Heroes: A Sage Brand Advertising Campaign (2017)

Showcasing customers as heroes in their business universe brought Sage’s new Business Builder brand positioning to life.

With an objective to help supercharge revenue in the United Kingdom and United States for the coming year by providing air cover for demand and sales teams, Sage made a $6M media investment in a brand awareness campaign “Heroes” across a handful of major metropolitan markets in these two regions. The effort included high-profile TV, print, out-of-home, online and radio. It was the first significant investment in the new Business Builder brand positioning that was crafted out the year before.

Requiring a mighty cross-functional effort, the Brand Team collaborated with global field marketing team and partner/reseller teams to line up customers to participate in stories, including unpacking many details and data points that demonstrated how Sage accounting products transformed their business. Brand’s creative team then leveraged those proof points as fodder for the advertising messaging. With the success of the “Heroes” brand work, we extended the campaign creative to the digital demand programs, providing imagery and messaging to align brand to demand and connect the customer journey down the funnel.

OUTCOME: Brand health checks showed an 11-point increase in spontaneous awareness of the Sage brand in key US and UK markets during 2017 “Heroes” campaign period. Additional increases included +58% in US paid search, +703% in Chicago web traffic, +364% increase in San Francisco web traffic, and +100% in London web traffic.