CASE 16 / Dell Technologies / 2022
I.T. Squad
Make professional expertise approachable, then let the audience ask the difficult questions.
AI-assisted research and analysis for the SNS Creative Fieldbook
Sources reviewed 2026-11-05
Campaign credits belong to the original creators. They did not write or endorse this analysis.
Credits: EssenceMediacom and Dell Technologies, as credited by the Shorty Awards; created with Reddit. Brand-owned posts identify expert contributors including Austin Evans, Lewis Howes and Jonathan Morrison.
Recognition: 2023, 15th Annual Shorty Awards: winner in Other Platform and Other Platform Presence, Gold Honor in Business to Business, and Audience Honor in Other Platform Presence.
Launch / edition: 2022. Award years: 2023.
The problem. The idea. The experience.
The campaign aimed to improve trust among IT decision-makers who wanted providers to understand their actual working problems.
How the idea came to life
An animated series used recurring characters Bryan and Ryan to address issues surfaced in Reddit conversations. Dell’s brand account presents episodes on working from home, privacy and innovation.
How it reached people
The series ran on Reddit, supported by expert AMAs and Reddit Talks. Brand-owned event posts establish activity in 2022; the campaign received Shorty recognition in 2023.
Supporting sources: Primary media-agency case → Primary award entry → Primary brand-owned campaign post → Primary brand-owned event post → Primary award-organizer announcement →
Read the data in context.
The numbers below describe different kinds of outcomes. Their date, scope and reporting source are part of the result.
- Reporting period
- Original campaign case; full reporting window not specified
- Scope
- Impressions, not unique buyers or qualified leads
- Evidence
- Agency and entrant reported
EssenceMediacom and the award entry report 72 million impressions. Their public summaries also report large follower and credibility changes, but do not provide the baselines or study detail needed to interpret those as reliable business-effect estimates.
The creative mechanism.
Community-informed comedy + practical answers + expert participation
The subject came from a real work problem
B2B content becomes more useful when the starting point is a situation the buyer recognizes. Community research can reveal the awkward trade-offs, internal disagreements and terminology that a polished product brochure often removes. This is an input to better ideas, not permission to quote identifiable users without care.
Entertainment can lower the cost of starting
A light format may make a dense subject easier to approach. It must still lead somewhere useful. If the next step contains only a sales pitch, the initial goodwill can disappear as quickly as it arrived.
Experts provide a different kind of credibility than mascots
A recurring character can build familiarity, but it cannot substitute for a competent person answering a real question. An effective content system can assign these distinct jobs to different formats rather than expecting one film to do everything.
Public questions are a test of the brand’s promise
An AMA exposes what people actually need, including topics the marketing team might prefer to avoid. That creates a chance to demonstrate useful judgment and to learn. It also requires staffed moderation, candid limits and clear ownership when a question needs support rather than advertising.
The intended behavior loop
- 01Recognize a familiar workplace problem
- 02Watch an approachable explanation
- 03Ask or read a specific follow-up question
- 04Evaluate the quality of the answer
- 05Return for help or consider the provider when a relevant need arises
Growth job: Relevant entertainment → evidence of understanding → qualified trust. This is an interpretation of the mechanism, not an audited attribution model.
A direction to take into the room.
Original editorial analysis and hypothetical proposed adaptation; not historical execution or proven results. This is a proposed adaptation, not historical campaign execution or a forecast.
Build original workplace sketches around permitted audience questions, each paired with a substantive guide and openly branded expert help.
The tension
Workplace humor can make technical content approachable, but decision-makers need accurate answers. A recurring format earns its place when it helps resolve a real problem.
The opening hook
Proposed fictional opening: “The workaround has become the workflow. How do we fix it?”
Visual direction
Use original characters and clearly fictional scenarios to expose a recognizable problem. Follow the sketch with readable steps and an expert-reviewed explanation. Keep the brand’s role visible and remove identifying customer or employer details.
A three-beat story
- 01
A short sketch makes one practical problem recognizable.
- 02
A qualified explanation shows a useful way to approach it, including limits.
- 03
Point to a complete guide and a permissioned community Q&A for relevant questions.
Give the audience a useful next move
Use the guide to resolve the problem or ask an appropriate question in the approved Q&A.
Build for the channel
- Workplace sketch: Introduce one issue with an immediate link to substantive help.
- Practical guide: Give reviewed steps, prerequisites and boundaries, with enough detail to support a decision.
- Branded expert Q&A: Answer relevant questions under the community’s rules using a currently supported format.
The first idea to test
Does a light narrative bring more qualified problem resolution than a direct tutorial on the same topic?
Measure and protect the idea
Primary: qualified problem-resolution feedback and subsequent relevant product evaluation. Secondary: useful questions, return readers, guide completion and opt-in demo requests. Use CRM evidence for pipeline claims rather than assigning all later sales to exposed viewers. Test interpretation: Does a light narrative bring more qualified problem resolution than a direct tutorial on the same topic? Source evidence limit: The 72-million impression total is reported by the agency and entrant, not an independent reach audit. The sources do not establish pipeline, closed revenue or incremental customer trust. A large follower percentage can start from a small base, and the undefined credibility multiplier should not be repeated as a precise effect. Historical platform features such as Reddit Talks must be rechecked before planning a new execution.
Do not disguise company participation as independent community advice. Follow the community’s rules, disclose commercial relationships, avoid scraping private information and protect customer or employer details. Technical advice needs qualified review and clear boundaries. Stop or revise: Pause if the community sees the content as intrusive, expert answers are thin, private information appears or the entertainment fails to improve useful engagement over a direct tutorial.
Turn the lesson into a test.
What you can borrow
Use audience questions to design an approachable recurring format, then connect it to substantive expert help. Judge the program by whether it resolves a real decision or problem, not by how many characters or episodes it produces.
What needs a rethink
Do not disguise company participation as independent community advice. Follow the community’s rules, disclose commercial relationships, avoid scraping private information and protect customer or employer details. Technical advice needs qualified review and clear boundaries.
Illustrative adaptation, not a historical campaign fact
A small-team experiment
A B2B software company produces three short, original workplace sketches around recurring support questions. Each connects to a practical written guide and an openly branded expert Q&A hosted with the relevant community’s permission.
Build the test
- Collect recurring questions from permitted public research and your own support patterns.
- Prioritize questions that influence a real purchase or implementation decision.
- Have a qualified expert review the explanation and join the follow-up.
- Compare a light narrative with a direct tutorial on the same topic.
Measure the right thing
Primary: qualified problem-resolution feedback and subsequent relevant product evaluation. Secondary: useful questions, return readers, guide completion and opt-in demo requests. Use CRM evidence for pipeline claims rather than assigning all later sales to exposed viewers.
Know when to stop
Pause if the community sees the content as intrusive, expert answers are thin, private information appears or the entertainment fails to improve useful engagement over a direct tutorial.
How this reading fits your brief
Start with the useful part.
Best for: Relevant entertainment → evidence of understanding → qualified trust
What to adapt: Use audience questions to design an approachable recurring format, then connect it to substantive expert help. Judge the program by whether it resolves a real decision or problem, not by how many characters or episodes it produces.
Prerequisites: Actual subject expertise; Community permission; Moderation; Technical fact-checking.
Smaller-team route: A simple sketch or illustrated story plus a useful Q&A can test the principle without a full animation series.
Budget: Not established by the cited public sources. No cost-fit claim is made.
Trade-offs and evidence: Read the limits below before choosing a test. There is no guaranteed reach, sales lift or ROAS.
Questions for your next brief
- Which problem does the buyer feel is consistently misunderstood?
- What deserves a simple explanation, and what requires an expert?
- How would we know the audience felt helped rather than merely entertained?
Sources & further reading.
Brand and award-entry results are attributed claims, not independent causal audits. Source links open the original third-party pages.
- EssenceMediacom: Dell’s New IT Squad →Primary media-agency case · Supports: Objective, content approach, expert support and reported impression total.
- Shorty Awards: Dell I.T. Squad, 15th Annual Awards →Primary award entry · Supports: Despite the unrelated legacy URL slug, the verified page is titled Dell I.T. Squad and records its credits and awards.
- Dell Technologies: Meet Your New I.T. Superheroes →Primary brand-owned campaign post · Supports: Actual episode topics and named expert spin-offs.
- Dell Technologies: I.T. Squad Reddit Talk with Lewis Howes, 2022 →Primary brand-owned event post · Supports: Documented 2022 activity; does not establish the full start/end dates.
- Shorty Awards: 15th Anniversary Winners Announcement, May 2023 →Primary award-organizer announcement · Supports: Calendar year of the 15th Annual Shorty Awards.
- Shorty Awards: 15th Annual Other Platform winner →Official award category record · Supports: Lists Dell I.T. Squad as winner and links to its award entry.
- Shorty Awards: 15th Annual Business to Business honors →Official award category record · Supports: Lists Dell I.T. Squad with Gold Honor and links to its award entry.
Independent educational analysis of external campaigns. These are not SNS client projects, endorsements or claims of involvement. Campaign facts and reported outcomes are attributed to their sources. Explanations, adaptations and test plans are original analysis and hypotheses, not proven causal findings.