Air­time

Recharg­ing Airtime’s relevance

  • Brand Strategy
  • Proposition
  • Naming
  • Visual identity
  • Verbal identity
  • Brand guidelines
  • Brand launch

Air­time had seri­ous ambi­tion but a brand trapped in func­tion. Known main­ly as a mon­ey-off-your-mobile app, it was stuck in a sea of high-effort, low-reward loy­al­ty schemes. Growth had stalled. The busi­ness had qui­et­ly out­grown the brand that once car­ried it.

The oppor­tu­ni­ty was clear. Air­time wasn’t real­ly a loy­al­ty prod­uct at all. It sat in an emerg­ing space between mobile lifestyle, fin­tech val­ue cre­ation, and micro-rewards. To unlock its next chap­ter, it need­ed a shift from func­tion­al pay­back to emo­tion­al pay-off.

We shift­ed Air­time from a dis­count util­i­ty to a brand of pos­si­bil­i­ty. Mon­ey off your mobile became true con­nec­tiv­i­ty cred­it, every­day spend pow­er­ing your mobile life. A sim­ple reframe that cre­at­ed mean­ing, dis­tinc­tion, and room to grow. Drop­ping Rewards from the name sig­nalled the step-change, open­ing the brand up to a broad­er, more ambi­tious role.

Life on the upside became the promise. More than a line, it shaped every choice from nam­ing, tone, design, and expe­ri­ence. A once-trans­ac­tion­al jour­ney now deliv­ered a sense of lift and ener­gy at every turn.

THE TRANS­FOR­MA­TIVE POW­ER OF AIRTIME

Air­time became a brand built around the pow­er of con­nec­tiv­i­ty, and reward­ing peo­ple with more of the moments that mat­ter in their mobile lives. This emo­tion­al shift reignit­ed reac­ti­va­tion, reduced drop-off, and helped move the brand from fru­gal hack to every­day enabler.

A DESIGN AND LAN­GUAGE SYS­TEM WITH LIFT

The cre­ative world blurred the lines between fin­tech, mobile cul­ture, and expe­ri­en­tial tech.

TURN­ING BUYS INTO HIGHS

We cre­at­ed Uplift­ing Sans, a bespoke type­face with char­ac­ters designed to boost moments of vis­i­ble joy. 

WORDS WITH LIFT

The tone of voice moved from trans­ac­tion­al instruc­tion to uplift­ing momen­tum. Not earn cash­back but boost your buy­ing power.

A CON­NECT­ED BRAND FOR A CON­NECT­ED GENERATION

We bor­rowed the lan­guage of mobile, using emo­ji-inspired expres­sion, to turn rewards into moments that felt instant, human, and uplift­ing. It cre­at­ed a more own­able expe­ri­ence, root­ed in the way peo­ple already com­mu­ni­cate every day.

“The new brand breathes life into the dig­i­tal rewards space and estab­lish­es us as the mar­ket leaders.”

Josh Graham, Co-founder & CMO, Airtime

CON­NECT­ING WITH THE MOBILE GENERATION

Visu­als cel­e­brat­ed the mobile gen­er­a­tion in an empow­er­ing, aspi­ra­tional way. Every­day wins were cap­tured with a sense of effort­less heroism.

BOOST­ING BUY­ING POWER

Cel­e­brat­ing the effort­less every­day moments was brought to life by cel­e­brat­ing the small rewards in our sec­ondary pho­tog­ra­phy style, mak­ing them feel heroic.

WEL­COME TO THE UPSIDE

We cre­at­ed a design sys­tem that inher­ent­ly felt uplift­ing and enhanced every­day moments.

“We want­ed a design sys­tem that felt inher­ent­ly joy­ful, turn­ing the ordi­nary into extraordinary.”

Grant Willis, Creative Director & Founder, ODA

Impact

  • Average app session time rose by 10%.

  • Email open rates jumped 50%.

  • Monthly active members surged by 21%,

  • Airtime reactivated 100k members 

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