The encyclopedia · Advertising & PR · Marketing decision · 2025
GoDaddy built a real fake business with its own AI to sell to small firms
To launch an AI brand builder for small businesses, GoDaddy used it to create a real, believable eyewear company run by Walton Goggins.
GoDaddy
the move
GoDaddy was launching Airo, an AI tool that creates a small business's logo, website and marketing assets in minutes. The challenge was making a brand builder feel real to skeptical small-business owners.
Instead of a feature-narrating demo, GoDaddy used Airo to make the thing itself: a fully realized eyewear brand fronted by actor Walton Goggins, launched with the irony that his 'goggle glasses' were built by the very tool being sold.
The self-aware Super Bowl spot brought startup culture and digital entrepreneurship into the mainstream B2B conversation. It demonstrated the product by using the product, which is why it cut through a category known for boring.
The campaign drove a 10% increase in consideration among small businesses and a $1.6 billion boost in market value, winning GoDaddy its first Cannes Lion — the Grand Prix in Creative B2B.
why it works
- Using the product to build the example proved it worked without a demo reel
- A self-aware, funny ad displaced the serious tone typical of B2B
- A celebrity fronting a fake company made the tool's output tangible
- The humor earned attention while the mechanism quietly demonstrated value
what transfers
For an unfamiliar tool, build a working example of it instead of narrating a feature; people trust what they can see function.
what came after
The campaign won the Grand Prix in Creative B2B at Cannes Lions 2025, GoDaddy's first Lion. It also drove a significant traffic increase to the Airo product and became a reference case for showing an AI tool through the work it makes rather than through claims about it.
references
- A Tale of Two Narratives: our look at the Creative B2B Cannes Lions 2025
- Winners of the Creative Data, Direct, Media, PR and Social & Creator Lions announced on day three
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