CREATIVE SHOWCASE 
Slate.com Flips for Visa
March 09, 2006
Visa taps AKQA for a fresh take on the classic page takeover to promote its bold new "Life Takes" campaign.
Creative Notes 
Firefox compatible
Campaign Details
Client: Visa
Creative Agency: AKQA
Creative Agency: AKQA
Campaign Insight
For video content created exclusively for the web, LifeTakesVisa.com is Visa's most ambitious effort to date. The site features roughly 60 vignettes that celebrate real life, from the everyday to the extraordinary. Unencumbered by traditional broadcast specs, we were able to create a web experience that extends the advertising message in a variety of ways, and tells individual stories that capture human nature at its best.
For the Slate.com ad placement (Creative 2) we created a simple homepage takeover with stopping power, the "Life Takes Perspective" unit loads the front page of Slate.com backwards, and invites users to flip it back and forth. Being sensitive to the user experience, should a visitor not engage with the piece, the page quickly flips around for regular viewing.
-- Steve Scowden, creative director, AKQA
Editor's Note
Creative Showcase is meant to be a teaching tool and an inspiration for our readers. We comment only on creative that we really love. Our panelists discuss what makes it great, but if they feel there were missed opportunities that would have made it better, we invite them to mention those. And finally, we seek out a wide range of opinions that reflect the marketplace for the panel, in order to provide constructive, useable feedback for agencies, clients and others involved in these creative pieces.
The Panel
In AKQA's "Life Takes Visa" campaign, we see not only an engaging creative execution, but also an innovative media placement that carries through the campaign's message. In examining the website, a graceful and inviting interface draws you in to explore each photo in a way that doesn't spawn any pop-ups, utilizes quick and smooth transitions, and enables you to send each clip you find interesting to a friend. Carrying along the campaign's message in a fun and quirky way, there are enough pictures to keep you around for dozens of minutes-- more time than could be spent with the Visa brand in any other medium.
As far as the media placement goes, in a variation on the "roadblock"/"welcome mat" strategy, the Slate website is revealed after an interaction with the Visa ad, ensuring that anyone that visits the site is touched by this campaign. Eyes are drawn to the ad as the only non-mirror-imaged item on the page, and a click resolves the issue. It's not very invasive, and consumers could even appreciate the innovative delivery. The ad itself doesn't explain the campaign, however, and there isn't that much incentive to actually click through to the site that lies beyond the click-- nor is there anything that tells you what lies beyond the click. But then again, getting a consumer to notice an ad is 75 percent of the battle.
Credit card companies have tried for years to add an emotional quotient to their campaigns. By allowing audiences to find the quotient that resonates for themselves, and inviting them to do so in a way that can't be ignored, this may be as close as they're going to get. I give it 4.5 out of 5 magnetic strips.
-- Ian Schafer, CEO, Deep Focus
Disclosure: While Bolt has done business with Visa, we were not a part of this campaign.
Let's face it, we've all seen enough jock/beer/car/travel minisites to last us a lifetime. How many more CPGs think they can build a compelling content experience for potato chips? Now, along comes a credit card company that thinks it can actually entertain us? Give credit where credit is due. Life Takes Visa is a great positioning and a very strong tagline. I have a DVR, so I almost never watch television advertising, but from the fast forwarding I did during the Olympics, it seems that this campaign is well integrated with the television ads. The spots are witty, heartfelt, funny, et cetera.
AKQA visually innovates. Period. On top of that, they deliver sophisticated, beautiful design that users can enjoy. They want people to play.
The minisite is elegant, simple and whimsical. And it's a really great use of video. I always, always worry about minisites being worth their investment because of how difficult it is to drive traffic. This site is a simple portfolio of shareable videos. I would like to have seen them take the step of allowing users to insert them in blogs and profiles, but Visa may not be there. Yet.
Good job to the people who run Slate for running this ad-- it's fresh. It's very immersive and may have angered some of their audience, but it's good marketing and the people who read Slate get a lot of value for free.
Visa is a credit card. That's it. It is very, very challenging to infuse a brand like Visa with feelings that resonate. Visa and their agencies -- particularly AKQA -- should take a bow.
-- Aaron Cohen, CEO, Bolt
As far as the media placement goes, in a variation on the "roadblock"/"welcome mat" strategy, the Slate website is revealed after an interaction with the Visa ad, ensuring that anyone that visits the site is touched by this campaign. Eyes are drawn to the ad as the only non-mirror-imaged item on the page, and a click resolves the issue. It's not very invasive, and consumers could even appreciate the innovative delivery. The ad itself doesn't explain the campaign, however, and there isn't that much incentive to actually click through to the site that lies beyond the click-- nor is there anything that tells you what lies beyond the click. But then again, getting a consumer to notice an ad is 75 percent of the battle.
Credit card companies have tried for years to add an emotional quotient to their campaigns. By allowing audiences to find the quotient that resonates for themselves, and inviting them to do so in a way that can't be ignored, this may be as close as they're going to get. I give it 4.5 out of 5 magnetic strips.
-- Ian Schafer, CEO, Deep Focus
Disclosure: While Bolt has done business with Visa, we were not a part of this campaign.
Let's face it, we've all seen enough jock/beer/car/travel minisites to last us a lifetime. How many more CPGs think they can build a compelling content experience for potato chips? Now, along comes a credit card company that thinks it can actually entertain us? Give credit where credit is due. Life Takes Visa is a great positioning and a very strong tagline. I have a DVR, so I almost never watch television advertising, but from the fast forwarding I did during the Olympics, it seems that this campaign is well integrated with the television ads. The spots are witty, heartfelt, funny, et cetera.
AKQA visually innovates. Period. On top of that, they deliver sophisticated, beautiful design that users can enjoy. They want people to play.
The minisite is elegant, simple and whimsical. And it's a really great use of video. I always, always worry about minisites being worth their investment because of how difficult it is to drive traffic. This site is a simple portfolio of shareable videos. I would like to have seen them take the step of allowing users to insert them in blogs and profiles, but Visa may not be there. Yet.
Good job to the people who run Slate for running this ad-- it's fresh. It's very immersive and may have angered some of their audience, but it's good marketing and the people who read Slate get a lot of value for free.
Visa is a credit card. That's it. It is very, very challenging to infuse a brand like Visa with feelings that resonate. Visa and their agencies -- particularly AKQA -- should take a bow.
-- Aaron Cohen, CEO, Bolt
Footnote:
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