Who: Xero, a New Zealand-based technology company with offices in New Zealand, Australia, the UK and North America, with boutique Toronto agency Fellow Human for creative and strategy; The Deli for production with Matt Eastman as director; Rooster, Fort York VFX, and TheVanity vfx for post production; BoomBox Sound for music; and Dentsu Creative for Canadian media.
What: An integrated campaign encouraging small business owners in North America to run their business more efficiently by using Xero's accounting software.
When & Where: The assets include OOH ads which ran in the fall, and a 30-second digital/ TV spot in market now.
Why: Xero entered the U.S. market in 2011 and expanded to Canada in 2018. Fellow Human, who began working with the US side of the brand after developing a relationship with the Canadian Xero team in 2022, was tasked with localizing the new brand campaign, originally developed in the southern hemisphere, for the US and Canada. The agency will continue to work with the brand to grow awareness in North America but could not disclose details at this time.“Evolving the global Xero brand for North America was at the heart and centre of this campaign,” said Xero’s brand marketing manager Patrick Razon, in a release. “The task at hand was to rethink how we could express the Xero brand and explain what we are, while also connecting to the needs of small business owners.”
How (the strategy): Co-founders and chief creative officers of Fellow Human, Travis Cowdy and Lyranda Martin Evans actually use Xero accounting software for their agency. For the campaign, they drew from their insights as small business owners to ensure the benefits of the offerings were communicated in an easy to understand way.
“We really got this brief. The numbers side of the business was the biggest learning curve for us, but getting a handle on it really helps you feel confident in making important decisions," Cowdy told The Message. “We really understand the benefits of having an intuitive accounting software on our side.”
“The global marketing work [Xero has] done always finds a way to present this very powerful software in a very human way,” he added. “We wanted to honour the fun work they have done in the past while still finding a way to do the heavy lifting we needed for this campaign.”
How (the creative): The TV spot features a woman and man navigating a maze of hallways, a metaphor for all the financial hurdles small business owners encounter. While the woman, who uses Xero, confidently strides towards her studio, the man continues to comically open door after door only to discover it is not the door he’s looking for (he’s met by a rather aggressive gust of wind, in one instance.)
As the woman walks, she says “The success of my business has taken some surprising twists and turns, but xero account software helped put me on the right path.” As she opens the door to her studio, coloured in the brand’s signature blue, she says “Find the power in your numbers, and open the right doors with Xero.”
“The Xero brand has a personality to it and we wanted this to come through in the work. A bit of whimsy and fun, and a beautifully designed set with a lot of poppy colour helped us deliver a lot of information to the consumer but keep them entertained and engaged at the same time,” said Cowdy in a release.
The OOH ads similarly feature big, punchy headlines like “get to the bottom of your bottom line,” on a backdrop of Xero’s blue brand colour.
[videopress u2hL70Mn]
