Oculus/Meta: From Home

Go Places From Home

Client: OCULUS/Meta reality labs

Hundreds of years ago, when the pandemic began and we had to shelter in place, Oculus’s tagline, “Defy Reality”, suddenly rang false. But since VR was legitimately an ideal activity during this time—one of the few ways to escape the house— this was a big opportunity for the brand; one we needed to take.

The challenge was finding the appropriate tone and messaging. We wanted to be honest, but couldn’t come out and say, “the world might be ending but hey, at least you can temporarily escape your fear and boredom with VR. And there’s a VR activity for everyone!”

The insight came when we thought about how our lives had changed: we were working from home. Seeing friends from home. Everything was happening from home. Then we realized, that’s what VR lets you do: “go places from home.”

That became our tagline, which could flex based on the games we were promoting. And since VR was the only activity that made this possible, we made a hashtag, #OnlyInVR. Two weeks later, we were introducing it with a visually simple but sound-complex video, and using the style for all our ensuing social posts that promoted VR games.