Justin Kramm: Creative Director/Copywriter

On Cinco de Mayo,
I wrote an Onion-style article called:

“Embracing the Chaos: Shitshow Creative Launches”

It was satire.
A fake press release.
A wink at startup culture.

But also,

it was my Jerry McGuire manifesto.

I hit publish thinking
a few people would laugh,
maybe share it,
and move on.

Instead,

600,000 views later,
a shocking number of people
thought it was real.

Real real.

“Congrats on the launch.”
“How do I apply?”
“Where do I sign up?”

And that’s when it hit me:

The satire worked
because it was true.

People are overwhelmed.
They are tired of pretending.
They want honesty
with a sense of humor.

So I made it real.

Shitshow Creative is where we turn
LOL into ROI
with NO-BS content

built on:

Comedy.
Kindness.
Chaos.

With a cause.

Because if a joke can spark this,

imagine what the truth can do.

Their habitat is threatened. Their hopes are dwindling. Our hearts are melting.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

Cool Effect is an organization that fights climate change by supporting the world's best carbon-reducing projects. For the holiday season, I helped Swirl in San Francisco create a campaign that explored the profound effects of climate change on humans and snowmen alike. 

For this campaign, I wrote the script for the short film "Save Our Snowmen", in addition to creating a full-page ad for the New York Times, video billboards, website copy, protest signs, bus wraps, emails, YouTube trailers, Facebook ads and more. 

Awards

2018 Graphis Advertising Annual: Silver Award

2017 Webby Awards Nomination: Best Writing Film/ Video

Press Coverage

Adweek

D & AD: Campaign of the Week

The Weather Network

Audobon Society

Tree Hugger

Clean Technica

Merca

LA Times

I wrote, produced, and directed the Living Seawall video, aka the origin story of how 860 feet of sad, aging concrete in Fort Lauderdale is getting a glow-up into a living, reef-packed, water-cleaning machine. The full seawall is slated to be completed in 2027, and yes, it’s basically coastal infrastructure with a personality and a purpose.

Then I went beyond the main film and built the social content universe around it, because one video is nice, but an internet takeover is better. I created a steady stream of short-form content that made the project easy to understand, fun to share, and hard to ignore. Think science, community, and faith, packaged like something you actually want to watch.

And because the ocean deserves marketing too, we made music video style social spots featuring our cast, including Carl the Manatee, our lovable aquatic hype-man. Carl’s job was to show up, charm the internet, and casually remind everyone that clean waterways are kind of a big deal.

The best part, it worked. In six months, the content helped drive over $1 million in fundraising. So yeah, we made a seawall go viral-ish, raised serious money, and gave a manatee a starring role, all in the name of cleaner water.

While known mostly for their computer mice, Logitech launched a global music brand in 2012. The category was dominated by companies such as Beats and Skull Candy selling music as a fashion accessory. But music is not a piece of clothing—it's a piece of history that deserves our respect.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

"Power to the Music" BRAND MANTRA

Three chords and a dream.
Sometimes that’s all music needs to help us accomplish extraordinary things like stopping wars, saving lives…and making babies.
And it’s been like this since the beginning.
Before we could speak, we could jam.
We made stones into drums, carved bones into flutes, and danced along to the universal language of music.
Today, we need music more than ever.
From lullabies to freedom songs, rap battles to national anthems, music is a powerful, contagious force for good.
That’s why we believe anything worth doing should be done to a beat.
At Logitech UE, everything we do is for people who don’t just love music; they live for it.
And while some have built monuments, museums, and even temples in its name, we believe the best way to properly honor music is to allow it to be heard it all its glory.
Because even in humanity’s darkest hours, when we are most estranged from each other, we can always count on music to unite us.
To heal us.
To deliver us.
If we only take a moment to listen.
Logitech UE
POWER TO THE MUSIC

When I was at AKQA/San Francisco, Red Bull approached us and asked us to bring to life the benefits on the can: "improves focus, concentration, and endurance." They wanted an experimental idea that went beyond the 30-second TV ad and would connect with a young audience. We created a feature-length mockumentary about the underground world of professional staring contests. Then we went to great lengths to convince the world it was a real sport and a growing movement.

NAMED MOST AMUSING PARODY OF THE YEAR BY SPORTS ILLUSTRATED

“UnflinchingTriumph.com offers a hard look at a man who specializes in hard looks. The site hosts director J.R. McCord’s Unflinching Triumph, a hilarious mock documentary about a fictitious Californian named Philip Rockhammer and his quest to win the national staredown championship.”

-Sports Illustrated

SYNOPSIS (from back of DVD)
Unflinching Triumph immerses the audience into the life of Philip Rockhammer and the underground world of Professional Staredown. From Philip’s breakout success to his tense showdowns with Staredown legend Tony Patterson, and his confrontations with his personal demons, we’re with him all the way. Philip’s voyage is at times joyous, often nerve-racking and occasionally heart-breaking. Unflinching Triumph provides an illuminating look at a man we never knew and a sport we never knew existed.

How do you open people’s eyes to what ESPN on a True HD phone screen looks like if they’ve never seen one before?
Show them something else they’ve never seen before.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

INNOVATIVE THEN. LEGENDARY NOW.
Take a trip through the history of Nike Basketball and meet the sneakerheads, b-ball experts, artists, designers, pro players and streetball legends that created a global culture. New episodes of this documentary series were released every month throughout the year.

My Role: Senior Copywriter

Mental is the world’s first mental health app created for men.

The app includes a 2-minute podcast every day: these are called “Daily Deuces.” Each one is a short, tactical masterclass that provides a daily multivitamin of science, wisdom, and motivation.

I wrote the scripts for more than 50 of these podcasts, and these were performed by Jason Kyle, actor/comedian and Founding Creative at Mental. During each recording session, he improvised copy that was aligned with the conversational (and sometimes profane) brand tone.

Every Daily Deuce is connected to a short journaling prompt that AI then converts into an achievable daily action. During a shave, users can plan and reflect on their AI-generated micro-purpose for the day.

My role: Creative Director and Podcast Writer

The storage company SanDisk launched a new music format to compete against streaming services. Each album came on a small storage card that also contained a bunch of extras such as videos and digital posters. To introduce this product to the world, I wrote a manifesto that appeared in a special edition of Rolling Stone magazine.  

Cover Page
It’s Jimi Hendrix at Monterey torching his guitar. It’s Seattle grunge, Memphis blues and the British Invasion. It’s a garage band, an MC, a supergroup and a solo act. It’s the Twist, the Worm and the Harlem Shake. It’s a KISS T-shirt, ticket stub, poster and lunch box. It’s the first show, the comeback and the farewell tour. It’s rock, country and pop joining forces to feed the planet. It’s praised for saving lives and blamed for taking them. It’s what kids think will save the world, and their parents say will end it. It’s notes scribbled on a napkin, lyrics spray-painted on a wall and a freedom song hummed in a prison cell.

Back Page
It’s more than a new format. For artists, it’s a new form of expression. For fans, it’s a new experience. It’s front and center and backstage. It’s the story behind the songs. It’s a complete album and extras on a plug-and-play card for your phone, computer or MP3 player.

Discover the new music format.
www.slotmusic.org

What if a smile could move a wheelchair?

What if a dinosaur could roar again?

What if a millisecond could save a life?

This is AI powering a new reality on Intel.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

Agency: Doremus (San Francisco)

Client: Intel AI

“Our Members are Your Gamers”

Gaming marketers misunderstand the value of LinkedIn as a channel for reaching current and potential customers--they think it’s all business. To combat this, LinkedIn conducted research via Nielsen on the Gaming Audience and proved that 55 million LinkedIn members are gamers.

We saw an opportunity to connect with one of the biggest gaming companies, Xbox, by having them experience gaming first hand. Thus our “Level Up with LinkedIn” 1:1 ABM campaign was born.

We created a narrative and supporting assets that would be leveraged by LinkedIn Marketing Solutions sellers with customers who sell products in the gaming industry.

Further, we focused on the top gaming marketers at Xbox and Leveled Up their LinkedIn profiles by turning them into gaming characters. With custom pixel illustration artwork,

3D printing and branded packaging, we Leveled Up each of these gaming marketers into their very own gaming character.

CONTENT: ABM – 1:1, Digital, Print, Sales, Activation

Results: LinkedIn gained one of the world’s top gaming companies as a client and increased ad sales revenue.

“Just finished the client call. they loved it! Your team did such an amazing job,we really, really appreciate it.”

— LinkedIn Gaming Lead

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

Keith and Kurt Closer are brokers and twin brothers. Keith believes in closing more. Kurt believes in closing faster. They’re total opposites. The only thing they agree on is the Community Mortgage from Change Wholesale.

In this campaign, we created two distinct characters and developed a wide range of content including parodies of online classes and instructional workout videos.

Each video featured a range of comical scenarios that showcased the twins’ distinct personalities while showcasing the benefits of the Community Mortgage.

This approach is refreshing for the category and generated positive buzz from mortgage brokers across the United States.

CONTENT: Digital, Social, OOH, Print, 1:1, Sales

Results:
50% increase in brokerage customers in only 5 months

50% increase in website traffic engaged

10M impressions

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

The Scion FR-S is a sports car designed for Millennials who want a thrilling driving experience at an affordable price. We showed how even a coffee run with friends (or a puddle splash) becomes an over-the-top adventure.

My role: Senior Copywriter

This global campaign for Philips featured all the grooming tips you need for every inch of your body.

My role: Senior Copywriter

Meet “The Cloudy One.” Now that he's free from infrastructure worries, only one thing can break his focus.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

Trend Micro was looking for a way to get noticed in the crowded security software market. While the competition played on the fears and anxieties of computer users, we took a different approach. We highlighted the employees at Trend Micro and showed that security is not just a job for them, but a way of life.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

AI-optimized computer vision is powerful…and with great power comes great responsibility. We brought this idea to life with this campaign launch video that shows many of the incredible ways that vision AI is helping humanity, thanks to the humans with the vision to lead their companies, employees, and communities forward.

This is Vision Done Right.

VIDEO SCRIPT

Cameras are everywhere. They hold the potential to make our lives better. But who will unlock them? And how?

The power of vision AI is being tapped into right now by visionaries who see the possibilities in every challenge. They are unlocking smarter, more safe, and more human experiences.

This is Vision Done Right…

By designing robots that spot defects in less than a second…Helping healthcare professionals detect life-threatening conditions…Creating smart inventory-tracking solutions. Connecting vehicles and sensors to improve road safety…and even launching a satellite with AI on board.

Intel partners are doing all of this and more with technology that’s affordable, accessible, and ready to go.

With open-source software, AI-optimized hardware, and a team of experts who empower you to boldly innovate, Intel Vision is your launchpad for exploring an infinite universe of possibilities.

With great vision comes great responsibility.

Unlock Vision today…with Intel.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

With the national rollout of 5G fast approaching, American industries were looking ahead to write the next chapter in our nation’s technological innovation and advancements. From automotive and manufacturing to healthcare, telecom, and education, the next decade will transform everything we know about the way we do business at home and abroad. From Network to Device, Intel will power America’s 5G.

CONTENT: Digital, Social, OOH, Print

Results: Intel became top of mind with key legislators and government influencers

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter

Intel's IoT meets the need for speed when it comes to vision technology at the edge.

My role: Creative Director and Copywriter