Microsite

Using Creative to Meet Business (and Budget) Challenges

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Project information


Kittencoder was a project that began with a challenge: How do you reach elite media executives at multi-million dollar industry tradeshows with less than 10K in budget when modern digital practices don't work (your addressable audience is not on social media, doesn't search, and isn't a heavy app user in a way where geo-fencing or display ads might apply).

The answer is to FedEx 30 target media executives colorful balls of yarn with nothing but a mysterious handwritten tag directing them to a tradeshow booth. Then spend 9k to reserve the smallest-possible space at the tradeshow, $350 to hire a teenager off craigslist for the day who is given no instructions or information, $130 on 25 tiny collars with custom tags that say 'kittencoder.com', and the remaining $500 on a donation to a local animal shelter to borrow 25 kittens for the day who want to roam around an empty tradeshow booth and play with yarn and media executives. Oh, and a saucer of milk. Kittens get thirsty when they play.

I am often asked how designs come together, so I wanted to share the creative journey this project took (as painful as some of these early mockups are). We got off to a great start by working with the business team to agree on a clear design brief and ask the right questions. It is at this point it became obvious that a ho-hum, run-of-the mill video encoding site wasn't going to achieve the objective, and that the site was going to be used to reach a very specific persona at tradeshows. Then the designer and I both put together two independent iterations of what we though a site layout might look like given our conversations--the designers a bit too weak and mine far too strong--before splitting the difference and trying to combine the best elements of both in a goldilocks layout to present to the business.

I feel like guerrilla marketing is made for scrappy products like this: Because we didn't have the budget to buy a custom font I even had a chance to make this one, the first font I've ever made. In addition, bi-lingual launches are always fun, and the unique limitiations in budget combined with a short delivery schedule meant a really memorable project.

Supporting brilliant technology teams with great creative, copy, and execution is the reason I love marketing, and Kitt is a project that will always be really special to me.

Scroll to the bottom to see the final result.

Project data

  • Kittencoder
  • Microsite
  • 2015
  • Web Design
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