Comic Book Series — Creative Strategy & Art Direction
TAB Bank isn't a conventional lender. They specialize in alternative funding — asset-based lending, A/R financing — for businesses that need capital fast and don't fit inside a traditional bank's box. Their pitch was that when their clients win, they win. The challenge was getting that message in front of the right people: Temp CFOs, the finance leaders parachuted into companies to steady the ship, who are exactly the kind of decision-makers who'd reach for a tool like TAB Bank on a client's behalf — if they knew to.
The Challenge
Temp CFO agencies are a narrow, sophisticated audience, and a conventional cold outreach campaign — an email, a brochure, a cold call — was never going to cut through. TAB Bank needed something with enough personality to earn a second look, and enough substance to actually explain what they do, delivered over time so the relationship had room to build rather than asking for a meeting on the first touch.
The Concept
We proposed something unconventional for a financial services ABM campaign: an actual comic book. The story follows Cliff O'Neil, a Temp CFO who gains a singular power — the ability to fund his clients' bank accounts on demand — from a mysterious device built by the enigmatic Dr. Imler. Armed with it, Cliff goes up against the Old Guard: the slow, rigid, red-tape version of banking that leaves businesses stranded when they need capital most. It's a wink at exactly the frustration real Temp CFOs live with, dramatized as a hero's origin story. The book's own tagline made the pitch explicit: "Every hero needs a sidekick" — and TAB Bank cast itself as that sidekick, the financing partner standing behind the CFO's win.
I worked on the strategy and concept alongside the writer, developing the superhero conceit as a vehicle for TAB Bank's actual product story, then art directed the illustration to make sure the visual world — character design, tone, the look of "the Old Guard" as antagonist — stayed sharp, consistent, and on-brand across the series. Alex Naylor wrote the story, Ian Johnston illustrated, and I led art direction.
Bringing It to Life
The series ran three parts, mailed physically to a curated list of Temp CFOs a few weeks apart — giving the story room to unfold like a real comic release instead of dumping the whole pitch at once. Each mailing was followed by an email and phone call, turning the comic into the spine of a multi-touch nurture sequence rather than a one-off novelty. The goal at every touchpoint was the same: make every Temp CFO who read it feel like the real hero for their clients, with TAB Bank as the power behind them.
It's an unconventional play for B2B financial marketing, but that was the point — a format built to get opened and read on its own merits, giving TAB Bank a reason to follow up that didn't feel like a sales call.