Mood Board: Fiverr ad encourages business leaders to consider freelancers part of company culture

With all this talk of a potential recession, freelance companies are gearing up for a boon to business.

“The way we work changed so dramatically in the last two and a half years, and with macroeconomical changes that are happening, I think the timing is super relevant,” Fiverr CMO Gali Arnon said of the company’s latest campaign, adding that freelancers can be a “great solution” for companies undergoing layoffs.

The ad shows workers celebrating freelancer Marco’s last of eight days at a company by eating cake in the break room. The catch? Marco isn’t actually there IRL.

Arnon said the goal of the campaign is to show corporate decision-makers “how they can extend their team” and “think about new ways of working” with freelancers, including considering them part of company culture.

“[Freelancers] work from the coffee shop or from their home office, but they still need to be recognized for their work,” Arnon said. “They still need to get feedback and praise and be part of the social fabric of a company.”

We spoke with Arnon about the creative elements that went into creating the new campaign—the first created in-house for Fiverr.

It’s coming from inside the house: After going through the agency pitch process, Arnon said Fiverr “wasn’t quite happy” with the ideas presented and put out a call to its internal creative team. Upon seeing this idea, she said, “It was clear that they know the product and the company and our culture and our ethos and our values more than anyone else.”

Give me five(rr): In addition to using its own creative team, Arnon said Fiverr also tapped freelancers on its platform–something it’s done in every campaign to date—for creative elements like voice-overs.

In-office: One Easter egg Arnon said may not be obvious to the average viewer is the setting of the ad, which is Fiverr’s headquarters in Tel Aviv. Shooting the ad required shutting two floors of the office down for two days. From start to finish, she said the campaign took about two to three months to create.

Let them eat cake: In keeping with the theme of the video, Arnon said, “As a surprise, we’re going to send a few cakes to our top freelancers in a few markets where they’re going to have their picture on it.” She said the plan is to document the deliveries and share on social.

Around the world: “We were preaching the fact that talent is global and you could work remotely for the 10 years that we existed before Covid hit,” Arnon said. The campaign is running in “key markets” around the world, including the US, UK, Germany, Australia, and France—all places where Arnon said Fiverr has observed a shift to freelance. She said Fiverr is putting “significant investment” in the campaign, which will run “for at least a few months” on linear and streaming TV and/or digital, depending on location.

Back to the break room: Pending public reception, Arnon said she can envision this campaign evolving into more than a single ad: “We do have other ideas around [this concept], other kinds of cultural moments in a workplace or traditions or ceremonies that were extremely funny,” she said. “So I think this has the potential to be more than a one-off.”