How Crayon took one brand message into 16 markets at once

Crayon is a global IT consultancy in cloud, software asset management and AI, with more than 4,000 employees and its headquarters in Oslo. It had a new brand message, the creative to carry it, and 16 countries waiting to hear it. What it did not have was a media partner able to land the same idea in all of them at once.

One message, 16 very different markets

The new positioning was a single line: always on the customer’s side. Crayon wanted it in front of decision-makers in IT and business roles across 16 countries and five continents: thousands of them, in markets with little in common beyond the message itself.

The messaging was written. The landing pages were built. The creative assets were finished. The missing piece was the media strategy: someone who could turn a completed campaign into reach, precision and measurable results in 16 places at the same time.

16 plans, not one plan run 16 times

Crayon had worked with us before, and that history shortened the start considerably: the team handed over the lead on digital advertising rather than briefing it out. We began with a deep dive into the campaign plans, with audience definitions, creative assets and KPIs all coming across from the global marketing team.

From that foundation we built a separate media strategy for every country. Each one carried its own localised LinkedIn and Google targeting, its own content promotion plan and its own budget allocation. 32 audience segments in total, two per market. One plan stretched across 16 countries would have been cheaper to produce and worse in every one of them.

The rollout ran in close sync with Crayon’s own organic promotion. Across six months a dedicated team of strategic project manager, paid media specialist, copywriter and designer handled weekly optimisations and produced fresh ad variants as the data came in. Weekly meetings and a live performance dashboard kept the global team and 16 local teams looking at the same numbers.

Farther, faster, and measurably better regarded

Over six months the campaign reached further and clicked faster than the benchmarks it was set against. Less usually for an awareness campaign, it could also prove the shift in perception afterwards.

• Reach that landed on the right desks. More than 1.2 million decision-makers were reached on LinkedIn alone, across all 16 markets.
• Clicks, not just impressions. 468,300 clicks came from Google Ads and 12,773 from LinkedIn. Website visits from the audience the campaign was built for.
• Above benchmark, then further above it. Google Ads returned a 2.28% click-through rate against an industry benchmark of 1–2%, and a 16% engagement rate.
• Favourability moved, and was measured. A LinkedIn brand lift study run after the campaign showed a measurable rise in brand favourability among the campaign audience compared with before it.

Three things, none of them luck

First, the campaign was localised rather than translated. Every market got its own targeting mix, bidding strategy and promotion plan, because a media plan that works in Norway is not the one that works in Singapore.

Second, it was treated as a living system rather than a launch. We tested, adjusted and improved throughout, pulling both creative and technical levers, which is where the 218% lift in click-through came from.

Third, we worked as an extension of Crayon’s team rather than a supplier to it. Open communication, shared dashboards and weekly check-ins meant 16 local teams and one global team never had to reconcile separate versions of the truth.

Phase two, already underway

The campaign was the first phase rather than the whole of it. Brightvision and Crayon are already working on the next: new creative, a tighter focus on conversion rather than reach alone, and the brand message pushed deeper into Crayon’s service offerings.

The message is established in 16 markets. The next question is what it converts.