Adweek: Take a Page From the Motion Identity Playbook

“If your brand doesn’t move, does it even exist?”

I wrote an op-ed for Adweek about the need for every brand to establish a unique motion identity. Here’s an excerpt:

It’s no secret that the social media landscape is changing at a breaking speed. Instagram and TikTok are placing evermore emphasis on video, tweaking their algorithms to favor moving content over static images. Reels are drawing the lion’s share of attention in people’s feeds, and we’re yet to see the full impact of Generative AI on content creation.

Add to all this our ever-reducing attention spans and the challenge is clear: It is now harder than ever for brands to engage audiences without video. The necessity for creating a consistent cadence of content that incorporates motion design and animation is driving a very real need for brands to enhance their visual identities by adding motion identity guidelines.

Beyond ubiquitous phone screens, the sustained benefit of establishing a robust motion identity is that it can add memorability and meaning for a brand in virtually every space and place. While a visual identity system provides the essentials—logo, colors, typography, imagery, icons, patterns—a motion identity expands this toolbox into the realm of video with principles, behaviors, guidelines and templates that establish new dimensions of the brand, such as timing, pacing and rhythm. A library of animation styles can be set for the most-used applications, while flexible guidelines encourage inventive play for special occasions. A great motion identity not only helps engage people in new ways, but also empowers brand teams to be creative, consistent and cohesive anywhere video is essential—which, arguably, is everywhere now.

Read the rest of the article on Adweek here.