To drive acquisition in the fourth quarter of our financial year amongst our target audience of sole traders/self employed/freelancers, the NZ Xero marketing team and the in-house creative agency (known as the Hub), worked together to produce a through the line campaign to highlight the simplicity of Xero as a tool for getting end of financial year ready.
The “Easy As Pie” campaign ran for 13 weeks from the beginning of January 2022 until the end of March, and generated a 9% increase in Xero subscriptions YoY, despite us spending 30% less YoY. The campaign drove the biggest end of financial year result that Xero NZ had ever seen
From creative planning to conceptual development through to dispatch the Hub delivered this campaign to broadcast media, digital display and social media channels.
Using research from our internal Voice of Customer team and studies from our global research partner, the creative concept developed from the pain points of being a sole trader. In essence, it’s easy for sole traders to put their accounting into the ‘too hard basket.’
The “too hard basket” insight was the genesis for our campaign, with the creative territory of make too hard too easy with Xero.
Through our campaign creative, we show how sole traders put their paperwork and financial admin into a physical representation of the too hard basket. Instead of putting it off, you can sort it on the spot so the tasks don’t build up and weigh you down. Using Xero to manage your business finances is “Easy As Pie” (the creative line used in the campaign).
With an ambitious acquisition goal and a modest production budget we had to be efficient with our resources while maintaining our high brand standards. The Hub approached this task with the same discipline and process as an external agency would.
I worked with the marketing team on the reverse brief, then a creative team were tasked with presenting a range of concepts for an integrated campaign. Our media strategy gave us the formats for a through-the-line campaign; broadcast TV, video on demand, broadcast radio and radio partnerships, supported by a solid digital and social schedule for conversion and re-marketing.
The creative team, together with Xero’s in-house director and video-media team, created detailed storyboards and animatics to communicate the concept to internal stakeholders then engaged with production house, WorkParty, for casting, props and filming. With a Wellington-based creative team and an Auckland based shoot we had to be innovative with the art direction during COVID restrictions. To maximise the availability of the talent, sets and budget, we ran a professional stills shoot to capture images for static digital and print at the same time.
The final result sets a high standard of creative production. The Easy As Pie campaign is now used by Xero globally as an example of how the Hub and Marketing can collaborate to produce world-class campaigns.
Credits: Creative director: Pete Montgomery
| Art director: Sloane Dougherty | Copywriter: Roz Sanderson | Lead integrated producer: Joel Walden | Producer: Myra Anderson | Video media producer: Tracey Flett | Executive media producer: Suzanne DeZeeuw
Director: Bryce McNamara | Production company: Workparty | Producer: Nikhil Madhan | DoP: Ginny Loane | Stills photographer: Simeon Patience
Media company: MBM - McCready Bale Media | Client service director: Deborah Brown
Xero NZ Marketing Director: Bridget Snelling | Xero NZ Head of SMB Marketing: Emma Scoringe | Xero NZ Partner Marketing Manager: Justine Wallendorf | Xero Campaign manager: Noor Yaikoob