What are templates used for?

Hello im doing this little research where im trying to find out what templates are used for. Im doing this so I can get to know the audience better and i’ll have a better understanding why people buy templates and what they are used for.

By knowing what the audience wants, youll have a better understanding what templates will sell better or not at all.

If im correct there are (in general) 3 types of buyers:

- AE People who buy the templates to use it as a part of their own after effects files, or to use them to show to their audience. These people in general are medioker or good in After Effects and use Videohive/templates to save time and money.

- People who buy templates to learn from them, ill consider this group students.

- People who buy templates with little to no knowledge of After Effects. Im mostly interested in this group.

Now if you look at the most popular items (After Effects Project Files) you’ll see a lot of logo revealers and short video promotions of some product or service.

Who buy these products? The obvious answer to this is: People who need or want templates to either show of their logo or introduce/communicate their product or service in a creative way. But to who do they show these videos? Their clients? On youtube or their website or also offline or as a opener for a series of videos?

Who buy these video opener / logo ident videos. The only thing I know about them is that they want to promote their product/logo and are familiair with this website & own After Effects.

Next to the logo reveal / short video promotions you also have the ‘less’ popular video template items, which are obviously longer & more expensive. I think the target audience here is way different adnd probably more diverse. If you check out the categories you’ll find the 3D, object and corporate to be most popular. The target audience within these categories are probably still very diverse. But what are these templates generally used for and who buys these video templates?

They obviously own After Effects and are familiair with the website and have an account, but I know nothing else about them haha.

Lately I am starting to think we are feeding youtube users primarily.. :/

-inlife

InlifeThrill said
Lately I am starting to think we are feeding youtube users primarily.. :/

I agree. But in the end who cares? I think we make what we like, and if buyers like it they’ll buy it. The occasional extended licence is great – brings a smile to my face anyway.

[edit]

~G

Yeah, got one today. It’s been a few moths since the last one. (party)

-inlife

Nice to see your reactions, I think it’s really hard to get to know the purchaser better.

But what we do know is that the purchaser is somewhat handy with computers, obviously owns after effects and most of them know their way inside the application.

I haven’t produced many templates or sold alot aand im not the best designer (im only doing this template thing for like 8 months but w/e) but I do notice about 1 in ~ 10 people email me how to fix a problem they encountered. Now by problem I mean they are trying to do something extra to the template or have extra needs with it. These ‘problems’ are usually more to the intermediate level and not particulary beginners material.

Ofcourse the amount of support depends on the user friendlyness of the template, and ofcourse the difficulty/level of the template. Since my templates aren’t particularly ‘rocket science’ and 95% of the people seem to know what they are doing with AE, you can assume most of the people are either basic or intermediate with After Effects.

Now as told in a post above this I think the majority of purchasers are probably using it for social media.

Im not too interested in this group, im more interested in the group that hasn’t been reached. For instance:

If I would like to create a wedding template with 20 placeholders, this will probably be my audience:

- 20 – 40 year of age - handy with computers & owns AE and is atleast a beginner or intermediate - is getting married or just got married. Or knows someone who will (as a gift) - is familiair with this site and knows he/she wants to buy AE templates

Now you see this group is pretty limited, so why not just create a cool logo revealer or 10 second intro that will be sold way more and will appeal to a great majority of people within the videohive community.

Ofcourse, HQ templates will be sold way more, but that’s not what I mean.

Now im not blaming videohive’s marketing team or anything but the fact is, most people either don’t know about AE, videohive, or don’t even realise they want a product that turns their photos into a cool video. Thats probably because they arent into video or editing in general. They just take pictures. They get limited because of the fact After Effects is needed, and therefor some skill & effort.

Money really isn’t the problem, let’s be honest about that. The prices are very low.

Can’t we find a way to leave After Effects out of the system. Maybe create a system where people can create their video in there browser instead of after effects? Ofcourse the options within this system would be limited, since it’s not AE. But im aiming for the more simple editing tools: like uploading & cropping images, place them in the video and then process them to a .mov that will be send to you by e-mail.

Again, by this im not aiming for the more intermediate AE user that likes to recreate or edit the templates in depth, but more for the beginners out there that just want to make a cool video, without the After Effects downside. I know a system like this can be automated, and will increase the sellings ridiculously (in theory).

Any ideas?

felt_tips said

dsnfanatic said
But what we do know is that the purchaser is somewhat handy with computers, obviously owns after effects and most of them know their way inside the application.

No, no and no!

(Not in my experience, at least)

dsnfanatic said
Can’t we find a way to leave After Effects out of the system. Maybe create a system where people can create their video in there browser instead of after effects?

Something like this, you mean? http://animoto.com I suspect Videohive’s somewhat more successful.

Hehe okay they are not experts, but they do know AE, own it at atleast know the very basic.

I mean a combination of animoto & videohive. What are the main reasons people go to this site instead of animoto? I think primarily because of Videohive’s HQ videos and the lack of creativity/design/editing possibilities at Animoto, right?

I think animoto and videohive have 2 very different audiences in general. Videohive has better quality videos and more editing possibilities, but it’s also harder (you need AE and some skills).

Animoto is easier but by far not as good as Videohive quality wise, but it is open for a way bigger audience.

Why not bring the best of two worls together? Where you can edit Videohive quality videos in a browser and the project will be send to you in .mov and .aep just in case. Everything is possible right?

In general: Don’t you think there is a gab between what is offered and what could be offered?

dsnfanatic said
In general: Don’t you think there is a gab between what is offered and what could be offered?

by gab i mean gap, my english sucks