Building Investor Trust — Creative That Builds Credibility

What makes an investor ad actually stop the scroll and move someone further down the funnel? In this episode of Behind the Raise, Martin is joined by VirtualAd’s Head of Design, Danielle Fobert, to break down the design strategy and psychology behind creative that converts. They discuss why investor ads should not be treated like mini pitch decks, how the hook-story-offer framework helps structure high-performing creative, and why founders need to focus on curiosity, clarity, and emotional connection before overwhelming audiences with information. Danielle shares what she sees working across static ads and video, including bold numbers, pattern interrupts, founder-led content, strong opinions, simple messaging, and the power of using real faces to build trust. From “ugly ads” that perform to AI-assisted creative, founder videos, and the importance of testing one clear message at a time, this episode gives issuers a practical look at how to create investor-facing ads that earn attention and drive action.

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:08

Welcome back, everybody, for episode seven of Behind the Rays. And today we have a very, very exciting episode prepared for you. Our first non-founder guest, virtual ads own, Danielle Faubert, our head of design, is joining us to discuss all of the design elements and the psychology behind creative that converts investors. And uh so we have an action-packed episode here going through different design elements, some of the psychological principles around our ad design and uh some of the core components around messaging, some advice for founders as well, and ultimately what we see working in our ads today. So, Danielle, welcome to the pod. It's great to have you on. And maybe for the benefit of our viewers and our listeners, maybe you could give them a little bit of background into your role, your history at Virtual Ad and how you came to be where you are right now.

SPEAKER_00 1:03

Awesome. Thanks, Barton. Yeah, it's happy to be on uh the show. Looking forward to hopefully future features as well, depending on how this one goes. But yeah, so uh here at Virtual Ad, I'm head of design. So pretty much I've been with Virtual Ad for four pushing five shortly in about a week, years. It's been a long, wild ride, but it's definitely been kind of the best um role I've been in for a while. Just going a little bit into the past, um, I graduated from OCAD in 2018 and was lucky enough to kind of jump out of school and right into work at a more traditional out-of-home kind of science shop. And then from there went client side and was focusing on in-house creative for a long time and then kind of went out of client side to go into more uh agency. And that's when I joined Virtual Ad and it's just been smooth sailing since.

SPEAKER_01 1:49

Yeah, that's awesome. Well, knowing that you're coming up now on your fifth year anniversary, I definitely want to hype you up a little bit more as well. And I will just let the audience know that Danielle is basically like a prolific content creator and designer and is able to handle a ton of volume and a lot of tasks and has been with us. I I almost want to say since day one, it hasn't been like total, total day one, but you've been with us through a number of different iterations before we, you know, fully landed in the capital raise space. And I think like each one of those phases has been such a key learning. And I think it's also been great seeing your evolution as a designer because I think when when you did come in, it was a like a skill set. Kind of like you said, it was largely more design-based and not necessarily that direct response where like you had that capability in that background. But I feel like you've I've really seen you grow and evolve into being able to create these awesome direct response ads and also just take on a lot of new challenges as the space ch continues to change. Like even I think when we started it was a lot of image ads, and now it's like a lot of videos.

SPEAKER_00 2:55

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 2:56

So that's been great to see. And you've been such an integral part of the team, and everybody that's worked with you always has such great things to say. It's no surprise that you're you're coming onto your fifth year now.

SPEAKER_00 3:06

We've definitely been through a lot of changes, and even like you were saying, kind of even just the environment around aid media has changed so much over the last few years. So I think that's kind of feeding into why we've had to go through so many iterations essentially to get to where we are for clients.

SPEAKER_01 3:21

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Like when TikTok became a thing, I was like, okay, it's like we're gonna be doing so much video from from now on. And I I think that's probably one of the things we'll touch on today is like how how well we see that working. But yeah, let's get into a little bit on the ad side of things and uh help the viewers understand what's kind of working from a design perspective and ultimately what you see coming up often in in these high converting ads. So, you know, one of the things that I often hear from founders when they hop on their first calls with us or, you know, they really start buying into the process. Eventually they they're always asking, like, what are we gonna talk about? And what are we like gonna say to people in these ads that we're doing? And I think that you have an interesting viewpoint when you start off with clients just even from onboarding, right? Because you're often taking them from this brand phase where they've really maybe focused on like their website, they've focused on building out investor decks, but they haven't fully made that transition to communicating to a broader audience about their raise. And so when you sort of step into that, what are some of the common misunderstandings that you see founders having about creative and and what they think will be working when they when they make that transition?

SPEAKER_00 4:39

Yeah, absolutely. And I think it's kind of like you what you said, um, they come from the branding side and mostly focusing on like awareness and that point. But for conversion-friendly ads, really, I think the biggest misunderstanding is founders want to put a lot of information up front center and kind of get everything out there. But when we're building these ads, the intention is really more just to get attention long enough to kind of transfer them further down the funnel where more information starts to build from there. So I'd say so most ads, when we initially get going, we keep them kind of bare, not too much giving away. And I think the first round of feedback or something that usually has to be kind of discussed with the first round, is that the ads aren't being built as kind of a mini pitch deck. It's more supposed to be just a big attention grab that we can then feed the rest of the information later once they're already kind of compelled into what we're potentially gonna tell them.

SPEAKER_01 5:38

Yeah, that's a good point. So it's not like you're not trying to find an ad that is going to somebody sees it and they're like, Oh, that's perfect. I gotta invest 50k right now. There's no silver bullet of an ad. Maybe there's a couple, maybe there's a couple, but uh, that takes a lot of time. But it's more so like you said, you want to take people to the next step. So be build enough curiosity that people want to essentially leave their scrolling experience and and go to the landing page, for example. So it's less about a silver bullet and more so about that uh like building the curiosity to get to the next step.

SPEAKER_00 6:14

Yeah, exactly. Because if you try to over-explain, especially in the ads, with the attention stopping time you have is really, really short. So if you try to overexplain too much, it becomes like convoluted and then people end up just scrolling past anyways. So just having that one big point that we can grab attention, peak curiosity, interest, emotion maybe, um, depending on kind of how we're working on this side. But um, anything that's can kind of drive a lot of just instant reaction versus kind of trying to digest information that's further down the line.

SPEAKER_01 6:46

So yeah, you're not trying to go through the whole PowerPoint in like 15 seconds, but more so leading with maybe the strongest point. And that kind of actually is a good segue into something that we often reference, which is this hook story and offer format. And I was wondering if maybe you could share and explain what that is and and why it's important to think about when founders are thinking of either like maybe making some ads or when we're explaining to them what type of ad formats work, how would you explain that hook story offer format?

SPEAKER_00 7:17

Yeah. So I'd say the type like titling is pretty self-explanatory. So we try to break down ads, video, static, carousel, even kind of going into the emails and landing page through the same structure of hook story offer. And essentially the way it works is we the first thing that the user or customer investor needs to see is of something interesting. And so that's kind of what we were talking about with the three-second attention grabber, something that will make them stop, stop the scroll, stop going through kind of their feed and through all the other photos that they're seeing. It's something that can really grab attention and then at least hold tight to then when we feed into the story. So, story is more where we get into the little bit of the explanation, but still not giving away too much. But here's really where we start to explain into or leading into the offer. So, this is usually we try to do it with a little bit of craft and art, not necessarily too blunt, but it's really there to kind of direct towards what we're looking to get from the user out of the ad. So it's booking a meeting, just going to checkout, kind of learning more. It's just feed into that offer. And so the story is really where the emotion starts to build after we pique curiosity. And then finally the offer, that's more mostly um a call to action there. So we try to be really direct on this segment, uh, where it is book a call or invest today or learn more. It's very direct. So there's no question of okay, I'm interested now. What? Uh we try to keep the kind of bottom portion of the ad, I'd say, or the last piece, very informative and direct. So there's there's no question really.

SPEAKER_01 8:52

Yeah, it's it's kind of funny that you can get really wrapped up in the hook and the story. And sometimes the call to action can fall off the map because you've done like such a good job of explaining the first part that you're like, oh, like they'll just naturally do this last part. But I find it is important to have that call to action because it almost anchors the next step. Like, I feel like when people, if you done a good job with the ad, people aren't necessarily clicking through to be like, hey, I got a book call. They're more so clicking through to be like, okay, I need a little bit more information. But then when they see that call to action on the landing page, they're like, oh yeah, I've actually seen this, you know, call action before. So I kind of feel like it's more of an anchoring tool than it is an immediate action tool, but it's definitely still important to include in the ad. And um, I'm always a sucker for a good hook. And I wonder if there's any that like I've my personal favorites are like the really contrarian ones where people do like a very abrupt pattern interrupt or they kind of uh t have a contrarian take on a a common topic. Is there like a particular hook format that you like or feel like it works, either visually or you know, messaging-wise? What type of format do you do you like to follow or or particularly like in this instance?

SPEAKER_00 10:08

Yeah, I'd say going for hooks. Um, we have a couple that are more visual based. Um, but then leading into kind of the like the interest peak, and I think um coming from the contrarian or um maybe more the pain point, like negative point of view, uh it definitely is a pattern interrupt. Um, and it will kind of stop people from like the incessant, incessant scroll kind of through social media. But coming at something with like strong passion or like strong passion against as well, um has worked really well. Um, so if you have something that we kind of can go up against, like a major problem that's out there and it's something that everyone is aware of, but it's something you can speak to, that's a huge uh hook kind of potential there. And so you can kind of work that into um like a variety of different variations going forward, build out full kind of concept uh branches from that. But visually, some other hooks we try to use are like the big numbers. Obviously, that's a huge one uh because it's very it's very to the point and it's the interest peak of the what am I gonna get out of it um point of view. So that's something that we we definitely use when we can. Aside from that, some other ones like going kind of into the contrarian is uh using the personality. So if there's a big personality with the brand, definitely we try to lead with that as a visual hook. And so it's using some of their vernacular um coming from like the founder side. They definitely know their business the best. So any little quips or one-offs that we can get from founders specifically that we can then kind of repurpose and it shows who they are and kind of who the company's about. Um, we always try to utilize those. And then of course, like founder faces, um, or any face really. Um, but founder faces are a big driver, um, especially for trust. And so that hook there kind of if people are used to seeing faces and they like to see faces. So being able to show a face as a visual hook definitely works.

SPEAKER_01 12:01

Yeah, I feel like nowadays the being able to hop on camera is almost like is such an essential part of it because it can be so easy to hide behind brand or be able to just like, you know, make a statement if you're just kind of putting a visual graphic out there. And people need to see that vulnerability and they need to see that person because it builds such a high level of trust, especially when we're talking about the investment space or companies that people haven't heard of yet, is like they they need to see that individual, somebody that's gonna stand behind their words. I feel like is so important. And we have a ton of examples of that. We're I know we're gonna like talk about it in a little bit, so I don't want to jump too far ahead, but I do feel like that's a really important piece.

SPEAKER_00 12:44

Yeah, for sure. Like we've even recently we've been on client calls where they bring up that people call in and go, I want to speak to so-and-so I saw in the video. And so from that point of view, um, being out there, it's people really want to invest in you, in the founder, in the person. Kind of that's where the trust is really built. Even if the opportunity is amazing, if there's no trust between person to person, it's kind of hard to get to that next step. So being able to show yourself, kind of speak to investors or clients or customers, it's huge. It's definitely a major trust factor.

SPEAKER_01 13:15

Well, and I love that because you know you're doing a good job in your messaging when people literally want to talk to you because they've they've seen you on an ad. And I've actually had that experience too, where I've seen ads for people a bunch of times, and and then I've actually like called or you know, had a call set up with them. And I actually ended up talking to the person. I was like, wow, I feel like I'm talking to a mini celebrity. So funny, but it it definitely works. And there's a benefit to that. But kind of on that point, I do uh I want to follow this line of thinking a little bit further because you, in some of the examples you'll bring up, we have the robotics company that we worked with. And I thought that was like a really interesting example of the power of putting yourself out there and also the the founder story, which you'll touch on a little bit later as well. But the robotics case study was super interesting because the robots themselves are so attention-grabbing and like really, quite honestly, a great hook. So you could almost ride ad performance based on the robots, but I felt like over time it almost became a little too de-humanized and de-personalized. And when we're looking to raise funds, it's like we're also we're battling the misconception that these robots were taking jobs, which they weren't. They were actually just helping. And there's so much automation and machinery on farms already, like there's that's not what they were doing at all. But there was a misconception of that. And I felt like if we didn't insert the human narrative and the founders weren't super keen on being in the ads because one, they were super busy and it wasn't just something they were used to doing, but they were very charismatic and like really great to talk to. So I was like, you guys are gonna be great in ads. And I found that it did make a big difference when they were able to hop behind the camera and be very candid. Like I thought that it was such a stark difference between just showing videos and photos of robots versus having the actual founder speak behind them. It's like almost made the robots friendlier to me.

SPEAKER_00 15:11

Yeah, and even with the little smiley faces, but for sure, especially in that particular situation, the founder story, it's a like it was a powerful and an emotional one. So coming from that side, being able to share that, like you were saying, just share it. Cause even if we ran statics where we kind of explained the history and like the reason for founding, having founder on camera kind of explain it themselves and you can see the like the emotion resonate within them, it really speaks a lot stronger than anything else that we could produce.

SPEAKER_01 15:44

Hearing it from the founder directly is such a huge difference. And oftentimes people, especially when we're thinking of the investor and startups, or that it doesn't even need to be a startup, you could just be running a fund. But ultimately they want to know the leader as well, what's the leadership is like. And the there's kind of two components. So there's that one founder story, which if it's a really good story, it helps to have a very strong why for the company. So they'll understand that, like, hey, if there's some, you know, hard times or tough decisions to be made, like this is the key principles that this company is founded on. And if those are really strong, that's gonna resonate with people. And then the second is yeah, that vulnerability is the found the founder to actually get behind and stand behind their words and put themselves out there. And I think like a big thing is surviving the comments section and just like not caring and just like putting yourself out there and being bold is such a huge step for the the founders to make. And we've always seen those ads do well.

SPEAKER_00 16:42

Yeah. And exactly to like what you were saying, um, having that, the like the backbone and the principles, every company has them. And it's just kind of a matter of getting out there and being able to speak them to the right people. Um, like if you have a like a company that you've built and you care for and you know you're gonna ride it out, it's being able to communicate that to especially investors and kind of that know that there is kind of a strong, there's a strong presence behind the wheel and it's gonna keep maintaining, even if things get rough out there, there is uh or if things get really, really good, there's uh no um worry kind of of kind of who you are investing with or who you're working with.

SPEAKER_01 17:22

Yeah, exactly. And I think also like to one of your earlier points, it's they're really effective at communicating the emotional piece of it, which we've seen, you know, different clients that we've worked with. And so I thought in the robotics example, they had like a pretty strong emotional story. Thinking a little bit about real estate client that we're working with, which is like less of an emotional industry. Like it's hard to get emotional about real estate, but I still think he does a good job because he's very passionate. And so exactly about like certain ways of investing and guiding people along what you know, or and like sort of casting uh light on certain areas that and he's so passionate about that. The founder is really that communicator for the emotion, I find as well.

SPEAKER_00 18:03

Yeah, that's the other, like the other definitely major example there, um, especially with the passion that comes for necessarily, I guess, some of the negative aspects of the industry, being able to come out pretty hard against something. It's uh something where when someone sees it and if they're kind of feeling even just like a twinge of that same kind of frustration or pain, kind of hearing that founder yell about it in ads, it definitely it's a huge stop. Like people want to stick, stay around, listen, kind of hear why what's making him so upset, why he's so angry about this. And then also the solution that is posed, uh, kind of post addressing, I guess, uh, the elephant in the room when it's in that industry.

SPEAKER_01 18:43

Yeah, yeah. I think that's a good point too, is like people are attracted to strong opinions, and it's always like a bit of a risk that you might alienate some people. I don't think that's as big of a risk as people think it is, but generally, like that's a scroll stopping kind of, I would say, position to take. Like if you're very opinionated, people are gonna be like, oh, what's this guy saying? It's a good hook for sure. Okay, so I wanna bring us into some of the actually some of our best performing ad creative and you sharing some of your thoughts around what's been working on that side of things and to share a couple of examples and kind of walk through some best practices and what you're seeing for some of our best performing ads. So maybe you could walk us through a couple of examples that speak to some of the principles that you had on the, you know, the design side. And yeah, so feel free to walk us through some of these observations of yours.

SPEAKER_00 19:35

Yeah, absolutely. So I think some of these things are things are kind of aspects that we addressed slightly earlier. So I'd say our kind of breaking these out into three groups. First one is definitely a big number. So large number, we have two top performers here and their variations. Well, at least one variation kind of per, but the huge numbers, especially when it's in investing and we have kind of returns or even past performance or anything like that, we can kind of really anchor on, that's a huge stop. And so what we like to do is blow it up as big as possible. Cause I would say a big trend recently has been to go teeny teeny tiny with text. And I think people view it as coming across as luxurious or more professional or sophisticated. But I'd say at the end of the day, it's really about attention grabbing. So depending on kind of what you're going after, it definitely can work to your benefit of being more, I guess, aloof and like really, really tiny and kind of sophisticated in that luxury approach. But to really grab attention on these social platforms where there's so many people competing all the time for everything, we like just to blow up numbers, texts, anything, get as big as possible, as bold as possible, but still maintaining, I guess, enough white space where it's not overcrowded. So overcrowded not only with elements on the actual design, but even in train of thought. We try to stick to one bit per ad and kind of break it up. So for these ads in particular, we'll focus on one piece. So it's either the returns or the track record. We're not trying to include the returns and the track record and also any other aspects of what you can get, uh, or like adding in a minimum um investment. So it's another piece that you could add in, and it definitely can still be included, maybe not in the visual, maybe we'd to kind of save that for primary text or something else. But to keep these visuals bold, we stick to just one train of thought and just kind of maintain that focus.

SPEAKER_01 21:29

Yeah, that's a good point. Is like there's always a ton to communicate in these opportunities, but focusing on like choosing a piece to focus on is important. And how do you ultimately decide what to prioritize? Because it can be difficult for I think founders sometimes to choose that because you know, somebody might come in and be like, actually, you know, it's the fact that there's a a very minimal hold on the funds that is what investors really love. And but that might not always be. The hook. So how do you how do you decide what you get, you know, what you'll be focusing on?

SPEAKER_00 22:03

Yeah. So I think that kind of that finding out what particularly drives investors' interest is something that we definitely find out when we do our spark testing, where we take kind of all the messaging, break them out into these very, very siloed creatives, and then kind of see which performs best and then move on from there. Um but when foundry comes in with kind of like you were saying, like, I think it's the the six-month hold, or I think it's the equity or kind of whatever aspect they want to focus on, it still comes down to we will try to break it out into these ad pieces where it's only focusing on one and then kind of see which performs best. And it doesn't mean we're gonna no longer talk about liquidity or equity or anything like that. It's just kind of what becomes the focus there. So typically we just base it on kind of performance and the data that we can look at and see what is driving conversions and what people may be, it's still an important factor, but it's not like the most interesting piece. Um, so that might be something that we don't necessarily run in the visuals, but we still keep it in the primary copy and we still keep it in the emails and the landing page. So it's still out there, but it's just not the attention grabber.

SPEAKER_01 23:12

Got it. So for for these examples for for those listeners that are not, you know, seeing them, but a good description of them is that we're highlighting some of the like larger numbers when it comes to these funds. In particular, these ones are speaking to returns. I think this also goes back to what you said earlier, Danielle, where we're just trying to get people to that next step. So there's not a ton that's explained about like the actual company itself in these particular ads, but the numbers and the statements are bold enough that people are gonna be like, I want to find out more about this. So they're going into that next step. And it's almost like you're taking a a less is more approach in a way.

SPEAKER_00 23:49

Yeah, for sure. Because look like when I think we said it a few times, but yeah, it really is just to stop them and then hopefully just get them engaged enough to keep moving on, even if that next step uh necessarily isn't a click, but maybe it's just reading the whole primary text or at least skimming the primary text and then hopefully you can get a click and then keep going from there. But I'd say the information definitely it builds up kind of as they move along.

SPEAKER_01 24:14

Yeah, nice. All right, what uh what else do you got for us?

SPEAKER_00 24:17

All right, so next batch is definitely kind of the bolder side of things. So here is kind of where we're attempting to do the pattern interrupt. Um so it we can achieve that in a various different ways. So here's kind of an example from the robotics company, and something that we were leaning on that was working, pretty much working until it stopped working, was kind of the ability to tie it back to something larger that people already recognize. So we were running with the Tesla of farming, which it worked really well until it kind of started to teeter off. But it's essentially being able to tie it back, like being able to have the potential investor reference it to something that they already know and then kind of make that pie there for what the offering is, kind of what how we're framing ourselves.

SPEAKER_01 25:07

Yeah, that association is uh is helpful, especially when there's it's a new space and it's like very difficult to explain like autonomous agricultural robots that uh operate in swarms and you know, do XYZ. It's like, okay, let's use an association so that people can quickly build a frame of reference and then try to and again like go to that next step. Like there's ultimately I think that one was a video, but the hook was strong enough that even if you just had it in like an image, people would be like, okay, I'm curious to learn more about this.

SPEAKER_00 25:38

Yeah, definitely. Because I I think we did use it for statics going forward and used it for headlines and kind of pretty much pushed everywhere that we could because it was just it was the ability, like the weight that was carried kind of through the reference.

SPEAKER_01 25:52

Nice. Um, any other examples that you wanted to show us?

SPEAKER_00 25:55

Yeah, so aside from kind of using that anchor point, uh, the other ones are we have some like visual hooks as well. So it's the banks move slow, investors can't. Here we're obviously referencing Taurus in the hair. This one, it was a it was a pretty big top performer for the client. So we did end up using this same sentiment, kind of repeated a few times in some different variations. Here it, I mean, it's the ad isn't too crazy in really any way. It's just once again, the kind of big bold text right in your face to kind of stop the scroll, hopefully. And then sticking to one one train of thought, one point. We're not going anywhere else. We're not kind of explaining anything beyond just this one piece that we this company operates very fast, which investors need, especially in a real estate space.

SPEAKER_01 26:43

Nice. Yeah, I think that was a really good example. Yeah, what's this final one here?

SPEAKER_00 26:47

Yeah, so this one it definitely is an older one. I think it's uh uh it's kind of a way back. Um, but this one was a top performer that kind of lingered for years as a top performer and then got lots of variations built off this. But this was the original piece. And so here, this one's just essentially a bold statement. Like there's not too much going on visually. Um, it's more the framing of just directly speaking to the kind of the user of I know what you're looking for and I know your pain points, and we have the solution. And it's just it's very to the point in that sense. So even for here, the visual hook isn't really having anything too over the top or being too bold. It's I guess more being bold in the sense of not saying too much. We're not going over the top. There is no face, uh, there's no real background image. It's just the kind of the message is enough that just kind of putting it out there with white space can stop and it's it resonates enough with people that they want to kind of learn more from there.

SPEAKER_01 27:46

I think this was like a really good example of getting to understand the customer. If I remember correctly, we had uh gone through some uh basically like first party research or uh survey questions that the client had provided. And I'll guess I'll just kind of describe the ad a little bit here. But this we worked this eventually into some of the core messaging, but I I believe it started as an image ad and it was targeting people interested in real estate investing. But it says, you know, but are you interested in real estate investing, but don't have the money, time, or confidence to get started? We got you covered. And so it's interesting because not really mentioning what the client does, not really mentioning that there's like some branding in there, but there's actually not a huge sell on the client side. But I feel like it really strikes at the heart of how that particular customer persona felt about getting started. And it was often that they lacked confidence or they didn't have the money or the time. And uh that was really the key part is that uh that was how that audience was feeling. You know, there was a lot of different messaging that was used over time that kind of, you know, maybe was like a little bit more instructional or more market-based. But I felt like this really struck at the emotional side of how that audience felt.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

Yeah, absolutely. And especially coming in with the the pain points, like money and time, everybody kind of feels that as a pain point, but the confidence portion of it, I think for this particular client was a huge piece of kind of going forward with the messaging, like you were saying, is a huge building block for the way that we targeted like all the personas, really.

SPEAKER_01 29:24

Yeah. No, absolutely. And and actually it's a good point because I think this ad came up over time and then it eventually became like part of the core messaging where we're like, oh, this is the one. This is the one that's like really working here.

SPEAKER_00 29:36

Yeah. Oh my goodness. Yeah, we have full, full campaigns based essentially on variations of this.

SPEAKER_01 29:42

That's right. Um, I know that you had uh another section, but we did talk about it a little bit more in detail. We skipped ahead a little bit talking about kind of the the founder and you know, using using a face and personality. Is there anything else you wanted to touch on on that? Or do you feel like we kind of covered a lot of the main points a little bit earlier?

SPEAKER_00 30:00

I mean, I would say for the founder pieces, um, look, of course, like we said, having having just your visual there, um, just have your face is a huge piece. Uh, it also goes into like also some potential trust points of just kind of platforms. So a lot of what we try to utilize isn't just necessarily like DTC, but also if we can use clips from like speaking events or really any event or something like that that helps also build social proof. That's a great use of kind of the founder face uh and story as well.

SPEAKER_01 30:31

Nice. And then in terms of like the founder, would you say that, you know, how would you describe to them? Or we have a couple of photos here. I think some of them are screen grabs from videos. Would you say like, would you push them towards doing video photos, et cetera? Like what's your straw what's your preference?

SPEAKER_00 30:48

Definitely I would say uh video, because I think most founders we have pictures that we can kind of source already. But I say for marketing specifically, uh like even especially looking for investors, video is definitely the most important piece. Um, and they don't have to be polished. Like a lot of these examples here um being shown right now are pretty polished and they're professional. Um, but we have some other ones where it's it's more kind of iPhone videos essentially. It's just holding the camera up and recording. Uh a lot of it, especially is just right off the cuff. Like uh when we work with founders, we'll usually provide scripts, but most of them are just bullet points of kind of things that we'd like to have mentioned. Um, but a lot of it, it's just really your understanding of the business and being able to speak to it as naturally as possible because you understand it better than anybody. So it's a really just videos hopping on, recording like 15, 30, like even a minute video. Because I definitely know you can keep going for a minute or longer, but just getting behind the camera uh and really kind of, or I guess in front of the camera and um just kind of letting loose for video content, it's definitely key.

SPEAKER_01 31:58

Those are like my favorite videos, is just when the founder just grabs a phone and goes off and and they honestly end up being the best. And it's like, I don't know what it is about it. Maybe it's just the level of comfort that it builds with the audience where it's like, oh wow, this person just kind of can speak to this very naturally. And I always find those are good. So uh yeah, that's that's a great point. Um, yeah, and I think when it comes to like the image ad versus video, it's like the image ad works well if that person has fairly large following and they're recognizable. But if you're not at that stage yet, you will, you know, have to be hopping, you know, making some videos. That's that's what you need to do. You know, I just get to move us to a couple of these like final questions here. So what what's one thing a founder could do, you know, this week to make their creative noticeably stronger? Like what would you uh what would you recommend for them?

SPEAKER_00 32:50

Yeah, so I think um the next step to really take, like even if I'm doing it yourself right now, is kind of what we just mentioned, just kind of getting on camera and saying really there's a couple things that you can speak to, but it's the main point is really just to get on camera and just be talking. But definitely I think the main things to be speaking to are kind of who this investment is for, if we're kind of speaking from from a raised point of view, it's kind of who you're targeting, maybe who it's not a good fit, so people can kind of self-qualify right away. And that's a quick video to do. History, like background, reason behind the fun, like we were saying as well, kind of being able to have that backbone and the principle to why your why, why you're doing it. Um, and then other ones as well is kind of tackling like main pain points and big questions that investors, maybe even investors that are currently investing, have just being able to tackle a question before they get on the call so that they already have that understanding, it's huge. And it really helps build um the investor kind of base when you're moving into actually getting the funds, there's way less questions and they're a lot more comfortable kind of with the process going forward.

SPEAKER_01 33:58

Nice. That's definitely a good tip. That's uh that's awesome. That's great advice. All right, got a couple rapid fire questions for you here.

SPEAKER_00 34:06

Okay.

SPEAKER_01 34:07

What is uh one tool that you can't live without in in your world right now?

SPEAKER_00 34:12

I'd say right now is definitely kind of some of the new features in Adobe. Um, so Photoshop's generative fill is huge, um, especially for kind of getting the most out of assets. So even if we have image assets that work really well, being able to quickly um kind of reshape and expand to utilize them in more platforms is huge. Um I keep saying this, but it's it's a massive piece of kind of how we continue with the variations and different kind of dimensions we need for all platforms. And then uh aside from that, uh Illustrator just came out with turntable, which I think is going to be real a really big piece kind of for statics um and and kind of being able to take elements that we're using and continue to use them across different platforms without necessarily having to totally redesign, but just be able to kind of repurpose. So that's that's really it.

SPEAKER_01 35:03

Nice. I feel like um there's so many new tool tools popping up. So it's you know, it's good to see Photoshop still like in the game and uh like and uh competing because yeah, there's a lot of new stuff out there. So that's great. And um, you know, we'd love to hear a a Danielle Faubert hot take on uh where you see design going over the next little bit, uh and uh or just a general hot take in terms of like the stuff that we work on.

SPEAKER_00 35:31

Okay, a hot take. Say it's kind of okay. Well, it's not too hot, I guess, because we've kind of been dancing around it, but I definitely say ugly ads work uh as long as they have the right hook. So that's even what we're like, and ugly doesn't mean hideous, but um doesn't mean pixel perfect. So like the iPhone cameras is something especially uh it doesn't have to be a full film set for an ad to really perform. Um and same with even when we're going into statics, uh kind of keeping statics more uh I guess general and vernacular and not overly designed, because I think when they get overly designed, people just scroll right past them. Um so kind of keeping things looking natural, but as long as they have a really good hook, uh, it's a huge attention grab, but it really doesn't matter what it looks like.

SPEAKER_01 36:18

Yeah, I like that. The the um don't judge an ugly ad by its cover. Um and you never know until it's out there. And there's something about the rawness of that approach, which again, people appreciate. And I just like that when founders don't overthink it too much and it's very authentic, and you just gotta sometimes put it out there. But uh I agree with you. It's and it's not to say that like pretty ads don't work either. Like those work as well, but you you don't always have to um you have to be able to experiment, I would say. Keep your uh options and opinions open. What do you think if there's something issuers should start doing now that uh, you know, if if a new client was to come in or a founder was to be like, hey Danielle, like how do I improve my ads? What's something I should start doing?

SPEAKER_00 37:05

Um we're gonna be beating a dead horse here, but I think again, it's really faces. Um if we can have a face behind the brand, it carries it way more than a logo could. People being social creatures, we like seeing faces, we like seeing eyes, and people talking to us. Um so I think that's really the the main thing. Um, it's just being able to kind of connect with people on a like a face-to-face basis. Um, and people like to see it. So videos, photos, uh, even like having a more personal feed as well, um, just being that social side uh is is huge. And so it's really is uh kind of getting on video, unfortunately.

SPEAKER_01 37:44

Yeah, it's kind of it's it's the new era, and you um, you know, you do see the company of the leadership of companies. Um, they are just a lot more present nowadays. They're not like hiding in a boardroom. And yeah, so hopefully, you know, when issuers come in and speak with us after seeing this episode, they'll be ready to to hop behind the camera and and make some good ads. Do you have a hot take or prediction for the next 12 months in terms of where you see design and messaging going?

SPEAKER_00 38:12

The next 12 months, well, okay. So, I mean, it's gonna sound like I'm repeating myself. Um, yeah, right. 12 months. Well, I'd say kind of with the way that kind of AI tools are going, uh, production quantity, it definitely it's kind of helped it expand so much. Um, you're able to get things out a lot faster. On that, however, on the flip side, um, to put kind of target audiences do matter. And I would say if you're skewing on the younger side, and younger doesn't mean like teens, but even just kind of on the early adult um side of life, AI, very obvious AI is becoming hated, I would say. And so it's um even with these tools being out there, I think going forward, the next 12 months, it's really going to be a shift back into kind of knowing when and where to use it and how to use it. Um so really obvious AI, it turns people off um a lot, but at the same time, it's useful for production um quantity and being able to kind of get a faster turnaround on things. So it's more uh I think in the next 12 months, it's gonna you're gonna see a lot of people either totally turning away from it or at least saying they're turning away from it. And then uh kind of you'll watch uh you'll see a better, a higher quality come out where it won't be so in your face and it will kind of continue to feel like made content.

SPEAKER_01 39:39

That's such a good point. And I feel like that could be like a whole episode in and of itself. Um, but it's gonna be really interesting to see how that plays out over time because there's um I find that it can be really obvious when people use AI for ads and it's like not really good, but then sometimes it can be really good. Like they use a really good idea and you're like, oh wow, that only could be done via AI. So but it's a high bar and it's tough. It's tough to meet. But I think that's a really good point. It'd be interesting to watch like the the backlash if there's gonna be yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:13

Yeah, and I think uh it it also comes if you're gonna really lean into AI to the point where like, okay, that's AI. Uh I think it comes into your uh presence of it, of not trying to hide, hide it and pretend it's not. Um, there's a lot of brands out there, they're running like, like you were saying, like over top extreme ads that are all kind of uh made by AI, but they're leaning into it. It's not it's not straying away from it or trying to hide it. Uh it's kind of going into it as the way the world is right now, it's just gonna keep growing and becoming a larger part of everyday life. So it's just gonna be embracing it in the right way.

SPEAKER_01 40:50

Yeah, exactly. I feel like one of the like if you're trying to hide it, it's not great. But if it's very obvious, it's like people, people will respect you for it for just putting it out there. Um But yeah, it's gonna be super interesting to watch. A lot of good hot takes in there. And um, yeah, I think just uh for this episode in general, a ton of gems and uh uh a lot of key insights for founders here in terms of how they can start to think about creative and understanding what converts from an audience perspective. So thank you, Danielle, for all of your insights today and for joining us. And to our audience, we'll see you on the next one.

SPEAKER_00 41:29

Yeah, thanks, Martin. I was happy, happy to be a special guest and looking forward to future episodes. So perfect. Thanks. Yeah, see you later.

unknown 41:39

You're welcome.

SPEAKER_00 41:41

All right.