Your Brand’s Best Friend

Klaviyo, the autonomous B2C CRM, and independent creative strategy company, Gus, today launched “Your Brand’s Best Friend” - Klaviyo’s first global brand campaign since unveiling its B2C CRM platform, and its first project in partnership with Gus.

Starring actress and comedian D’Arcy Carden of “The Good Place” and “The Five-Star Weekend”, the Klaviyo campaign brings the idea of a brand “BFF” to life, positioning Klaviyo as the trusted partner that gets your brand, understands your customers, and always has your back. Carden personifies Klaviyo throughout the campaign, turning the technology behind smarter, more personal customer relationships into an actual work friendship.

In the hero film, Carden stars opposite Leo (played by Griffin Toplitsky), a marketing leader at the large, fictional outerwear company BIG COAT. Their working relationship plays more like an inseparable friendship as they build global campaigns over a shared milkshake and manage customer conversations during an increasingly competitive game of ping pong. By the time their latest campaign is ready to launch, the pair - powered by Klaviyo’s autonomous B2C CRM – are celebrating like best friends who just pulled off something big together.

“The best relationships are built on really knowing someone, and we think the relationship between a brand and its customers should work the same way,” said Jamie Domenici, CMO of Klaviyo. “Klaviyo gives businesses a deep understanding of their customers and helps them turn that understanding into experiences that feel relevant and personal. Gus helped us capture the role we want to play for consumer businesses: a partner that knows their brand, understands what they need, and is always there to help them make the next move.”

The idea extends across the global 360 campaign through OOH and digital executions that borrow the familiar language of friendship to capture the relationship between Klaviyo and the business professionals who rely on it to grow their businesses. Carden brings an infectious energy to the campaign, effortlessly tapping into both quirky, physical comedy and the Type A, “get sh-t done” mode that made her a natural fit to personify “Your Brand’s Best Friend.”

“Somewhere along the way, B2B became synonymous with functional advertising, and we don’t think it has to be,” said Spencer LaVallee, Co-founder and CCO at Gus. “The people making business decisions are the same people watching comedy, sports and everything else they love. With Klaviyo, we wanted to build an idea that could live in that world. ‘Your Brand’s Best Friend’ takes a complex CRM story and makes it immediately relatable, giving us a platform that can be funny, emotional, and culturally relevant without losing sight of what the product actually does.”

The campaign will have a major U.S. presence on NFL on CBS, with spots airing on Sundays this fall in five major U.S. markets: Los Angeles, New York, Chicago, San Francisco and Dallas. Bringing Klaviyo onto some of culture’s biggest stages, the global campaign will run beginning on September 21 across streaming and social, including Amazon Prime Video, Sky, YouTube Select, 9Now, Meta, TikTok, Reddit, and through a partnership with Call Her Daddy.

The hero film was directed by WATTS, the husband-and-wife directing duo known for blending elevated visual craft with sharp comedic instincts. Campaign photography was shot by O’Shane Howard.