How Moody’s is Turning Risk into Reward

Jordan P. Kelley, Content Director, Brand Storytelling

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In 2024, Moody’s did something it hadn’t done in over 115 years—it made a big investment in its brand. Not only did they overhaul their brand identity system and launch their first ever brand campaign, but they launched a new commitment to brand storytelling that expanded how most audiences thought about the brand. Known largely as a global credit rating agency, the brand wanted to promote its thought leadership and the perception of its offerings in data and analytics. Enter its first, ever docuseries, The Infinite Game, which explores the dynamic world of financial crimes and the real world impact of Moody’s financial crime compliance and third party risk management business.

The series was a product of the talents of Moody’s in-house StoryLab, a mix of creative strategists, designers, filmmakers and data storytellers, intent on telling engaging stories that bring the brand’s new tagline to life: Decode risk. Unlock opportunity.

BrandStorytelling caught up with Joe Cogan and Mark Rundle with Moody’s StoryLab to learn more about the origin and making of The Infinite Game.

To start, tell us more about Moody's StoryLab - when was it formed, where does it exist in the company's internal structure, and what is its primary function?

Moody’s StoryLab was formed in the run up to Moody’s brand relaunch in March 2024 – it sits between both the Brand and Communications teams and was established with the goal of telling bold and clear stories from the world of credit and finance.

What kind of conversations existed internally around the kind of content creation Moody's was interested in pursuing before the inception of The Infinite Game?

The stories we pursue are ultimately driven by our brand’s purpose: to uncover meaning amid uncertainty so that organizations and individuals can thrive. And during our conversations we investigated a number of interesting narratives that aligned with exploring risk in many industries, and the challenges and opportunities they provide. One thing that we were sure of was that we wanted to create something that would be sticky with a broader audience, using a format that would stand out in the credit rating space – and several of our topics leant themselves beautifully to a documentary series.

Once this idea was settled upon, what were the StoryLab's first steps? How was The Infinite Game translated from a concept to a production?

The first step forward was to map out the story we wanted to tell and lock in an angle that would be compelling. We then identified our subject matter experts whose individual stories were incredibly crucial to making an appealing documentary for a broad audience. When we knew which experts we were speaking to, we could start to draft the film with more granularity. We began by reaching out to Geoff White - a fantastic author and investigative journalist - and Professor Zoe Trodd - a leading modern slavery academic and expert - who had both been wonderful guests on our Moody’s podcast KYC Decoded, and who we both knew had fascinating stories to tell that aligned with our overarching narrative.

What learnings were made during production that will influence future productions?

We have an incredible bench of subject matter experts from which to pull when imagining how we can tell engaging stories. These are colleagues who have deep knowledge of the space and a great level of support and understanding for the brand story we are telling. Their collaboration made Moody’s insights very accessible for us, and brought a unique perspective through which we could view these topics

What has the reception to the series been like both internally and externally?

Externally the reception has been wonderful, with over 110K views on YouTube and ongoing media traction. Internally, the series has been a resounding success, helping to generate employee engagement and leading to support for further projects.

As reflected by the existence of a storytelling department and this series, Moody's places a certain amount of value on storytelling. Why? How does the company define the value of this kind of storytelling and content creation?

Every data set is a potential documentary in waiting. Simply put, stories connect us better with our customers, and we have a wealth of great stories waiting to be told. Moody’s is involved in some complex areas of the global economy, which can only be fully understood when seen from multiple perspectives. These stories highlight the depth of our insights and support our brand purpose and how we help our customers.

What can we expect to come from Moody's StoryLab next?

We’re currently in the final stages of post-production on our next film entitled ‘Work from Where’, which explores what the future of cities and downtowns will look like in the greater context of hybrid working. This series draws upon our insights within the commercial real estate space and explores how businesses can navigate this uncertain future.