SAP is the world’s largest provider of business software, counting 99 of the

world’s 100 largest companies as customers. As a 50-year-old technology company that pioneered the category of ERP software, however, SAP was perceived as only serving the largest global businesses.

The size of the US mid-market, however, is enormous. North America represents nearly half of all global software spending, and the US mid-market represents nearly 80% of all US software spending. So in 2023 SAP set itself a business objective to reintroduce itself to, and ignite a new customer base among, this important and growing segment that had previously felt ignored.

The program objectives were to 1) gain mindshare among entirely new prospects, who never considered SAP as an option, and 2) boost consideration, giving them reasons to believe SAP can help them take their mid-market business to the next level.

SAP helps today’s businesses be ready for the unprecedented change they are facing every day. To communicate this, we created an outdoor digital activation that helped prepare businesses for whatever the world would throw at them that day. Every morning for ten straight days, we would select four provocative business news headlines. We then used generative AI to merge these four stories into one singular graphic image. That image was then used to brief different illustrators around the world, who would reimagine it in their own style, and bring human artistry, craft and insight to every concept. The activation ran for ten straight days on megasites in New York, Los Angeles, and Atlanta, as well as across multiple social platforms, with the finished concept going live daily just twelve hours after that morning’s kickoff.

While the business environment is always changing, the rate of change has become unprecedented. They face entirely new challenges that weren’t on their radars the day before. How they respond can determine whether they become famous…or obsolete.

Our insight was that: Every day brings a new ‘four-headed monster’ (an entirely new combination of issues) that businesses have to battle with and overcome. One challenge alone might be straightforward to address. But when combined with other events in ways we’ve never experienced before, it gets a lot more complicated.

What Generative AI does best is synthesize concepts to produce a thought starter that could serve as a brief to a digital artist almost instantly. And the creative platform of BE today READY afforded us the ultimate flexibility to tell any combination of news stories from whatever may be happening on any given day.

For ten days, the campaign proceeded as follows:

7-8AM: Agency used a live news API feed to source provocative Business, Economics, and Technology news stories

8-8:30AM: Top four news stories were chosen for the day’s ad. A four-part headline was written (our ‘four headed monster’), that would illustrate the full scope of that particular day’s business challenges and opportunities.

8:30-10AM: Agency used generative AI to merge these four stories into one singular graphic concept.

10AM-6PM: That image was used to brief an illustrator, who had 8 hours to reimagine and reinterpret it in their own style.

6-7PM: Final concepts were approved and published live across digital billboards in New York, Los Angeles and Atlanta. As well as on social media and SAP’s campaign landing page.

Ten days. Three illustrators working around the world. Thirty total installations, in three cities and multiple digital channels.

With AI doing our prep work and providing us with thought starters, we saved hours if not days, allowing our artists to shine in near real-time, crafting unique images with mood, texture, meaning and detail.

We had to gain mindshare, (re)shape perception, and turn interest into traffic - to give ourselves any hope of converting prospects into leads and into potential future customers.

Pre-vs-Post campaign brand Consideration and Momentum jumped +18%.

Trust in SAP grew +14%, as did positive perception in SAP as a brand that helps organizations overcome disruption and uncertainty by 11%.

We not only achieved these results and surpassed expectations across the board, but we helped drive 955,056 brand new and unique visitors to the SAP website during the campaign period, and set entirely new benchmarks in terms of creative development speed (10X faster) and production speed (336X faster), thanks to our use of Generative AI as a supporting tool.

Finally, SAP’s internal business impact projection model predicted a +118% ROI in additional revenue attributable to this specific campaign within the next three years.