Wise and Little Big Engine Expose Absurdity of Old-School Money Transfers

Little Big Engine, the independent brand performance agency and production company, has launched a new integrated advertising campaign with Wise, the global technology company building the best way to move and manage money internationally. To showcase Wise as the smartest way to send money abroad, the advertisements feature scenarios where individuals make absurdly poor decisions about sending money internationally.

The campaign reveals the five most common scenarios in international money transfers: family remittances, celebrations, overseas property and buying from overseas businesses. Each advertisement depicts an outrageous situation that illustrates why using traditional providers or banks to transfer money is expensive, slow and clunky—a clueless choice. The strategy is to drive visibility and customer registration for Wise, showcasing it as the much smarter alternative Americans and Canadians should be using.

“With media platforms turning over the power to control what content you want to watch, advertising doesn’t have permission to do anything but be entertaining,” said Patrick Maravilla, founder/ECD Little Big Engine. “We made these as entertaining as we could with Wise pushing us the whole way. We wanted to raise awareness of the problems that come from sending money abroad—and then show why Wise is the smartest solution.”

The campaign will run on linear TV, CTV, YouTube and radio (with three :30s) and includes media buys in prime comedy and sports slots, including The US Tennis Open, the NFL, The WNBA, Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Fallon, Steven Colbert, SNL, America's Got Talent, The Voice and the Emmys. The media buy will be targeted to the San Francisco, Seattle, Austin, Ontario and British Columbia markets.

"Americans and Canadians sending money internationally with traditional providers or banks are dealing with hidden fees, inflated exchange rates and slow transfer times. But they don't realise that using these methods is actually quite silly, as it's a complicated, outdated process," said Matt White, head of planning and strategy at Wise. "People make crazy choices every day, but even if you're sending money abroad for something dumb, you should still do it the smartest way, which is through Wise. We're excited to be partnering with Little Big Engine to bring to life the realities of sending money abroad in a fun, playful way that will resonate with our target audience. As they see these ads we hope more viewers will be smart and get Wise."

Little Big Engine began its work with Wise earlier this year. Wise is continuing to build its upper funnel marketing to grow and engage key audiences across North America, as well as showcase the challenges of sending money internationally through creative, engaging content.