Expeditionary layering outfitter Beyond Clothing® has debuted the company’s first genuine 360° brand campaign, Go Beyond. Below is an exclusive behind-the-scenes examination of the goals and content for Go Beyond, as related by Omni-Channel Director Andrew Connor and Marketing Manager Paul Searles.

We celebrate those who go beyond personal challenges to live life to the fullest.

Those who go beyond fear to find courage they didn’t know they had.

Beyond self doubt to earn their own respect.

Beyond weakness to discover strength.

Beyond limits to explore just how far one can go.

We celebrate those who Go Beyond to show that anyone can.

The intent behind the campaign was to bring the soul and heartbeat of Beyond to life through the power of real stories from real people who have been with us since Day One. Over the course of Beyond’s history, we’ve done an excellent job perfecting the layering system for professional teams around the world in some of the harshest conditions. As a result of this we’ve created long-lasting relationships that have built the foundation of who Beyond is today. At the core of it is the “Beyond family.” What better way to bring this brand to life than through the voice of those that know us and our mission best.

As a brand, we have incredible loyalty within the professional segments that we currently support. However, with the general public—or what we like to call the “modern explorer”—there is relatively little brand awareness. This is simply because we’ve focused more on perfecting our craft than on amplifying our message. We’ve got incredible product with an amazing community; we just need to get it out there.

The whole goal this year was to establish a strong DTC, omni-channel platform and catapult ourselves into the “outdoor commercial sector” with a proven technical layering system and a message that moves people to take action. To take action to explore the world and their own potential. To take action and make this world a better place.

The purpose of this campaign was simply that: use real people to tell real stories that make someone feel the brand

This campaign was a true 360° brand campaign, and we made sure that everyone passionate about our mission was involved in some aspect. From ideation to creation and execution, and from product to messaging, we had our entire internal team and external partners involved during each phase of the process:

The t-shirt started off by a simple phone call with one of our Explorers (brand ambassadors), Ashley Horner, an athlete and founder of the Unbroken Foundation, a nonprofit organization aimed to help beaten and battered women. Ashley just started talking about life and her journey; the obstacles she’s faced and the challenges she’s overcome. This conversation was given to our design team to produce the visual graphic t-shirt that everyone is wearing today.

We simply took the graphic t-shirt design, shared it with our “Beyond Family” (i.e., other ambassadors, influencers, outdoor experts, and key industry partners) and said, “We have the utmost respect for who you’ve become as humans and professionals, what you’ve achieved, and the impact you’re making on those around you. When you look at this design and how it relates to your story, what comes to mind?” From there it was a flood of personal stories that were so unique and so specific, and yet so universal that every one of them brought chills to our marketing team.

The goal here was to highlight our people—our “familia”—and their stories in a raw, artistic and compelling fashion: black and white, film-style treatment with an analog feel and film-reel transitions. A simple black background with proper lighting. Straight-on portrait framing that keeps the focus on the person, expressions, and emotion behind the stories. And then rounding out the presentation by mixing in B-roll footage that relates to and informs the tale while also providing a visual break. Overall, the visual direction is a striking contrast to our media thus far, and is meant to be intentionally disruptive.

As you can see on the ecom experience landing page, we’ve intentionally listed these components in order so we can subconsciously gain respect through highly artistic creative assets, and gradually show more real and relatable content in hopes of making a true connection:

Carefully crafted/edited video storytelling

Teaser – A shorter video to raise curiosity, drive interest, and capture the attention of those meandering on the world wide web and network of social channels, pulling them to our website so they can see more.

Long form stories – intentionally released in an episodic format to allow each story the spotlight and respect it deserves.

This was a twofold approach: involve our community outside of those highlighted in our Hero stories, and also provide a segue that shows even though we have actors, musicians, and highly notable people, that our community can also share their stories in a powerful way simply from their phone.

We implemented a social shareability component so that our community can share their own stories on their own channels. We strongly believe each story is unique and incredible, and we want to hear them and share them on our platform as well.

The community can also silently (i.e., without sharing their story to the public) engage by purchasing the Go Beyond t-shirt. As a technical clothing company this was hard because we want to focus on our product technology. However, we wanted a lower barrier to entry product because we firmly believe in our mission inspiring the world, and we want this mission to be accessible to everyone.