Let’s be real, digital marketing used to be a lot simpler at the start of the internet. Now we have AI generating any material you need, and many businesses prioritise quantity above quality for SEO reasons. We’re drowning in a tsunami of digital content, and frankly, a lot of it deserves to sink.
By late 2024, 67% of consumers are expected to experience marketing fatigue, and many are ready to unsubscribe from brands that send them too many messages. That piece of content that took blood, sweat, and tears to create? It's competing with approximately 4.95 billion pieces of content published daily across social platforms alone. The math is not in your favour.
The answer to engagement isn’t in more content, it’s better content. That’s where scrollytelling comes in.
What is scrollytelling?
Scrollytelling combines “scrolling” and “storytelling”. It creates immersive experiences through text, images, videos, and animations that appear as the reader scrolls through an online document. Think of it as a story that is told progressively, dependent on the reader’s input for scrolling. Unlike traditional web content that dumps everything on you all at once, scrollytelling allows readers to navigate through information at their own pace while keeping them engaged.
However, the technique isn't entirely new. The term “scrollytelling” was first coined to describe online longform stories characterized by audio, video, and animation effects triggered by scrolling. What's changed is that it’s gaining significant popularity as a strategy to make information digestible and break with traditional content formats.
The content overload problem
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room. Or rather, the 47 elephants, 12 tigers, and a confused zebra all trying to fit through your attention span at once. To say that online reading has changed over the years would be putting it lightly.
Marketing nowadays requires a strategic approach to stand out amidst information overload—especially with how easy it has become to generate content with AI and how much there is of it. The average person encounters thousands of marketing messages daily. The internet has become a battlefield for organisations fighting for attention.
“Content fatigue” is a documented negative response caused by excessive use of platforms and constant pressure to consume digital content. Your audience isn't just tired, they're actively developing an allergic reaction to traditional content formats.
As a result, readers will scroll past your carefully crafted infographic faster than they'd swipe left on their ex. Or they start reading your blog post with genuine intention, then abandon ship somewhere around paragraph two when they remember they have other tabs open.
The traditional solution? Make everything louder! Brighter! More animated! Add more exclamation points!!! Use more emojis! 🚀✨
So far, we can’t conclude that it’s working. The solution is to stop competing by doing something different.
Why scrollytelling actually works
The reason scrollytelling is such a successful technique is that it exploits a fundamental quirk in human psychology: we're wired to crave control. (Even if it's the illusion of control over when we see a bar chart.)
Pacing
Scrollytelling serves information at your tempo. When readers are able to control the pace, that means they're not overwhelmed or underwhelmed. Their reading experience is comfortable and more likely to keep them engaged.
Creating commitment
Every scroll is a micro-commitment to reaching the end for our readers. By leveraging scrollytelling techniques, they won't realize they're being led deeper into your content until they're halfway down and genuinely curious about your quarterly retention metrics. It's the IKEA effect applied to digital content: the more effort a reader invests in navigating your story, the more valuable it becomes to them, and they will want to reach the end.
Dopamine
Interactivity is what defines scrollytelling. Each scroll reveals something new, playing into our curiosity and triggering small dopamine releases upon reveal. It’s literal science.
Focused reading
While traditional web pages can be distracting (hello, cookie consent banner and "related articles"), scrollytelling creates a focused tunnel of attention. Readers become less likely to multitask when they’re being led through a story without distractions.
Examples of scrollytelling
Let's examine some scrollytelling examples that have proven successful in real life:
1. Bidwells' "Driving Innovation at Speed" Motorsport Report
Bidwells turned motorsport industry research into a literal race experience. Multiple race cars launch and follow you down the page. Interactive charts and data points reveal themselves at strategic points along the journey, using brand-consistent colors to maintain visual cohesion. The scrollytelling version focuses on key takeaways while building toward a conversion-focused form that lets you download the full report at the finish line.
2. Renault’s “Everything about electric driving” infographic
Renault's interactive infographic follows Olivier and Jeanette's road trip to Paris, embedding information within a fictional journey. Instead of dumping product specifications on potential buyers, real-world scenarios are used to introduce key details such as charging stops and low battery notifications. The car progresses down the road while information materializes through animated effects on scroll. This example shows how scrollytelling transforms abstract products into tangible experiences.
3. Apple's product launch pages
Apple mastered the art of the scrollytelling years before we had a name for it. With every release, you could count on a sleek page showcasing the new product. Each scroll builds anticipation, reveals features progressively, and creating desire in potential buyers. Take the product page for Airpods Pro 2 for example.
Hungry for more? Check out other interactive scrollytelling examples here!
Tips to do scrollytelling the right way
So how would you leverage scrollytelling techniques for your marketing goals? Here are several tips to get started:
Start with the story, not with animations and effects
The biggest mistake brands make is leading with the technology instead of the narrative. Cool parallax effects won't save bad content. Once you’ve got the structure down, only then start figuring out how scrolling effects can enhance that structure.
Beware of doing too much
Not everything needs to animate (and that’s coming from us). Sometimes the most powerful moment in a scrollytelling experience is when something doesn't move. Stillness can create emphasis in the same way silence can during a speech.
Be critical of content length
There's a sweet spot between "too short to be meaningful" and "longer than most people's commutes." If users need to scroll for more than 30 seconds to reach your conclusion, perhaps you're testing their commitment and not telling a story.
Always optimise your experiences for responsiveness
Most scrollytelling happens on mobile devices, where the scroll gesture (through swiping) is intuitive and natural. If your scrollytelling experience doesn't work flawlessly on mobile, you might just miss out on more than half of your potential traffic.
Measure scroll depth over page views
Scrollytelling is vastly different from traditional content and therefore requires different interpretation of metrics. A high bounce rate might actually indicate that users consumed your entire scrollytelling experience in one sitting. Tracking scroll depth, clicks and time spent at sections might tell you more about the experience than page views alone.
Scrollytelling will future-proof your content
Scrollytelling isn't about following the latest design trend, it's about giving back control to your audience and creating focus amidst all the noise from other brands. It transforms overwhelming information into guided discovery, passive consumption into exploration, and digital fatigue into curiosity.
Truth is, your audience is tired of being marketed to. While most consumers will choose to unsubscribe from brands’ overwhelming message volume, scrollytelling offers a radically different approach. Traditional formats simply can’t compete.
Instead of trying to be louder than the competition, scrollytelling lets content speak for itself, and a great story needs no further explanation.
