketing strategy, it’s never an either/or choice. Explainer videos are great to attract attention, and sometimes are even used in ads together with other top of the funnel use cases, generating awareness and educating prospects at the top of the funnel. But once you’ve sparked that interest – you need to keep the momentum going!

It’s time to bring in the demo videos to show the how and why behind your product – and guide your potential customers by the hand, to make that final decision.

To truly scale your SaaS – a well structured video strategy should incorporate both the demo and explainer formats, as well as additional brand awareness content, and testimonial pieces. This way – you guide your prospects with a smooth journey, increasing the speed of the sales – from awareness to conversion.

That’s why when we’ve worked with Allfred – we’ve built an all-in-one solution combining different video formats that are used at key conversion points.

Here at Zelios – we work with tons of SaaS, AI, Tech companies, from founder led startups to enterprises – and what we see is that a clearly presented solution, that’s worse, can beat an ingenious solution that’s not properly communicated.

So if you are looking to turn your solution into a must-have – reach out to us for a custom video funnel consultation.