Motion Hatch: Helping Motion Designers Do Better Business

[00:00:00] I just think it's fascinating because it's such a like big thing to create a studio, right, that you've both like decided like, Oh, we're gonna have a studio each. Algo really started as a single project for one client on one day, very slowly over the years, kind of understood that. We were creating something on its own.

[00:00:18] That's Luca, he started Algo, a studio that specializes in video automation and content systems. Our focus is about creating motion design narratives that engage but also inform. That's Alenia, and she founded Illo with Luca in 2012. And Illo is a motion design and illustration studio. And in this podcast, you're gonna learn how to run a motion design studio.

[00:00:44] Well, actually two motion design studios. Learning to delegate is one of the hardest thing. I will hire first maybe two creative people and the third one should be more in the business side. How these studios use social media to get bigger and better clients. The relationship with social media, it could be very rewarding but also very frustrating.

[00:01:04] And what essential systems and processes that you need to be implementing into your business to get your ideal clients. Maybe on the business side, I would say that the first thing you need to do is probably So you have two studios, what is the purpose of both of your studios and how did they come about?

[00:01:23] illo is a motion design, uh, studio, the big focus on motion art direction and colors. Our focus is about creating, uh, optimistic experiences and, uh, in general motion design narratives that can Engage and, uh, but also inform we started illo about 13 years ago, almost. Yeah, yeah. Almost 13. Both Ila and I, and some of the early team members come from an engineering background.

[00:01:49] Actually, we didn't study at our school. And so it was natural for us to kind of go towards, uh, mixing code with, uh, with the video. creation process that we were having. And so, yeah, I'll go really started as a single project for one client, uh, on one day as a part of illo and then very slowly over the years, over the course of maybe three or four years, it become to be a sort of a repeating type of thing that we were doing with some of the clients.

[00:02:17] And then we kind of understood that. We were creating something on its own and that needed probably something of its own branding, its own website, a different kind of approach. And also then we started hiring specifically for Argo roles. And so we also started to have slightly two different cultures internally with within the two teams.

[00:02:37] So we actually. incorporated the second studio and kind of split. And the last probably evolution point was when Il and I decided to kind of focus each one on one of the two studios so that we could follow them properly, right? Instead of both running both studios, which was a bit inefficient at that point.

[00:02:54] But yeah, overall algo is very much focused on our video automation. So that means that we basically create systems with our clients that then later turn into maybe a tool, a dashboard. That on the client side that they're able to use over time to produce content. Yeah, it's really interesting because I think most people would be tempted to either just, I guess, make it part of Illo, right?

[00:03:18] Or like make like a different product offering. What was really the driving force of creating the two studios? You know, like, what do you think is the benefit of, of having two of them as two separate studios? We started to think that we needed a second brand and a second portfolio, especially when we started to feel that, uh, maybe that some of the clients were slightly different, for example, with algo, we work a bit more maybe into the news editorial type of sector.

[00:03:46] We have a lot of work done for the crypto startups or, or companies in general. And from a stylistic point of view, of course, it's also a bit different. So while illo probably is a bit more towards. illustration. Yeah. I'll go maybe it's a bit more towards graphic design and we play by saying that, yeah, we always the dark side of illogical, but yeah, basically, um, slowly we understood that we needed to have a, um, a bit of a different approach and we could also profit from having a bit of a different positioning, a bit of a different strategies for the two studios and then gradually.

[00:04:19] We went ahead with that. Yeah, that makes sense, because I think we talk about positioning a lot and it's becoming more and more important to like stand out in our industry is to think about like how you're positioning yourself. So I think it was really smart for you to, you know, make sure that you're kind of keeping these separate.

[00:04:37] But do you find that you also Share clients like are you like oh actually this project is more an algo project this one is more an illo project Like how does that kind of work? Yeah, of course, like we have many point of connections So sometimes we pass or exchange our clients. Sometimes we also collaborate together.

[00:04:55] It's not so frequent, I will say, so I think that right now we have a couple of projects per year where we can collaborate together. It's always really fun when when we do because of course it mixes the team in an interesting way. But it's true. And also, I should say that probably most of the time is the Ildo team that is referred because of course, being more established.

[00:05:12] But yeah, sometimes it happens that also the algo team is kind of receiving a brief and say, No, this is much more for Ildo. And so Let's bring them on board. So yeah, we are very open to clients about this. It's very important for us to stay authentic about what's our vision, both as Inlo and Algo. But it's also true that we have like so many things in common.

[00:05:32] First one, we share the same space. Some of the Algo team members have been Inlo team members. I like to know more about like the team structure and like how many people are on each team. I just think it's fascinating because it's such a like Big thing to create a studio, right? That you both like decided like Oh, we're gonna have a studio each, right?

[00:05:53] You know? Like almost So I think it's awesome. Yeah. I'd just love to know more about the structure and like how that works. Yeah, the other team is about 10 people right now. I would say that, yeah, we have a pretty lean design team, which is basically our designer Kami and me. Uh, we have one producer and we have then two animators.

[00:06:13] We have a figure that we call motion engineer, which is an animator and coder at the same time. And then we have two developers, which are more towards front end, back end, API, stuff like that. While about Elo, we are in between, let's say, 15 to 20 people, because I'm considering the full permanent staff here, like with an employee contract, but also maybe the very close freelancers that are partnering with us on a daily or weekly basis.

[00:06:40] So. I like working very strictly with the other creative director that is Christina and also the general manager that is Annie. So I'm leading the studio as CEO and creative director or of course, like we have, uh, I would say two thirds of our studio that is made by, uh, creatives in these categories. Of course, we have designers and illustrators and Motion designers and animators, other people working on the business team or in general on the strategy.

[00:07:08] We have a business strategist with producers. Of course, we have a person taking care of the portfolio. Now our communication that is a very big thing for studio. And we also have an R and D directors that is guiding us when the studio wants to acquire a new skill or also if we have problem or things that we want to do but we don't know how to do it, uh, uh, Mateo is the right person for us.

[00:07:32] What, who in the studios were like, almost like the first hires? Because I know that a lot of people listening to this or watching this on YouTube are thinking about, okay, if I want to start a studio, am I thinking about more creative people to hire first? Am I hiring more, like, operational producer? type people.

[00:07:48] Like, how did you both approach that? If, like, someone should start a studio right now, I will hire first maybe two creative people. And the third one should be more in the business side. Learning to delegate is one of the hardest thing, for example, that I struggle with for a long time. And yeah, you should start to learn that you will get guidance and will get feedback.

[00:08:10] And maybe at the beginning you still have that little time to. do your own design, animation, whatever is your, is your craft, but basically, yeah, from time to year, I have to know that you, if you follow the route of the studio, you will at some point be delegating all of that or almost all of that. And basically, yeah, going towards, uh, giving direction, of course, being the creative director, being the director or whatever, but delegating your, your creative side, at least on, on the execution level and also learning that.

[00:08:42] You shouldn't open the files and like change it because of course, the people that you are going to do it slightly in a different way than that you do at the beginning, it's going to be stressful. It's going to be like you want to open that file and just fix it. But instead, you should give feedback verbally instead of doing that.

[00:08:57] And also from time to time, of course, it will be you will be hiring people that are becoming better than you through experience, but they can only it. have the experience if you, if you do that, if you jump in and open the files and edit yourself, they're not going to get the feedback from, from that.

[00:09:14] They're not going to learn enough. So it's very, very challenging part, which is if you want to hire, if you want to start a studio, that's your biggest challenge, probably rather than, of course, of course, keep hiring the right person. It is also. But maybe the first worry is, is about that is about your role changing.

[00:09:31] There are creatives which are amazing, but they don't love to do any of that. And it's totally fine, but it's better that you know that. And maybe you, you, you're going to become a superstar freelancer that does incredible amounts of money and is very successful and recognized. Maybe even better money.

[00:09:49] Exactly. At the beginning, for sure. At the beginning, for sure. Uh, but yeah, it's, uh, it's a process that you, that you, that you follow in the one in running a studio. If, if you like to work on processes, if you have your organized, uh, side of the brain. And you like that to work and to take a bit the lead.

[00:10:07] Yeah, definitely. I, and I think a lot of people think, okay, I'm like a really good freelancer and maybe I want to start a studio, but then they don't really think about the implications of that and what that means. That's obviously not the only way to grow in that way, but I think it's really important to think about, is like hiring other people, delegating some of the work, like taking a more management role, is that something that I really want to do?

[00:10:28] So you said you have like a, someone doing business strategy. So what exactly are they doing? Because obviously this is Motion Hatch where we talk all about the business stuff. So I'd love to like talk about like, you know, how you think about marketing and what you're doing in that sense. Of course, like it's working with the new opportunities that we have.

[00:10:46] He's also thinking about what are the opportunities that we have beyond maybe our inbound requests. And also, let's say, thinking about the vision and direction that we want to pursue. What are the ideal clients and projects they want to have, for example, for this 2025? We really like about like manifesting the ideal projects we want for the studio.

[00:11:09] Because this keep us like following a vision in a fun and playful way that is also about the Illio vibes. Yeah, I really like that, um, you know, visualizing the ideal client, like, I teach people to do this a lot, like, think about who's your ideal client, your avatar, like, break it down, things like that, obviously that helps you to, like, seek those people out as well, like, we're, say, manifesting it, but I love that idea too.

[00:11:32] So, like, is then the business strategy person, are they, like, Using that info and are they like directly going out and trying to find these types of clients for you? Like, how does that work? No, we don't have, let's say, a salesperson that is actively seeking for opportunities or maybe organizing meeting with potential clients.

[00:11:54] The main thing for us is our portfolio, is our Instagram channel. Depending on what we put out there, usually we have additional results in the next few months, let's say six months. So it's not like something that is very, you do it today and tomorrow we have a result, but it's a more like a long term strategy.

[00:12:12] Yeah, definitely. We definitely rely mostly on inbound. This is valid both for ELOF and for ALGO. We also analyze a lot of data. I mean, we are pretty analytical on things. We, we kind of track, uh, for example, one interesting thing that we found out a few years ago is that if you track the number of, of leads of, of people contacting you, just the number, not the quality, not, not even then you can get into a different level of analysis later, but basically just the number.

[00:12:39] Uh, and you match that with your income chart, let's say, and you make two charts. And of course, in function of how long normally the average project is. So let's say that. that for algo can be maybe a couple of months. You can actually see a correlation, a bit of a correlation, of course, between how many people contacted you two months ago and the revenue that you did today.

[00:12:59] And so that, for example, is something, an example of what we, what we like to track. I love that you're measuring the amount of leads. Do you know, Like the conversion, right? Like, say you have 20 projects leads, right? We evaluated that 10 are good, and then do you know, like, you got five of them, or Do you see what I mean?

[00:13:16] Like, do you know the percentage of that? Yeah. Um, not sure. Maybe it will be around Not by art. 10 or 20 percent, I don't know. Probably out of 10 leads, probably it's one or two that move forward. So, for various reasons. So, like, sometimes it's not Because, of course, also the range. of requests that we get is very, like, sometimes we get, uh, can you do this, uh, motion design videos of two minutes for, uh, 200?

[00:13:45] And we still get some, some of those. Yeah. I think it's, it's normal. As Luca was saying, like, this way of evaluating the quality of the leads we receive, it's also a way for us to evaluate if we're doing a good job in terms of the work we do. The work we can put in our portfolio, of course, these are strictly correlated, and we try to have most projects, let's say, in the green area.

[00:14:13] This means that are satisfying not only financial aspects. But also, as Luca was mentioning, the coolness, also strategy, and also how much we feel like that this project could be easy to do for us. This doesn't mean that we are not open maybe to different techniques or things that is a bit out of our comfort zone.

[00:14:37] But the important thing that Is that in that case, uh, probably we really need to be super inspired. So the project should be super cool or maybe super well paid. Uh, so we can have like, uh, it's one of the factors to be considered, right? Exactly. Well, one of the should at least to be sure that we can still deliver a great, great, uh, project because we are inspired or because we are paid with a good amount of money.

[00:15:02] You know, it's a, it's a wheel of thing. It's of course pretty magical. And we still, you still don't know, but yeah, we know that sometimes we get a request because we end up in a mood board that that's an art director created and that maybe it was following us from, from Instagram, for example, let's say, but it's very random and you cannot You can control it only to a certain extent, of course, but the important thing is that you're always doing the whole work behind all of the elements of the wheel, I would say.

[00:15:30] So like, of course, doing great work first one, then sharing as much as possible in portfolio. And then, yeah, being relevant overall and being active there so that you can, people can still find you and get reminded that you exist and that you do this cool stuff. And then maybe at that point you get some contacts and of course then doing the interesting work to to turn just a random email into, into a potential project.

[00:15:56] So that's also a lot of work there. You can even feel stuck at some point. We, it happens from time to time. So another huge asset and opportunity that we use in order to get unstuck when we feel that these, the running of the, on these, uh, like little hamsters off of. On this wheel is not the working is maybe doing a studio project.

[00:16:14] So for example, I'm thinking about, uh, that we had a few years ago for the seventh anniversary of our studio. We, uh, we did a project studio project with the whole team was really fun, which is called the tarot bot. And kind of that, that project really brought us a lot of new, interesting leads. Mostly because of course we were getting outside of our comfort zone.

[00:16:33] We were doing something. Uh, which stillistically was what we wanted to develop as a studio, but we couldn't have the opportunity to do, to do on client projects. So yeah, it's really important sometimes to also invest in your, in your free time and try to have. The whole team, even though if it's, uh, it's, if it's a big cost of the, the rewards after that can be really, for example, so after working with that project, we, we did an important project for, for Pinterest that at the time for illo, I mean, the, the time was driven largely by that project, that, that auto bot studio project that we did.

[00:17:06] So, yeah, it's always, um, a balance, but yeah, sometimes if you get, if you feel stuck on that wheel, it's good to. Try to do that with your projects. Yeah, I like this idea, you know, the flywheel where you're, what you're doing inside the studio is, is affecting like the work that comes in. I feel like it can be difficult to kind of start this process because obviously as you're like supporting that.

[00:17:30] And then the work comes out and then the better clients come in and you can kind of like elevate up through that. But can you remember like back when you first started maybe like Illo or like what was sort of your strategy back then and how do you think about that? I'm just thinking about like what can we give everyone listening that's like actionable that maybe haven't got as much eyes on them as Ilo and Algo does right now.

[00:17:54] It's a different market condition right now because like we feel of course that like that the market is very saturated right now and uh when we started we were it was just like a handful maybe. Motion Design Studios, so right now it's very different. It's also very, uh, nice that, uh, nowadays, uh, I think that, uh, the credit world is more open to different styles and trends.

[00:18:16] It's not anymore about, uh, this is like 2019 and this is the style of the year. Everyone should do. The same things and if you are not doing like you are going to be out of the competition. So I think that there is space for everyone. I think that it is really important to show consistency and also passion for your work.

[00:18:35] Also in your communication, your social media offers like, uh, the relationship with social media could be, it could be very rewarding, but also very frustrating. It's very, very stressful to put even just like an Instagram post out there. And to see the results, sometimes it's good, sometimes it's not good.

[00:18:53] It's important to have a certain regularity and to really show what you want to do next. If I were to start today, probably I, especially as a freelancer, maybe a good relationship with other peers, with studios and trying to reach out. I mean, reach, reaching out privately really doesn't have anything bad that can happen.

[00:19:12] And the worst that can happen is that I don't know, they don't reply to you or. Or they just say, no, thanks. But yeah, it's true that sometimes we post on our illo page that has 100, 000 followers, something that you've, you really thought it was interesting and was working, doesn't get any recognition. It's like, okay, why?

[00:19:30] I don't know. But yeah, also should make sure that you use maybe the right asset in between real carousel or standard posts, for example, knowing all the rules and how they change frequently. Of course, it's really. Fundamental. Yeah, that's annoying. Yeah. Yeah, that's annoying. Yeah, but it's good to hear that you're focused on that.

[00:19:49] Right? Because that's a lot of that's kind of what I do as well. Look at like, okay, this is working right now. This isn't working so much and try and share that information as much as possible. Because you mentioned Instagram a lot. And obviously you have a large following there. Is there something that you're like, actively doing there or something that you say like, Oh, this is working quite well for us right now, just that might be quite helpful for other people listening.

[00:20:12] I think that, for example, uh, for us, uh, in this moment, so this is like February 25, the recording. Uh, so, yeah, for example, for us, um, Carousel on Instagrams are working better than Reels because they are exposed more to our audience. Also Reels used to perform well when they were a bit like shorter, right now when they are longer.

[00:20:42] In any case, it's not maybe the best lens for us because maybe if they are very short like 5 to 7 seconds, it's very short for us, maybe just one animation. If they are one minute, it's too much for our kind of communication. We can share this piece of advice in this historical moment, but of course, like, things change constantly.

[00:21:01] Maybe in one week it's not relevant anymore yet. And also, yeah, we, we have, uh, like also BNs, I think it's, it's a platform that's working quite well. We had a few clients coming from Asia, especially that were coming from BNs, uh, that, yeah, that, that platform also, as you know, maybe, I don't know, for example, in China.

[00:21:22] Some of the platforms are blocked. So instead, I feel that I think that BNs is not, I think still, it's still relevant. And sharing your work on BNs is a potentially interesting take. And also LinkedIn, maybe that's, it's very, very important. I mean, maybe we are like Laura leaning towards Instagram. Yes, because it's also our source of inspiration, but also being present on LinkedIn is.

[00:21:46] It's where it matters the most, probably, because beyond like your, uh, your peers and your creative connections, you want to up Yeah, I think, um, I talk so much about LinkedIn, so we won't go into it too deeply in this episode. But, but I think it is also changing, right? It's also tweaking its algorithm. And I think what's really tricky right now is that if you start talking about motion design, it's going to show a lot of your work to other motion designers, which isn't necessarily what we want.

[00:22:17] We want to show it to clients, you know, so there's. definitely ways of tweaking the wording and like how you talk about stuff and things like that. But I wanted to move back to Behance because we don't talk about that that often. It's interesting to hear that you find it useful. Is there anything you're doing particularly on there?

[00:22:33] Like I know people make these like amazing case studies of their work. Like how, how are you approaching that? It's not an easy platform. It's not something like Instagram. If you post one thing, uh, if you need to actually, yeah, post less frequently and create up the case study. We are using it more for maybe behind the scenes or a bit of a sort of similar take to the portfolio but with some stuff that is maybe more interesting for other designers rather than Anyone would, we would fall on our, uh, portfolio page, but yeah, if the work is relevant, uh, sometimes it's the creatives that brings us into the client because maybe it's, I don't know, the art director that's worked, that's working at Google that sees that, and maybe it's bringing that one piece of, of, of your work into, into the mood board, as I was saying, And so it's, it's not always, let's not consider only the client type, the, I don't know, the CEO that's on LinkedIn.

[00:23:25] It's probably sometimes, of course, our peers can, can be the, the standard, the starting point of our conversation that gets you to the producer, to the, to the more business oriented people. We. Really try to, uh, focus on the right thumbnail for the project that maybe it's not the right, the same time that we have on the website, uh, we try to find a way to send out and to make sure that the thumbnail is not too crowded, or it could be understandable, even just like what the.

[00:23:53] for a site. Yeah. Sometimes we, we post a few of them internally in Slack and we get people to vote. So to try to get a small, a small team of live feedback. Yeah. We talk so much about this when I, you know, we're doing our YouTube videos and stuff like that. It's like some of these thumbnails, they show up super small.

[00:24:12] So it's like, how are you grabbing people's attention? So it's interesting to hear that. Behance is kind of working in a similar way. It's like the first, like, impression, if that makes sense, and is it easily understandable too. And it's interesting also, I think, because it gives you the opportunity to think about if you have to synthesize the whole project into one animation, into one GIF, what is that?

[00:24:35] So yeah, that's an interesting project and an interesting aspect to keep in mind, especially when you're working on the next project, so that you're thinking, okay, I need, of course, uh, kind of this, this, uh, synthesis moment somewhere in, in, into the work. And so it's a sort of, uh, let's say visual title of the project.

[00:24:56] So it's something that influences the way you work later on. Of course, it's not always possible. I'm not saying that we are always selecting them beforehand. I'm not saying, but yeah, it's interesting to think about your project into, okay, what is the. individual GIF. Actually, we say GIF, not GIF. But basically, what is, what is the individual GIF that is going to represent the whole project and can represent the whole project?

[00:25:20] That's a very interesting exercise, I think. Yeah, awesome. I'm just going to loop back to something we talked about earlier because we've mentioned like so many processes and like how you evaluate leads and how you know you think about briefs and stuff like that. If there's like one system or process you think like every motion designer or studio owner should have in their business, like what would that be or what area of the business would that be in?

[00:25:43] Uh, maybe on the business side, I would say that the first thing you need to do is probably have a sort of tracking of the amount of project that you're invoicing. And of course, making sort of an estimate of where your year is going based on, on the number of leads and on the course amount, for example, uh, yeah, we have a file that is dedicated to that, which is basically.

[00:26:04] Uh, very simply trying to estimate, uh, the, how much we will invoice in February and March and April. And from that came to understand where the year is going more or less. So that is a very basic, and I know, I hope that everyone is already doing that, but basically it's a part of a process that, that is pretty useful, of course.

[00:26:24] Yeah. And I think that what Lucas said, it's very important because also having good financial stability is, uh, or like the, at least an estimate of it lead us. And I think it's our people to make bolder, creative decisions because you are willing to take more risk if you know that you are already in a safe position economically.

[00:26:43] And so maybe you can take the risk to pitch, uh, more like, um, experimental ideas because of course maybe you're losing that pitch, but if, uh, it's, it's the right idea for the client, maybe you have a really powerful piece in your portfolio. Um, so yeah, in general, I think that, I mean, my piece of advice is that everyone like working in this industry needs to, to gather some inspiration also for the business part that is super, super important and leads us to.

[00:27:15] Stay within, like, this, uh, industry and work for, like, a long time. We know that we don't have to convince you, Aileen. And we know that's one of your main topics. Yeah, but no, it's great. It's great to hear from you and hear about everything that you're doing. And I really, really also agree on the financial side of things.

[00:27:33] Like, we just brought out a pricing toolkit, and it has a financial forecast in there. And I think it's, like, absolutely what everyone should do. Because then also you can see, you know, okay, my business made more money last year at this point, and then maybe it was a little bit quieter here. So that gives you opportunity to either like, okay, well let's fill in those gaps, or like you say, let's like, think about, you know, maybe some more personal projects, or some, you know, more exciting low pay projects in that time when we know it's a little bit quieter for us, or things like that.

[00:28:03] And I think it's really powerful, you know, to do that work and it's not that fun, but you know, hopefully we're here to provide some of the help and inspiration to do that too. Absolutely. Yeah, exactly. And also, yeah, having in mind that when you started here, okay, what, what is going to be my goal, what I want to achieve and what that translates into the Monthly, for example, uh, figures that I need to make that that's, uh, of course, yeah, you want to have these, uh, kind of internal conversation with, with yourself.

[00:28:30] Thanks so much for listening all the way to the end of this podcast. I really appreciate you. Now it's really exciting because Spotify has actually just launched comments and I've been reading some of your comments over the past few months. So if you would like to let me know what you thought of this episode, you can actually comment on Spotify directly in the app, and I would love to chat to you over there.

[00:28:53] Thank you so much for listening all the way to the end. I appreciate you. See ya.