At the beginning of this year, our friends at a Withum approached us to create a commercial to help them garner new recruitment candidates. During the pandemic, many businesses like theirs experienced significant turnover due to the ease with which talent can interview and switch positions to other firms. Everyone is working from home – without needing to travel, they can work anywhere and for anyone. This commercial would be designed to promote Withum’s culture and show potential employees what it’s like to work for Withum.
This push for recruitment was focused on a key demographic – 20 and 30 years olds who have finished college and are already working at their first job. The goal was to target folks looking for a career move, folks looking to find the place they’ll be at for a decade or longer. Withum wanted candidates to discover their firm and consider their Fri, even though they’re not one of the big four accounting firms because of their future and employment benefits.
Withum is an amazing place to work and our job as the creative agency was to demonstrate that in a fun and engaging way.
This commercial was created to visually demonstrate the features and benefits of becoming a Withum team member, like flextime, open time off, tuition reimbursement and so much more. It was also designed to show off their recently renovated work spaces. The spot truly shares just how collaborative and creative of a space it actually is.
Inspired by a commercial by Verizon, we pitched a tour video through the Withum offices led by a host that oozes confidence and sophistication, and is a key member of their target demographic. As our host travels through the office, she lists all the reasons why she chose to work at Withum, while team member benefits like physical fitness classes is being visually demonstrated behind her. Driven by a youthful soundtrack the spot is fun and energetic.
We filmed this commercial in one ambitious 12 hour day at the Withum offices in East Brunswick, New Jersey.
The spot included six different set ups with moving camera action, moving talent action and background action. It was a symphony of choreography! All actors were actually employees of Withum too! They did an amazing job and their passion for working at Withum is evident.
As always our crew was enthusiastic and eager to produce this spot. We got creative with filming with a steadicam on and off an elevator, through a yoga class and a foosball party. Because of the scale of this project, we had a larger crew than we typically do. We brought on an assistant director to help coordinate schedules with our extras, and several additional wardrobe and hair/makeup assistants. And our crew played multiple roles! Our wardrobe stylist even lead an impromptu yoga class to help our extras learn a few zen-like moves.
This project was so much fun to work on, and the end result is a hip and engaging commercial that is bringing in the right candidates for one of our favorite clients.
Withum is an international accounting firm, assisting their clients around the world in advisory, tax, and audit services. But they’re more than just CPAs – they offer a multitude of services to their clients that don’t receive the attention that tax services do. Enter Grey Sky Films!
In 2022, the marketing team at Withum returned with a request to create new commercial content for their More Than A CPA campaign. We collaborated with them to write and develop new commercials to showcase three additional advisory services: S.A.L.T. (State and Local Taxes), Mergers and Acquisitions, and ESG.
We followed the original creative conceptualization by personifying the problem and presenting the Withum Advisory Service as the solution.