In January this year, Momo went live with a new campaign for Jupiter (the neo banking app). The campaign was a fairly simple one, consisting of a series of 5 performance marketing films, carrying a messaging of a mix of new and old features available on the app. The brand was coming from a place of wanting to do higher ROI ads, which delivered their value proposition clearly to the audience and compelled them to check out the app. This meant that our campaign had to be crystal clear about the messaging while simultaneously creating a strong brand image and recall.
Along with the in-house team of Jupiter, we wrote 3 films to be 15s long, and the other 2 to be 20s long. The mandate was to keep the value prop as clear as possible while still catering to the ever-decreasing attention span of our TG. With every second being spent in delivering the benefit of the features, we were left with an important question – how do we ensure brand recall and brand presence in the series?
The answer came to us in the form of Production Design.
Jupiter has always been heavily associated with a particular shade of orange – one that they like to call “Spacefire Orange”. It has been part of their physical and online presence in large doses, separating them from the competition and at the same time creating a clear chain of connections across their communication being consumed by their audiences. We decided to give this color a clear centerstage in our Production Design, while still keeping things interesting in our frames with a complimentary palette. To also ensure zero distraction from the main messaging while still creating a subconscious impact of the brand, we decided to go with a Minimal Abstract treatment for the entire series.
As the Director, my objective was clear – create a screenplay that focuses heavily on the protagonist, the messaging & benefits of the features, while allowing the sets to create a subliminal impact on the way the viewers see the brand and how they recall the campaign.
Our Production Designer for this project, Chaithra Puthraya, really rose to the occasion and delivered on the brief. She and I exchanged simple designs & references at first, outlining the basic premise of each film, and talking about the exploration of the colors, the textures, the context and the aesthetic appeal of the sets. This process began with me personally exploring the realm of possibilities with AI through Midjourney, mashing that up with detailed references from my idea banks, and eventually ended with Chaithra creating custom designs for each set in 3D visualizations.
The result was a consistent campaign with clear branding of Jupiter (thanks to Spacefire Orange!) along with a unique identity to each film and clear messaging overall. The images included here are all from the development process of one of the 5 films. You can watch the films here - https://tinyurl.com/JupiterCashflowMomo
This exercise in Branding through Production Design left me with a few key takeaways –
1. In performance marketing, brand presence is extremely important for creating a consistent, cohesive and easy-to-recall campaign.
2. Brand presence doesn’t always mean “a large logo” in the film, and instead can be utilized in different ways to enhance a Director’s vision and create beautiful aesthetics.
3. If you want to pack as much information into every film you make, using every aspect of filmmaking to your advantage is an essential skill.
Here’s to more Branding in Production Design in the coming years of advertising! Cheers!