Explainer Makers

Small business

Explain your service.Win the clients who get it.

Your clients won’t read a list of services. They’ll watch a short film told the way that sells yours: one client’s story, the job from start to finish, or a straight advert for your service. An animated explainer for your website and social media, at a fixed price, script included.

Now playing
The business in the owner’s head

Samples

What you’d get.Animated explainers, 2D or film-style.

Each sample follows one client. Yours can follow the job from start to finish, or be a straight advert for your service. Tap a film to watch it with sound.

For accountants and bookkeepers

Bookkeeping practice

The business in the owner’s head

A practice that runs on one person’s memory, and the new starter who has to learn it.

Accounting

From 18 to 80

An 18-year-old won’t read a list of services. She’ll watch her own life with one firm, from her first tax return to eighty.

Accounting

The first year

A hairdresser opens her own salon and doesn’t know what a BAS is. Her accountant’s story of her first year, month by month.

Accounting

The shoebox

An electrician ignores a forty-item checklist and brings a shoebox in August. Then the same June email, sent with a film from his side.

Accounting

The switch

A florist has wanted a new accountant for three years, but switching sounds like a month of paperwork. Then the firm’s homepage shows her what moving takes.

Accounting

One story, five pieces

An accountant means to post on LinkedIn and never gets to it. One client’s story, cut into a main film and four short episodes.

For other small businesses

Mortgage brokers

Two brokers

Two brokers in one town offer the same loans. One website is a list. The other is a short story of a self-employed couple getting a yes.

Mortgage brokers

First home

Four years of saving, three bank apps and three different answers. Then a broker’s homepage story shows a first-home couple where to start.

Lawyers and conveyancers

Say it once

A conveyancer draws the same diagram four times a week. Then first-home buyers get a short story before the first meeting.

Lawyers and conveyancers

The will

Margaret put off her will for eleven years. Then a law firm’s homepage story shows her it starts with one plain conversation.

Financial planners

The third booking

A couple cancel their first meeting twice because they don’t know what to expect. Then the booking email, sent with a film from their side.

Insurance brokers

The fire

A workshop burns at two in the morning. A broker’s homepage story shows the owner what she does on the worst day, before anything burns.

IT support

What the invoice buys

Jo can’t see what the IT firm’s monthly invoice buys, so her practice switches to a cheaper quote. Then the same invoice, sent with a film from her side.

Builders and trades

After the quote

A client signs a builder’s quote, then hears nothing for two weeks. Then the same quote, sent with a story from her side.

Physio and allied health

Week two

A patient feels better by week two and cancels. The clinic’s story of her six weeks, including the week most people stop.

Online shops

Not from the photo

A grey bag on a white background, and a buyer who scrolls past. Then the same beach shade, shown from her side on a windy day.

How a video gets made

We talk. I write it.You see every scene before it moves.

Shown with a sample film: SAP go-live Monday, made for programmes facing the 2027 deadline.

01

We talk

Half an hour on a call. I read your documents and website first, so we start on what matters.

The brief: thousands of people at a mine site move to new SAP screens on one Monday. Show them that Monday before it happens.

02

I write the story

Told the way that suits your message: a person, a project, a place or an advert. You sign off the script.

Meet Sam. He plans maintenance at a mine site. Twelve years in the old screens. He can raise a work order with his eyes shut. On go-live Monday, he can’t find it. The crew is waiting.

03

You see every scene

Every scene as a still frame. You sign them off before anything is animated.

Scene 3: Sam at his old screen
Scene 4: Sam lost on go-live Monday
Scene 5: the crew waiting by the truck

Scenes 3, 4 and 5, signed off as stills

04

Then it moves

Animation, a professional voice, music and captions. Versions for your website, social media and your LMS.

Usually about three weeks from our first conversation.

How I break a big idea into scenes

Questions

The short answers.Ask me anything else.

Do I need a script?

No. If you have one, I’ll work from it. If not, writing it is included: we work out together what it needs to say, and I write it. Either way, you sign it off before anything is made.

What do you need from me?

A half-hour conversation, links to your website and any brochures, and quick sign-offs.

2D animated explainer or film-style?

A 2D animated explainer is clear and quick to make. Film-style looks like a short film: photoreal people in an office, a shop or your client’s kitchen. You get any scene, including ones too dangerous or too costly to film, without a crew, a location or a cast to book. The scenes are made with AI tools from a storyboard you sign off. They take longer to make, so they cost more.

Why does film-style cost more?

Film-style scenes are made in a separate photoreal video tool that charges for every take. The film-style add-on covers the takes it needs to get each scene right. Changes you ask for follow the same two rounds as every video.

What if a scene isn’t right?

I work on the script with you until you’re happy with it. On the video, you get two rounds of changes. A third round of changes to the video, or any after it, is A$250 + GST a round, to cover the extra production time and costs. If something in the animation itself goes wrong, such as a hand or a cup that moves the wrong way, I fix it at no cost, in a 2D animated explainer or film-style.

Is it made with AI?

The scenes and animation are made with AI tools, from a script and storyboard you sign off. Nothing is animated until you’ve approved every scene.

What does it cost?

A fixed price by length, from a one-minute film. The prices are on the prices page. 50% when the project starts, and 50% on the final invoice, before the full-resolution films are delivered.

Can I use it anywhere?

Yes: your website, LinkedIn, email and presentations.

Contact

Start a conversation.Tell me what you need, and when.

A line or two is enough. I’ll come back to you by email.

Prefer LinkedIn? Message Ken McHardie on LinkedIn.

The cover of the guide

Free guide · PDF, 10 pages

How to get your animated explainer made

The prices, how to choose a length, what a film looks like, and what you and I each do to make it.

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