VSA Partners is celebrating its 40th anniversary! Since our founding in 1982, VSA Partners has become an integral part of the Chicago design and strategy community and has worked with top brands, like IBM, Google and Nike, to help companies break through in an increasingly noisy world.
To mark the milestone of our 40th year, we sought to do something different from the typical approach that companies might take to celebrate such occasions.
“We easily could have focused this anniversary as a retrospective on the exceptional work VSA is known for,” says CEO Anne-Marie Rosser. “But what really makes VSA successful is our people and their laser focus on designing for a better human experience. We knew that any effort to mark our anniversary should reflect the VSA way of thinking that has driven our work for 40 years and will continue to empower us for years to come.”
With this framework, VSA created an insightful, playful and at times poignant video series exploring the power of design in all its forms. The result is a window into the minds here at VSA, and how team members channel the world of design into their work.
The editorial campaign focuses on a wide range of concepts, from museum branding to detective shows to kitchen gadgets. Each video then explores how these transformational ideas have improved and enhanced the creativity of individual staff members.
“We too often take for granted the products, services and social constructs of the modern world,” says Chief Creative Officer Curt Schreiber. “But when we take time to examine how these innovations have radically changed and improved our lives, we’ll often find deep inspiration for the next big innovation yet to come.”
The video series comprises short videos of less than a minute apiece. Partner and Head of Design Thom Wolfe explains, “The idea is to not overwhelm people with our inspirations, but to encourage them to consider their own sources of inspiration and ultimately create a social dialogue about the role of design.”
Explore the complete collection.
“If just one person or marketer who views this video is inspired to approach their world through human-centered design, we’ll count this as a success,” says Rosser. “When we lead with designing for the human on the other end of the experience, that’s when truly magical things happen.”
This year, VSAers are embarking on an ambitious journey to redesign logos, websites, apps, packaging and more. It’s our contribution to businesses, brands and society by exploring potential solutions to the many types of expressions and experiences in the world we think have the potential of being better. We have not been commissioned for these solutions, but rather it’s our passion for great creativity that motivates us.
In some instances, we’ll be considering what exists today. At other times, we’ll consider the opportunity for something yet to be solved, but we see it as critical for the future.
Visit design4better.co to see the ever-evolving sketchpad for ambitious concepts that push design and organizations forward. From bold ideas to new interactions, we create with curiosity and purpose.
See the ads that have people commenting “Am I being trolled,” “Someone call the exorcist,” and “Wait, was this on purpose?” (Yes, yes it was.)
We’re super excited to share the Keep It Real campaign, a partnership with computer security company McAfee. Keep It Real is a new campaign created to raise awareness about the rise of AI-driven scams, while also working to shift the culture of shame that surrounds being scammed.
The campaign blends thumb-stopping digital ads that use AI to spark conversation about what’s real and fake online with Scam Stories—a movement that empowers scam survivors to speak out, reduce stigma, and help others stay safe. Together, these elements create a powerful, human-centered effort to inform, connect, and protect.
“By using AI in our ads with intention, we’re recreating the same confusion and doubt people experience when faced with a scam, creating a need to look twice,” said Stephanie Fried, Chief Marketing Officer at McAfee. “And in parallel, Scam Stories gives voice and power to the real people behind those moments. Holistically, this campaign helps shift the narrative from shame to understanding, and reminds people that anyone can be fooled. Seeing is no longer believing—we cannot rely on our instincts to help us tell real from fake. We need powerful tools to keep us safe and give us peace of mind.”
The creative ad campaign was developed in partnership with VSA Partners and launched alongside McAfee’s Scam Detector, a new feature that uses AI to automatically spot scams across text, email, and video. While the ads lean into the surreal, the message is serious: with AI blurring the lines between real and fake, people need help telling the difference.
The campaign’s digital ads—including Travel, Weight Loss, and Tolls—were designed to make people pause and think. One of the first spots to gain traction shows a woman lounging on a beach, when her head suddenly rotates a full 360 degrees. Online reactions were immediate. Some assumed it was a post-production error. Others thought it was a deepfake gone wrong. And while a few viewers realized it was intentional, many were left wondering whether the moment was accidental or planned. That uncertainty was part of the point.
“The ads are clearly artificial—but that’s intentional,” said Anne-Marie Rosser, CEO of VSA Partners. “We wanted them to feel just real enough to make people pause. That moment of confusion reflects what so many people experience online today—AI is harder to spot, and it’s easier than ever to get tricked. By creating that tension, we’re helping people connect emotionally and recognize how vulnerable we all are to deception.”
Based on initial results, the verdict is out—people are ready and hungry for this kind of conversation. McAfee is already seeing an impact from these ads, with social engagement 50% above benchmark and CTR 55% above benchmark.
The second pillar of the campaign, Scam Stories, is a social series built around the voices of real scam survivors—stories from people who’ve been scammed and are speaking up to help others stay alert. From concert ticket scams to spoofed customer service texts, people are sharing their experiences using #KeepItReal and #MyScamStory, and helping others stay alert in the process. Among the first to participate are actor Chris Carmack and his wife, performer Erin Slaver, who share how even they were misled.
To extend its impact, McAfee has partnered with FightCybercrime.org, a nonprofit that helps people recognize, report, and recover from scams. As part of the partnership, McAfee is donating $50,000 worth of online protection to individuals in FightCybercrime programs, as well as to the staff and volunteers who support them. The partnership will also include new efforts to expand online safety education.
To help drive greater awareness of the value of Scam Detector, McAfee has also partnered with several popular influencers to educate their audiences about the rise in scams and how to stay safe. Look out for comedic and informative content from recognizable names such as Alexandra Madison (@alexandramadisonn), Theo Shakes (@theo_shakes), and Kristen Knutson (@callmekristenmarie).
From surreal visuals to the real-life voices, every part of the campaign was designed to blend technology and empathy, showing how creative marketing can spark conversation, shift perception, and drive action. Keep it Real brings McAfee’s brand purpose to life in a way that feels real, human, and impossible to ignore.
To view the campaign, submit a story, or learn more about McAfee’s Scam Detector, visit https://www.mcafee.com/en-us/scam-stories/.
This year, VSAers are embarking on an ambitious journey to redesign logos, websites, apps, packaging and more. It’s our contribution to businesses, brands and society by exploring potential solutions to the many types of expressions and experiences in the world we think have the potential of being better. We have not been commissioned for these solutions, but rather it’s our passion for great creativity that motivates us.
In some instances, we’ll be considering what exists today. At other times, we’ll consider the opportunity for something yet to be solved, but we see it as critical for the future.
Visit design4better.co to see the ever-evolving sketchpad for ambitious concepts that push design and organizations forward. From bold ideas to new interactions, we create with curiosity and purpose.
See the ads that have people commenting “Am I being trolled,” “Someone call the exorcist,” and “Wait, was this on purpose?” (Yes, yes it was.)
We’re super excited to share the Keep It Real campaign, a partnership with computer security company McAfee. Keep It Real is a new campaign created to raise awareness about the rise of AI-driven scams, while also working to shift the culture of shame that surrounds being scammed.
The campaign blends thumb-stopping digital ads that use AI to spark conversation about what’s real and fake online with Scam Stories—a movement that empowers scam survivors to speak out, reduce stigma, and help others stay safe. Together, these elements create a powerful, human-centered effort to inform, connect, and protect.
“By using AI in our ads with intention, we’re recreating the same confusion and doubt people experience when faced with a scam, creating a need to look twice,” said Stephanie Fried, Chief Marketing Officer at McAfee. “And in parallel, Scam Stories gives voice and power to the real people behind those moments. Holistically, this campaign helps shift the narrative from shame to understanding, and reminds people that anyone can be fooled. Seeing is no longer believing—we cannot rely on our instincts to help us tell real from fake. We need powerful tools to keep us safe and give us peace of mind.”
The creative ad campaign was developed in partnership with VSA Partners and launched alongside McAfee’s Scam Detector, a new feature that uses AI to automatically spot scams across text, email, and video. While the ads lean into the surreal, the message is serious: with AI blurring the lines between real and fake, people need help telling the difference.
The campaign’s digital ads—including Travel, Weight Loss, and Tolls—were designed to make people pause and think. One of the first spots to gain traction shows a woman lounging on a beach, when her head suddenly rotates a full 360 degrees. Online reactions were immediate. Some assumed it was a post-production error. Others thought it was a deepfake gone wrong. And while a few viewers realized it was intentional, many were left wondering whether the moment was accidental or planned. That uncertainty was part of the point.
“The ads are clearly artificial—but that’s intentional,” said Anne-Marie Rosser, CEO of VSA Partners. “We wanted them to feel just real enough to make people pause. That moment of confusion reflects what so many people experience online today—AI is harder to spot, and it’s easier than ever to get tricked. By creating that tension, we’re helping people connect emotionally and recognize how vulnerable we all are to deception.”
Based on initial results, the verdict is out—people are ready and hungry for this kind of conversation. McAfee is already seeing an impact from these ads, with social engagement 50% above benchmark and CTR 55% above benchmark.
The second pillar of the campaign, Scam Stories, is a social series built around the voices of real scam survivors—stories from people who’ve been scammed and are speaking up to help others stay alert. From concert ticket scams to spoofed customer service texts, people are sharing their experiences using #KeepItReal and #MyScamStory, and helping others stay alert in the process. Among the first to participate are actor Chris Carmack and his wife, performer Erin Slaver, who share how even they were misled.
To extend its impact, McAfee has partnered with FightCybercrime.org, a nonprofit that helps people recognize, report, and recover from scams. As part of the partnership, McAfee is donating $50,000 worth of online protection to individuals in FightCybercrime programs, as well as to the staff and volunteers who support them. The partnership will also include new efforts to expand online safety education.
To help drive greater awareness of the value of Scam Detector, McAfee has also partnered with several popular influencers to educate their audiences about the rise in scams and how to stay safe. Look out for comedic and informative content from recognizable names such as Alexandra Madison (@alexandramadisonn), Theo Shakes (@theo_shakes), and Kristen Knutson (@callmekristenmarie).
From surreal visuals to the real-life voices, every part of the campaign was designed to blend technology and empathy, showing how creative marketing can spark conversation, shift perception, and drive action. Keep it Real brings McAfee’s brand purpose to life in a way that feels real, human, and impossible to ignore.
To view the campaign, submit a story, or learn more about McAfee’s Scam Detector, visit https://www.mcafee.com/en-us/scam-stories/.
We’re thrilled to share that VSA took home a 2025 ANA REGGIE Award for our work with FactSet on the “Not Just the Facts” campaign. The REGGIEs—one of the most respected honors in brand activation—celebrate bold, creative campaigns that drive real business results.
“Not Just the Facts” flipped the B2B script by injecting some much-needed personality into financial services marketing. With help from our production partner Thinking Machine, we created a campaign that humorously called out the overload of data without context—making the case for FactSet’s unique ability to deliver insights that actually matter. The result was a 280% increase in brand awareness, a 438% increase in marketing qualified leads and a 76% increase in consideration.
This win is a testament to what happens when brave clients and creative teams push the boundaries of what B2B can be. Here’s to making smart ideas stand out—and to saying no to boring B2B advertising.
Companies don’t always use data to power their brand positioning shifts. Often, it’s a subjective exercise that reflects what internal stakeholders are experiencing when they interact with customers.
That subjectivity can be dangerous for brand positioning work because it can root your brand in promises and messaging that won’t last over the long haul and may not reflect the needs of high-value growth targets.
When clients come to VSA for brand positioning work, we usually suggest their brand positioning journey start with Promise to Performance®, our proprietary quantitative research methodology.
Promise to Performance (P2P) was specifically designed to identify the key ingredients of a brand positioning that is true to your business, relevant to your customers and different from what your competitors are saying. In other words, it’s everything you need, and nothing that you don’t.
P2P provides the answers to three key questions that will help you prioritize the brand promises you should focus on in your brand positioning:
In this piece, let’s focus on promise alignment to high-value audiences—why we approach it the way we do and why it matters for brand growth. We’ll cover the other two areas in future pieces.
Our approach starts with prioritizing across a long list of potential needs—about 20 unique statements, on average—to find out which are most important to each respondent in the survey. The need statements are custom written for each study to capture a range of functional and emotional needs that represent different potential priorities within your particular audience.
We then use need segmentation to define the audience cluster groups. With any segmentation exercise, there are typically foundational needs that all segments identify as important for the category. These needs are important to be competitive in the category—so it’s important to have them covered—but they are not usually differentiating.
Here’s an example: We worked with a company that offers a technology solution for small businesses. First, we surveyed their total audience, and then we performed a need cluster analysis to reveal audience segments with different priorities representing unique mindsets. In this case, all SMB segments have similar reliability and service need priorities.
One of the big benefits of doing need-based segmentation is that it can uncover the hidden gems. These are the needs that don’t immediately rise to the top in overall audience ranking of importance, but they can actually carry outsized weight for certain audiences.
For a differentiated position, we want to isolate those needs that are uniquely important to different customer segments, and then act on them.
On average we find about 4.0 segments with each study, and each segment has an average of about 3.6 needs that shape that segment—meaning, they are both important to the segment and more important for that segment compared to the audience as a whole. Often, segment-defining needs are lower ranking overall, but they over-index in importance for a particular segment. In fact, when we looked back across our P2P studies, we found that 82% of segments have at least one middle-of-the-pack need. And 45% had at least two.
Take our SMB technology provider’s audiences. You can see that some of their needs are foundational to all audiences, and some are unique to just that segment. All segments believe that reliability and great customer service are important, but within each segment there are more nuanced needs that define that particular audience.
Based on these defining needs for each segment, we can now align product capabilities, brand strengths and other reasons to believe to inform both our positioning and our messaging to the opportunity segments.
And in fact, you shouldn’t try to be. As brand marketers face tighter budgets and scrutiny over returns, you need to focus your energy where it will have the most impact. Segmenting your audience based on needs allows you to see which ones have the highest potential for growth and which ones you should deprioritize because they don’t align with the category white space and what your company can deliver.
The risk of overlooking some of the middle-of-the-pack needs becomes particularly impactful when those needs are priorities for your high-value segments. That means more likely than not, there’s something important to your high-value target that’s lurking below the surface.
Back to our technology provider example: Of the four segments, we found that two of the groups (Control Seekers and Tech Skeptics) provided no opportunity for growth at all because of their complacent mindsets toward technology.
And then we found that one additional segment (Customer Advocates) was important but wouldn’t provide the kind of growth the company was looking for.
The fourth segment (Edge Seekers) was where the real opportunity was, and where the company could focus its positioning to accelerate growth. This is a group that (1) has one-third of the market size at 36% and (2) is actively seeking a technology that can grow its business. Both the segment’s size and its mindset make it ripe for growth—and a prime audience to focus on for positioning.
This approach yields more precise, differentiated positioning that will stand out from a sea of vague brand generalities, as well as ensure that the brand is focused on the places where it stands to gain the most. You don’t need to ignore your lower-growth audiences, but you can write positioning that primarily focuses on the accelerator groups while still appealing to the lower-priority audiences.
One of the best parts of P2P is how actionable it is.
After we identify our segments, we then build profiles of these different audience members that includes their needs and how to talk to them. These profiles easily onboard your marketing and sales teams to craft messaging that speaks directly to the things these prioritized audiences care about most. Using these audience profiles, you can also relate the need-based segments to other “addressable” audience profiles that your teams are using, which can serve as a great complement to demographic segmentations.
If you’d like to work with a partner that can identify the key ingredients of a brand positioning that is unique, ownable and aligned to your audience’s core needs, we’d love to hear from you. You can get in touch here to learn more about P2P and how it can work for your business.