ROLE

ACD/Writer

AGENCY

Small Army

VIBES

Friendly Snark

TEAM

AD: Papee Therawat

ACD/CW: Jess Tardy

ECD: Sam Pitino

WORK

Brand Voice

Tagline

Messaging

Visual Identity

OOH

Direct Mail

UGC Campaign

An advertising awards show needed to stand out in a crowded field of industry events and increase submissions from creative professionals. The challenge was creating a brand identity that would actually make ad people want to participate instead of just rolling their eyes and scrolling past.

Working as associate creative director and writer with Small Army’s team, my partner Papee Thirawat (design genius extraordinaire) and I developed a “trash talking” concept that leaned into what advertising culture actually loves: industry gossip and competitive critiques.The insight: Ad people love to dish on hot industry gossip while pulling apart competitor work (have you seen Mad Men?), so why not make that the whole brand experience?

We created print and digital postcards featuring ad world “burns” and helped revamp the website UX to reflect this insider voice. The strategy was making the awards show feel like it was created by people who actually got advertising culture, not some generic event marketing that could work for any industry gathering.

The trash-talking approach worked like a charm: the brand scored roughly a kajillion more entries than the previous year, landed us some shiny trophies, and earned a spot in Design Quarterly. Turns out when you create brand experiences that speak directly to your community’s shared language and inside jokes, you can drive way higher engagement than boring, safe industry marketing that tries not to offend anyone.