“What the heck does that mean?”

Not gonna lie. A lot of our latest campaign will make absolutely no sense to a great majority of people who see it. Many who drive past the billboards will just shake their heads. As will those who see bus shelters on Van Ness covered in code. 

But the developers who build the internet we’re addicted to? They’ll get it. They practically wrote it. (In some instances they completely wrote it.)

While last year's Stytch campaign from boutique ad agency Division of Labor reminded us all how much we hate remembering passwords, this year’s is telling a very different story. Stytch is about a lot more than just passwordless authentication. It’s an entire platform for developers who build authentication. And building those pages and having them work seamlessly can be quite a chore.

But not with Stytch. They’ve developed a modern platform that let’s developers build authentication without workarounds or writing thousands of lines of additional code. And while that message may not resonate with the majority of San Franciscans, it can create an emotional connection with those who do understand.

Division of Labor specializes in working with Series B Startups and tech companies like Stytch. Of course, before we can develop ad campaigns like this, we have to dig into the product and figure out what it is we’re talking about. Our clients at Stytch were incredibly patient with us as we iterated on ideas and stared with blank faces as they took us into the depths of the GitHub universe. After poking around a bit on Reddit, we came away with a simple visual that would instantly convey the benefits of Stytch while simultaneously flying over the heads of the non-coding majority. 

Pair the visual with a headline like git commit -m “auth, simplified” and you’ve got yourself advertising gold. Or, so we think.

The Captcha executions are especially fun because of the stupid irony they display; humans spending time convincing robots that we’re not robots. Meanwhile, robots are better at solving Captchas than we are! Infuriating. The idea came out of a human insight; the irritation we all feel when we’re served up a Captcha. But when Stytch founder Juliana Lamb pulled out the fact that bots are now more skilled at solving these things than humans, the messaging got more focused and highlights the fact that Stytch has a better way.

So to the question; If people don’t understand your advertising, can it be great? The answer is, yes. As long as the people who are meant to get it, get it, it can indeed be great. On the other hand, when Coca Cola runs ads that look like the one below, it’s a missed opportunity. Because everyone in the world should be able to figure out a Coke ad. But even after you explain that this is about recycling and that’s supposed to be a crumbled-up can, or something, it still doesn’t make any sense.

Thanks to everyone at Stytch who continues to be amazing clients. There are a lot of great San Francisco ad agencies out there. And we’re honored Stytch chose us. If you’re in San Francisco, keep your eyes peeled for the ad campaign and those scratching their heads nearby. And if you need Series B startup advertising and are looking for an ad agency, let’s talk!

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The Small Agency Blog is produced by Division of Labor; the ad agency for startups, based in San Francisco, twice named Small Agency of the Year by Ad Age. The award-winning creative shop services a variety of clients and specializes in startups that have obtained Series B financing or higher. They also offer freelance services. Click here for a free consultation.