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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Television”]

 

This award recognizes outstanding and creative use of Television Media. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Television” to include: television commercials, infomercials, or other use of television as the primary media.

 

Finalists:

 

Mediahub for Shinola

At its core, Shinola is unconventional and progressive, but still relatively unknown (<3% awareness). Mediahub knew TV would be the perfect medium to elevate them. With a budget of less than $300k, Mediahub leveraged three innovations for this campaign: 1. Primary research that got to passion over popularity. 2. An activation that dramatically pushed against category norms. 3. A deployment strategy where the digital/viral aftermath exceeded the strength of TV. Mediahub addressed their challenges in an innovative way – they created the game show “Can You Tell Sh&t from Shinola?” To air on Jimmy Kimmel Live! While it pushed the envelope, its unique, funny, and esoteric nature was true to the brand’s DNA and gave them the impact they needed to get in front of their best consumers. The brand’s risk paid off. It gave Shinola impact well beyond the 2.2mm viewers who saw the piece on ABC. Versus the week prior, Shinola experienced an 80% increase in incremental traffic on Shinola.com, a 65% increase in organic searches, a 30% increase in revenue, and 41k YouTube views. In addition to the Detroit-centric press coverage, AdWeek featured Shinola’s Kimmel spot and did an in-depth piece on the brand, garnering 3mm views online.

Trilia for Dunkin’ Donuts

A priority challenge for Dunkin’ Donuts is to protect and grow the breakfast business, and continue to position the brand as the top coffee and breakfast destination across key markets. Trilia integrated Dunkin’ into the everyday lives of their target consumer by aligning the brand with ritualistic behavior surrounding weather. A unique social component invited viewers to become weather watchers and participate for the chance to have their photos and videos featured across multiple channels. But the cornerstone of the campaign was local television news. With CBS owned and operated stations, Trilia created the Dunkin’ Donuts Weather Watchers cross-channel program, with local customized message and content running across six markets that represent 70%+ of Dunkin’ sales. Since the target watches morning news to “catch the weather,” Trilia capitalized on the trusted viewer-weather team relationship to lend credibility to the brand. Dunkin’s Weather Watchers exemplifes where the local television marketplace is moving- a fully integrated on-air, online, and mobile platform where advertisers are embedded in content. In the first five months of this partnership, Dunkin’ Donuts’ message has been distributed through television, digital and social platforms, delivering almost 95 million impressions in their top sales markets. CBS Weather Watchers runs on Dunkin’!

Trilia for John Hancock

John Hancock faced competitors outspending them by 5x and saw encroachment on the empathetic tone that had been John Hancock’s hallmark. As standing out became more of a challenge, John Hancock turned to Trilia to get back to their creative legacy of presenting an unvarnished look at life in a way that expanded upon their traditional TV-centric approach. The resulting “Life Comes Next” campaign leverages media consumption habits (i.e., second screen behavior), while also delivering an integrated ecosystem of messaging (TV, digital, social, search) that provides a higher level of measurability. Trilia created “teaser” spots on tv that prompted viewers to go to HancockNext.com to see multiple endings of real life situations, an integration that played well in live-TV-sports viewing. Second screen tactics included twitter TV targeting, high-impact units in relevant sports content, and used targeting technology partners to seek our affluent sports fan wherever they were consuming content online. In the first three months, John Hancock saw almost 1.5 million visits to the site (10x the benchmark for impressions needed to generate a site visit), with 65% of traffic coming from T

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Radio”]

 

This award recognizes outstanding and creative use of Radio Media. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Radio” to include: radio advertising, radio underwriting or sponsorship, or other use of radio as the primary media, including both traditional broadcast and streaming radio platforms.

 

Finalists:

 

Mediastruction for Iron Mountain

When Iron Mountain focused on growing its b2smb business, it turned to radio to be its powerful branding tool. Iron Mountain piloted a jock-endorsed campaign in four test markets. A radio talent coach assisted jocks in more emotionally relaying Iron Mountain’s unique sales proposition. Stations received visits from the local Iron Mountain team, who shared stories of its rich history: Iron Mountain’s bunker stores original negatives of 120,000 famous motion pictures, Bill Gates’ Corbis collection of iconic photos (like Rosa Parks on the bus and Marilyn Monroe’s billowed skirt). With organic excitement for the brand conveyed by on-air talent, the campaign results were impressive. The small-market, jock-endorsement test campaign delivered a 15% increase in website visits from the target markets and a 6% increase in leads. The positive outcome encouraged Iron Mountain to invest in branding and scale. For the larger-market campaign, which saw total site traffic up 9%, site traffic from test markets up from 8-17%, organic search volume up 11%, call volume up 29%, sales leads increased 55%, and closed deals increased 16%.

 

Trilia for Dunkin’ Donuts

When Dunkin’ Donuts launched dark roast – a new, bolder addition to their coffee lineup – Trilia wanted to harness the powerful connection between music and mood to educate music lovers and Dunkin’ fans alike about the new coffee blend. Proprietary research showed that audio messaging is an effective platform for Dunkin’ product messaging. With the launch of Dunkin’ Dark Roast, Trilia created “DJ-Dark Roast,” a first ever advertiser technology modification with spotify that could bring the new coffee blend’s “bold and smooth” attributes to life through different music. Spotify provided their listeners (20 million uniques in the US) recommendations that were a bit “bolder” than their previous listening behavior while also including a “smooth” finish to the playlist with more familiar songs (e.i., new songs from artists previously added to their playlists). Users also had the freedom to toggle back and forth between bold and smooth. In one month custom interactive DJ-Dark Roast experience page was visited 95,000+ times by 77,000 unique users, with interaction rates four times higher than spotify average benchmarks. 15,000+ Unique playlists were generated and many were shared with friends.

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Print”]

This award recognizes outstanding and creative use of Print Media. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Print” to include: newspapers, magazines, posters, brochures, fliers, direct mail, or any other printed forms of media.

 

Finalists:

 

Mediahub for JetBlue

JetBlue’s mission is to bring humanity back to air travel. The airline’s customer service was recognized in 2004 with the J.D. Power Award for Best Customer Satisfaction Among Low-Cost Carriers, and recently won its 11th consecutive award. To celebrate this accomplishment, Mediahub was tasked with developing a communications plan that would get JetBlue noticed, but in a clever way, befitting its reputation as a witty yet humble brand. With a limited budget, a tight timeframe and high expectations, their strategy was grounded in being locally relevant while creating impact at scale. The result was an innovative and disruptive newspaper blitz that was executed across JetBlue’s six priority markets on just one day. Targeting premium placements within main news, they launched a two-page “fly-over” that showcased 11 planes flying across the news in a nod to their 11th consecutive award. They supplemented the local buy with a national insertion in the New York Times, making JetBlue the only advertiser to do so. In one market, they even developed a stand-alone insertion for consumers to build their own paper airplane. The successful execution produced local market impact with over 4.5mm total impressions delivered across our priority markets.

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Out of Home”]

This award recognizes outstanding and creative use of Out of Home Media. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Out of Home” to include: billboards, public transit and bus shelter advertising, mobile billboards, and digital billboards.

 

Finalists:

 

Allen & Gerritsen for Celtics

 

Mediahub for JetBlue

 

Mediahub for VH1

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Digital Media”]

This award recognizes media plans that are driven by Mobile Media. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Mobile Media” to include: mobile or handheld devices, tablets, apps, advertisements, banners, video, click-to-buy, location-based features and services, MMS & SMS marketing, and in-game advertising. (Please note: “driven” implies that Mobile Media should be the main component of the media plan. Other media may be a part of the plan as well.)

 

Finalists:

 

PGR Media for Keds

Keds had experienced strong sales leading up to 2014, but was challenged in a highly competitive casual footwear category. Keds was consistently outspent and had a modest budget (single digital MM), and the PGR Media team was challenged to increase sales and raise brand awareness. PGR Media capitalized on Keds’ partnership with their leading “Brave Girl,” Taylor Swift, to reach their target “Brave Girls” (ages 13-24) in order to set themselves apart from their competition during a very competitive back-to-school season. PGR Media created a digital strategy that aligned Keds’ brand pillars by infiltrating culture, integrating into their “Brave Girls’” lifestyle, and fostering participation across social platforms. They collaborated with leading digital fashion/ lifestyle authorities to inspire brave girls to style their Keds through YouTube fashion influencers, Instagram contests, and Facebook promotions. They developed integrations with the TV show Pretty Little Liars and Taylor Swift’s base of “Swifties” to drive additional buzz around the former’s season premier and the latter’s new album and video release. The successful integrations not only garnered 352MM paid impressions and millions more in earned over the back-to-school period, Keds enjoyed a 20% increase overall in U.S. sales.

 

Trilia for Dunkin’ Donuts

Dunkin’ was looking to reach Millennials in a meaningful, non-obtrusive way in order to drive perks acquisition and get Millennials in store. They sought an integrated, cross-channel partnership that had multiple touch-points for maximum impact, with 45% of Millennial internet users playing games nearly two hours per day. Trilia’s solution was the integrate Dunkin’ Donuts into gameplay to drive brand awareness among Millennials in a fun way that was true to the brand’s character. Trilia created the first ever cross-platform, in-game integration partnership with Adult Swim. The fully integrated campaign included an enhanced gameplay experience for Robot Unicorn Attack 2 (RUA2) gamers by integrating Dunkin’ to reward fans without disrupting the in-game experience, an on-air custom spot, and digital/social support across Adult Swim and Dunkin’ properties. These spots lifted brand favorability and the Adult Swim outperformed on the following key metrics:

Dunkin’ likeability: 150 index

Dunkin’ brand opinion: 133 index

RUA2 social promotion earned over 762K potential social media reach through Facebook

Among RUA2 gamers, 45% reported visiting a Dunkin’ Donuts restaurant and 25% reported signing up for DD Perks

 

Trilia for John Hancock

John Hancock faced competitors outspending them by 5X and saw encroachment on the empathetic tone that had been John Hancock’s hallmark. As standing out became more of a challenge, John Hancock turned to Trilia to get back to their creative legacy of presenting an unvarnished look at life in a way that went beyond their traditional TV-centric approach. The resulting “Life Comes Next” campaign leverages media consumption habits (i.e. second screen behavior), while also delivering an integrated ecosystem of messaging (TV, digital, social, search) that provides a higher level of measurability. Trilia built upon second screen behavior trends; “teaser” spots on TV prompted viewers to go to hancocknext.com to see multiple ending of real life situations, an integration that played well in live-TV-sports viewing. Second screen tactics included Twitter TV targeting, high-impact units in relevant sports content, and used targeting technology partners to seek our affluent sports fan wherever they were consuming content online. In the first three months, John Hancock saw almost 1.5 million visits to the site (10X the benchmark for impressions needed to generate a site visit), with 65% of traffic coming from TV.

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Mobile Media”]

This award recognizes media plans that are driven by Mobile Media. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Mobile Media” to include: mobile or handheld devices, tablets, apps, advertisements, banners, video, click-to-buy, location-based features and services, MMS & SMS marketing, and in-game advertising. (Please note: “driven” implies that Mobile Media should be the main component of the media plan. Other media may be a part of the plan as well.)

 

Finalists:

 

Carat for Staples

Staples, like most retailers, struggles with proving the value of mobile marketing, as they still face the issues of how to quantify the value of mobile media given cookie-tracking limitations tied to cross device behavior. Carat’s brand accelerator campaign was designed to answer two questions: how can Staples accurately attribute sales back to a mobile campaign, and what is the best way to engage with users on a mobile device? The brand accelerator program took a two-pronged approach: use high-involvement tactics via engaging interactive units to create an initial connection, and then re-message those contacts with a more DR-driven message to drive sales. The campaign proved that mobile media assists in driving a subsequent sale in-store or on desktop: 83% of the media ran on a mobile device, yet 75% of conversations happened in-store, and 25% were on desktop. Carat was able to demonstrate that display has a role in both the upper and lower funnel stages of the purchase path by using sequential messaging to marry the two tactics. This campaign drove almost a 4X incremental ROI vs. standard upper funnel campaigns and produced revenue results that were 95% higher than similar efforts using ‘last click’ methodology.

 

Trilia for John Hancock

John Hancock flipped the “end-focused” life insurance industry on its head when it introduced “Vitality,” a product that celebrates life and rewards those who are living an active and healthy lifestyle. John Hancock is outspent 5-to-1 in a low involvement category, so Trilia was tasked with launching and creating positive buzz around a complex product with a budget that a fraction of the competitors’. John Hancock’s affluent target is a light TV viewer and heavy mobile user, so Trilia used mobile as the hero of their cross-channel campaign. Trilia partnered with Hancock’s PR agency, Weber Shandwick, for maximum buzz/alignment. Launch day consisted of Twitter TV Targeting, utilizing high-impact units, tapping technology partners, interactive tablet units to drive brand awareness, partnering with Forbes for live Twitter chat, etc. The messaging “life insurance that rewards you for living healthy” was displayed throughout with mobile as Trilia’s hero channel. In the frist 7 weeks, the campaign generated more than 285,000 site visits; and the cost per visit was well below goal (-36%), with 71% of visits driven by mobile. The campaign produced a 10% lift in consideration of Hancock with Vitality.

 

Trilia for Dunkin’ Donuts

With 253MM vehicles on U.S. roads, America doesn’t just run on Dunkin’, America drives on Dunkin’. Waze has become the way more than 50MM Americans drive. Dunkin’ Donuts was an early adopter of Waze, and Trilia knew from proprietary research that reaching prospects in the moment hen they are in close proximity to a Dunkin’ location can prompt a quick visit. In 2015, the goal was to better align DD’s integration around how users behave in the app. This year’s integration includes prominent DD pin locations that offer “drive there” directions, dayparted messaging, weather targeting, and zero speed/traffic takeovers. Waze users can even opt to have New England Patriots star Rob Gronkowski give turn-by-turn directions and other notifications! Dunkin’ also introduced a custom traffic targeting solution, specifically targeting Waze users stuck in traffic and providing them a special offer from DD, redeemable within the app. Waze and Dunkin’ Donuts have partnered for over half a billion relevant, local impressions highlighting DD locations on Wazer’s maps, DD has become an ingrained part of Wzers’ in-app experience.

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Social Media”]

This award recognizes media plans that are driven by Social Media. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Social Media” to include: Facebook, Twitter, viral or word of mouth campaigns, YouTube, or any other social sharing platform. (Please note: “driven” implies that Social Media should be the main component of the media plan. Other media may be a part of the plan as well.)

 

Finalists:

 

Mediahub for MassMutual

MassMutual’s advertising was generating awareness, but it hadn’t lifted in a few years. Social platforms presented the greatest opportunity to create a collective dialogue around MassMutual’s brand purpose: caring for those who matter most. The “Love Is a Gift” campaign was inspired by a Ted Talk by Ron Gutman on the financial value of smiling and paying that love forward. The campaign encouraged people to share photos and stories on loveisagift.com and through Instagram using #loveisagift. Local guerilla marketing events kicked off the campaign, followed by a paid video-seeding strategy. A public relations campaign, blogger program, Twitter party, and MassMutual’s Facebook and Twitter efforts continued awareness. Custom social targeting tactics were implemented to reach users likely to upload images and donate to charities. Retargeting was used to encourage those who originally uploaded a photo to return and view the photo gallery. Through video-seeding partner Viralgains, Mediahub honed in on users who were most likely to share the video in order to further spread the message and increase engagement. The campaign generated: 580,000+ video views, 43,000 clicks to the site, 66,000 total social engagements. Mediahub surpassed campaign interaction goals by 600%.

 

Mediahub for TV Land

In 2015, TVL launched younger in hopes of re-introducing TVL as a destination for fresh, exciting content for Gen X women. Proprietary research showed 87% of Gen X women try new shows because of social networks or friend recommendations, so Mediahub’s strategy was straightforward: get into the target’s social feeds. Pinterest helped showcase the looks of younger, and Mediahub leveraged Hellosociety, a network of Pinterest influencers, to give younger posts an instant credibility boost. Mediahub utilized Twitter’s conversation-targeting products to target women talking about Fifty Shades of Grey and the Oscars, and commissioned pop culture icons to tweet on TVL’s behalf to build excitement for the show. On Instagram, Mediahub promoted pictures of the cast hanging out as friends in NYC, emulating a typical post the target would see in her feed. To ensure content was “shareworthy,” Mediahub used video behemoth Facebook to relentlessly test and optimize toward content that was shared most. On premiere day, Mediahub blasted top-performing clips to previously engaged users. Their efforts paid off. Younger generated the highest rating for w18–34 for any original sitcom, peaking at a 1.04 L+3 rating among w25–54 (compared to a .28 W25–54 l+3 prime rating in q4 2014).

 

PGR Media for Keds

Keds had experienced strong sales leading up to 2014, but was challenged in a highly competitive casual footwear category. Keds was consistently outspent and had a modest budget (single digital mm), and the PGR Media team was challenged to increase sales and raise brand awareness. PGR Media captialized on Keds’ partnership with their leading “Brave Girl,” Taylor Swift, to reach their target “Brave Girls” (ages 13-24) in order to set themselves apart from their competition during a very competitive back-to-school season. PGR Media created a digital strategy that aligned Keds brand pillars by infiltrating culture, integrating into their “Brave Girls’’ lifestyle, and fostering participation across social platforms. They collaborated with leading digital fashion/lifestyle authorities to inspire Brave Girls to style their Keds through YouTube fashion influencers, Instagram contests and Facebook promotions. They developed integrations with the TV show Pretty Little Liars and Taylor Swift’s base of “Swifties” to drive additional buzz around the former’s season premier and the latter’s new album and video release. The successful integrations not only garnered 352mm paid impressions and millions more in earned over the back-to-school period, Keds enjoyed a 20% increase in overall U.S. sales.

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Native Advertising Campaign”]

Best media plan utilizing native ad formats that attempt to provide valuable advertiser content seamlessly integrated with a publication’s online communities, overall improving the user’s experience.

 

Finalists:

 

Mediahub for Shinola

 

PARTNERS+simons for AIG

 

Trilia for Dunkin’ Donuts

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[symple_toggle title=”Best Use of Branded Content”]

This award recognizes media plans that are driven by Branded Content. The Maven Awards Jury defines “Branded Content” to include advertising in the form of entertainment including TV content, web content, podcasts, etc. (Please note: “Driven” implies that Branded Content should be the main component of the media plan. Other media may be a part of the plan as well.)

 

Finalists:

 

Havas Media for Seagate

Seagate lives and plays in the data landscape, but it remains relatively unknown. Havas Media’s goal was to elevate Seagate as a thought-leader while reminding consumers that the data landscape is not something to shy away from, but something to embrace. Havas Media partnered with The Atlantic– an authority on both technology and thought leadership- to explore the boundaries between data and the human experience. The content series’ two custom webpages captured both the business and consumer sides of the data world. One page showed the sheer volume of data from one industry to the next, allowing users to zoom in and out and interact with the visualization. The second explores the top digital platforms from Google to Instagram, delivering a real-time live feed of the quantity of information passing through cyberspace. Early data shows overwhelming success, with 30,000+ unique visitors in the first 4 weeks. The series has been shared 1200X+ across social channels, far surpassing the benchmark of 500-800 shares. The series has been picked up by tech leaders: Symantec tweeted “The Invisible Infrastructure” to 130,000 followers; an organic post on Reddit drove nearly 10,000 page views in a week.

 

Mediahub for Shinola

At its core, Shinola in unconventional and progressive, but still relatively unknown (<3% awareness). Mediahub knew TV would be the perfect medium to elevate them. With a budget of less than $300K, Mediahub leveraged three innovations for this campaign: 1. Primarily research that got to passion over popularity. 2. An activation that dramatically pushed against category norms. 3. A deployment strategy where the digital/viral aftermath exceeded the strength of TV. Mediahub addressed their challenges in an innovative way- they created the game show “Can You Tell Sh&t From Shinola?” to air on Jimmy Kimmel Live! While it pushed the envelope, its unique, funny, and esoteric nature was true to the brand’s DNA and gave them the impact they needed to get in front of their best consumers. The brand’s risk paid off. It gave Shinola impact well beyond the 2.2MM viewers who saw the piece on ABC. Versus the week prior, Shinola experienced an 80% increase in incremental traffic on shinola.com, a 65% increase in organic searches, a 30% increase in revenue, and 41K YouTube views. In addition to the Detroit-centric press coverage, Adweek featured Shinola’s Kimmel spot and did an in-depth piece on the brand, garnering 3MM views online.

 

Trilia for Merrell

With an aging core target, Merrell needed to become more relevant to a Millennial audience. Trilia was charged with re-launching the footwear brand to a younger audience, with the release of Merrell’s most innovative hiking boot yet, the Capra. Trilia built a custom-branded storefront at Sundance Film Festival, the Merrell Trailscape, which hosted a first-to-market motion capture virtual reality hike. Trilia partnered with Wenner Media to help reach critical mass and launched Trailscape Online- a sponsored section on rollingstone.com housing all festival-related content and news. Rolling Stone brought renowned film critic Peter Travers to Trailscape, and conducted interviews with film stars including Ryan Reynolds, Jack Black, Johnny Knoxville, and Jason Segal. These videos were posted in near real time, and were exclusive to the Trailscape hub. The combination of social and high profile digital homepage takeovers generated 33M+ impressions across Wenner Media properties. The click through rate was 389% higher than industry benchmarks, with a 62% lift in brand consideration among the target. Social conversations peaked to 9X the trailing average. Most importantly, 4,191 total pairs of new shoes were sold on merrell.com.

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[symple_toggle title=” Best Integrated Campaign”]

This award recognizes media plans that are driven by any integrated combination of media including television, radio, print, out of home, digital, mobile, social, new and non-traditional media, or branded content.

 

Finalists:

 

CVS Health for CVS Health

How does a Fortune 12 company successfully change their name, rebrand their purpose, and pull one of their highest volume products ($2B in annual revenue) from the shelves all in one day? They staff a war room full of social media users and launch a national multi-channel marketing campaign to communicate all of those changes at once. On September 3, 2014, CVS Health emerged with advertising, press, and events to introduce the new name and announce they were pulling tobacco products from the shelves immediately. Notable tweets to CVS Health came from Michelle Obama, Mike Bloomberg, and the White House Press Secretary, among others. A robust national TV campaign launched with roadblocks in both early morning and evening news. National newspapers reached educated, affluent consumers and influential targets throughout the campaign timeframe and were paired with their digital counterparts to create a holistic experience. Results at the end of the campaign included a 30%+ increase in brand recall, 200K new social fans/followers, and 50%+ increase in store locator clicks. In April 2015, the current Fortune 500 list was released with CVS Health jumping two spots to #10.

 

Mediahub for PBS

Mediahub was tasked with turning an epically long documentary (14 hours of content across 7 consecutive nights) on the Roosevelts into a compelling family drama with a budget half the size devoted to comparable programming on rival networks. Mediahub conducted focus groups and concluded they needed to contemporize and humanize the Roosevelts by anchoring the viewers’ existing knowledge and focus on surprising, intimate details. The campaign focused on meeting educated groups across trusted sources, including a Roosevelts category on Jeopardy!, a caption contest in The New Yorker, and editorial and native integrations on The Huffington Post and The Daily Beast. Premiere night drove the highest ratings for a Ken Burns’ documentary since 2007, and maintaining over half their viewership across all seven nights.

 

PARTNERS+simons for AIG

AIG is the official insurance partner of the New Zealand All Blacks and USA Rugby, a partnership built upon shared values of performance, strength, integrity, and tenacity. The goal for PARTNERS+simons was to make the match between these teams at Soldier Field in Chicago the most talked about rugby match in U.S. history and to ultimately improve AIG’s reputation through their affiliation with this historic event. PARTNERS+simons drafted a media mix that included high impact channels (The Wall Street Journal, Grantland.com, NBC) at the national level, and a heavy local presence in movie theaters and interactive bus shelters – places where they could leverage the sights and sounds of rugby. The November 1, 2014 match turned out to be the single largest rugby even in U.S. history, completely selling out the 61,500-seat Soldier Field with 26,700 of those tickets being sold in the first 24 hours. To quote Nigel Melville, CEO of USA Rugby, “It was a landmark day for all involved, from our fans and participants to our broadcast and business partners, and we are more excited and bullish about the future than ever before.”

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[symple_toggle title=” Best Use of New and Non-Traditional Media”]

This award recognizes media plans that are driven by New and Non-Traditional Media that do not fit into the above categories. The Maven Awards Jury defines “New and Non-Traditional” to include: emerging media, search engine marketing, in-game advertising, tablet advertising, and non-traditional use of traditional media. (Please note: “driven” implies that New and Non-Traditional Media should be the main component of the media plan. Other media may be a part of the plan as well.)

 

Finalists:

 

AMP Agency for Icelandair

 

Decibel Media for Wentworth Inst. of Tech.

 

Trilia for Merrell

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[symple_toggle title=” Best Plan for Campaign Spending $1M or Less”]

This award specifically recognizes outstanding and creative media plans with spending less than $1 million.

 

Finalists:

 

Mediahub for Shinola

Shinola hails from Detroit and had a mission to disrupt the fashion category at large. They wanted to take the magic they had created in Detroit to other major U.S. cities where they were opening stores. Mediahub conducted primary research to uncover a target that matched the Shinola values. With Scout they created a quantitative study to find consumers who refuse to believe that American making and creativity are dead. The insights revealed under-the-radar style destinations where go-to properties for brand inspiration, and that local pride is a must-have with any brand that consumers care about. Mediahub created custom videos of three influencers- a photographer, a creative director, and a fashion stylist- in new markets who epitomized a piece of the Shinola brand. Each one created a video that took us through a day in their life in their respective city. All of this was propelled through the hashtag #lovemycity. Ultimately the campaign saw 87% new visitors to shinola.com, #lovemycity mentions increase by 183% in the social space, and video engagement was 172% higher than site benchmarks.

 

PARTNERS+simons for AIG

AIG is the official insurance partner of the New Zealand All Blacks and USA Rugby, a partnership built upon shared values of performance, strength, integrity, and tenacity. The goal for PARTNERS+simons was to make the match between these teams at Soldier Field in Chicago the most talked about rugby match in U.S. history and to ultimately improve AIG’s reputation through their affiliation with this historic event. PARTNERS+simons drafted a media mix that included high impact channels (The Wall Street Journal, Grantland.com, NBC) at the national level, and a heavy local presence in movie theaters and interactive bus shelters – places where they could leverage the sights and sounds of rugby. The November 1, 2014 match turned out to be the single largest rugby even in U.S. history, completely selling out the 61,500-seat Soldier Field with 26,700 of those tickets being sold in the first 24 hours. To quote Nigel Melville, CEO of USA Rugby, “It was a landmark day for all involved, from our fans and participants to our broadcast and business partners, and we are more excited and bullish about the future than ever before.”

 

Trilia for Merrell

With an aging core target, Merrell needed to become more relevant to a Millennial audience. Trilia was charged with re-launching the footwear brand to a younger audience, with the release of Merrell’s most innovative hiking boot yet, the Capra. Trilia built a custom-branded storefront at Sundance Film Festival, the Merrell Trailscape, which hosted a first-to-market motion capture virtual reality hike. Trilia partnered with Wenner Media to help reach critical mass and launched Trailscape Online- a sponsored section on rollingstone.com housing all festival-related content and news. Rolling Stone brought renowned film critic Peter Travers to Trailscape, and conducted interviews with film stars including Ryan Reynolds, Jack Black, Johnny Knoxville, and Jason Segal. These videos were posted in near real time, and were exclusive to the Trailscape hub. The combination of social and high profile digital homepage takeovers generated 33M+ impressions across Wenner Media properties. The click through rate was 389% higher than industry benchmarks, with a 62% lift in brand consideration among the target. Social conversations peaked to 9X the trailing average. Most importantly, 4,191 total pairs of new shoes were sold on merrell.com.

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[symple_toggle title=” Best Use of Research and Insights”]

This award recognizes media plans that were significantly based on a specific insight from audience and/or marketing research and data.

 

Finalists:

 

MARC USA | Results Digital for Payless

Payless competes with mega-stores and huge online retailers. It’s crucial that each media dollar spent is impactful. In order to quantify and validate the impact of digital media, MARC USA was presented with the daunting task of quantifying digital media’s influence on in-store sales. Payless needed a way to prove that scaling all digital dollars would drive both online and in-store revenue. Through both internal analysis and external partnerships, Payless and the agency measured the impact that online campaigns have on in-store revenue. They captured consumer exposure to digital media campaigns, overlayed customer purchase data, matched in-store transactions to each consumer’s online campaign exposure, and quantified online campaign influence and impact on in-store sales along with a new media strategy, technology infrastructure and measurement approach. This allows them to identify in-store impact across channel and device to make granular optimizations to increase overall revenue. Since implementing this strategy, digital campaigns produced over 1,400% ROAs. The agency also discovered desktop users are 4x more likely and mobile users are 133x more likely to purchase in-store vs. online. The agency has proven that digital media drives valuable in-store revenue at significantly higher rates than seen online.

 

Mediahub for Shinola

Who would open an analog watch factory in the digital age? Shinola. They are a three-year-old, Detroit-born luxury watch company. But with only 3% awareness,Shinola went to Mediahub to find the right target audience. Mediahub dispensed with the standard research filters – age, minimum household income, and propensity to buy luxury products. With Mediahub’s proprietary tool, Scout, they conducted a quantitative study of 1,000+ people, screened to find consumers who have a passion for quality and who refuse to believe that American craftsmanship and creativity is dead. They uncovered three insights that were germane in shaping their go-to market strategy: 1. How it looks vs. How it’s made 2. News as the cultural currency 3. Countercultural fashion. These insights moved Shinola into uncharted territory and new partnerships that were as bold as Shinola, itself, including a consumer-first magazine plan which favored thought leadership titles (Vanity Fair, The New Yorker, The Atlantic, Wired) over fashion titles. These insights have moved Shinola in the right direction. Aided awareness has grown 467% in just six months. Additionally, social sentiment around the brand is currently at 92%, proving that they’re engaging the right crowd.

 

Trilia for John Hancock

John Hancock flipped the “end-focused” life insurance industry on its head when it introduced “vitality,” a product that celebrates life and rewards those who are living an active and healthy lifestyle. John Hancock is outspent 5-to-1 in a low involvement category, so Trilia was tasked with launching and creating positive buzz around a complex product with a budget that was a fraction of their competitors’. Trilia leveraged research and insights to create an integrated campaign that helped John Hancock stand out from their competitors, appear larger than spending allowed, and hone in on their target wherever they were online. Trilia conducted first-party interviews with fas and utilized secondary research tools to help inform a strategic cross-channel media plan that hit their dual audience through mobile and social media platforms. The messaging “…life insurance that rewards you for living healthy” was displayed throughout. With mobile as Trilia’s hero channel, in the first 7 weeks, the campaign generated more than 285,000 site visits; and the cost per visit was well below goal (-36%), with 71% of visits driven by mobile. The campaign produced a 10% lift in consideration of Hancock w/vitality.

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[symple_toggle title=” Best Multicultural Campaign”]

This award recognizes media plans designed specifically to reach various multicultural markets.

 

Finalists:

 

Mediahub for MassMutual

A recent study found that only 20% of African Americans believe that they are on track to meet their goals for retirement. Knowing that Black History Month is a pivotal time to intercept this conversation, Mediahub worked with MassMutual to develop an integrated campaign based off the catalytic idea of honoring the past by creating a legacy for the future. In order to stand out and catch the attention of their target audience during this cluttered month, the campaign started on Facebook and Twitter where consumers were invited to define their legacy using #inthreewords. All creative drove to a custom landing page which outlined important facts and figures in African American history and tools to help users create a legacy for the future. Mediahub also partnered with The Root, a core endemic site that featured four custom blog posts and tapped into their social media platforms. Running an integrated campaign with consistent messaging across platforms proved to be very effective. Asking users to share their stories generated 37% and 40% higher interaction rates than the previous year on Twitter and Facebook, respectively.

 

Moira Studio for IBA

 

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[symple_toggle title=” Best Business-to-Business Plan”]

This award recognizes media plans focused on business-to-business efforts.

 

Finalists:

 

KSV for National Grid

How can a business take advantage of their utility’s energy efficiency expertise if the decision makers don’t know about it? They can’t. National Grid developed a series of placements tied to key industry verticals in Massachusetts and Rhode Island that illustrated how a combination of broad-based, business-oriented media channels and hyper-audience targeted media placements could overcome these business challenges. This targeted marketing campaign enjoyed tangible success, with National Grid’s energy efficiency customer awareness rising from 48.5% to 62.8% in just three months and media response rates which performed above industry standards.

 

PJA Advertising + Marketing for Corning Life Sciences

In the year since Corning Life Sciences acquired the Falcon line of liquid handling and cell culture products, they watched the sales of their industry-leading centrifuge tubes consistently decline. PJA Advertising + Marketing reversed this slide through standout creative that elevated the importance of the product and reinforced the product’s consistently high quality. PJA implemented an effective social media campaign, producing a YouTube video that surpassed the industry benchmark and reaching their target audience through paid, owned, and earned media.

 

Trilia for John Hancock

John Hancock Investment Advisors’ products are sold through third-party intermediaries, which makes communicating their approach and product benefits to an external sales force both challenging and essential. To succeed, JH needs their investment wholesalers to internalize their unique manage-of-managers model: marry the innovation, agility and conviction of boutique managers with the oversight and risk controls of a large, institutional asset manager. This is a complicated message to convey to a market where they are already being outspent 5:1 by other industry leaders. However, by utilizing a strategy that combined high profile reach, contextual relevance, and message frequency, JH overcome this deficit and generated increased consideration for the brand. Their successful marketing campaign generated a 16% lift in consideration for their manager-of-managers model and drove a 31% increase in overall site traffic. There is so much renewed confidence in this line of business that they secured additional marketing funds to continue their campaign.

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[symple_toggle title=” Risky Business Award”]

The purpose of this award is to recognize media plans that took a significant risk, went against the conventional media wisdom, and put a meaningful budget toward taking that risk. Examples would include reaching a new and unconventional audience, experimenting with a new media channel or vehicle, or generally taking a brand where it hadn’t been before from a media perspective.

 

Finalists:

 

Mediahub for LL Bean

L.L.Bean was founded on the premise that if you make quality, durable goods people will come back. They marketed this through detailed catalogues. Mediahub needed to find a way to translate this message of quality in today’s clickable, shoppable world. The campaign borrowed cultural equity from established voices by tapping into a blogger network accessible through federated media. They worked with bloggers to develop posts featuring a hero product that felt germane to the tastemaker’s style, but also appeased L.L.Bean’s desire to emphasize quality. In addition, Mediahub co-wrote gallery posts that showed the breadth of products available to outfit each season. Each content push also included a supporting media plan that would scale the hero product images through aspirational touchpoints via Instagram and Pinterest. Engagement for the effort was strong. Each post outperformed federated media’s social engagement benchmarks by 3x. Readers even shared the articles and took over 5,000 social actions, exceeding the average by 30x. The most compelling case for co-created content was the revenue it drove. Our partnership with federated media only represented 9% of our spring media spend; however, 24% of revenue garnered during this period was the direct result of the tastemaker co-created content.

 

Norbella for Arbella

Arbella wanted to connect with a younger demographic within Boston while cutting through the spending clutter of the competition. They partnered with Boston Globe Media (BGM) to develop an exclusive event – “Covered by Arabella,” a market-wide challenge to discover Boston’s best cover band. The campaign was executed through digital, print, and streaming radio. Over the course of the contest, Arbella switched out the creatives from soliciting entrants to inviting people to vote for their favorite cover, and later to inviting the BGM audience to the final event at the Hard Rock Café, where the top three finalists were invited to perform. This event, which featured Arbella signage (step and repeats, TV commercial playing on repeat on venue TVs, branded photo booth). Culminated in the winning band receiving free studio time at RadioBDC to record a demo tape. The campaign was extremely effective from both a branding and event-specific play. For a 2-month campaign, Arbella received over 14mm impressions and were included in three bonus ticketwatch emails to music enthusiasts. But the real value for Arbella was the amount of exposure they received within all of BGMs properties for a campaign under $30,000 (media value well over $100k).

 

Trilia for Merrell

Trilia was charged with re-launching Merrell to a younger audience, with the release of the brand’s most innovative hiking boot yet, the Capra. Through proprietary research, Trilia learned that Merrell’s target—the experience collectors—are as passionate about cultural events as they are about the outdoors. Trilia convinced their client to upset category norm and go all-in on a two-week integrated brand experience unlike anything before; it was big, non-traditional, even “risky.” Trilia built a custom-branded storefront at Sundance Film Festival, the Merrell Trailscape. This virtual reality experience became a celebrity hotspot where they gave interviews, relaxed, and were outfitted with Merrell gear. Significant press coverage included Fast Company, Creativity Online, Wall Street Journal, PSFK, Adweek, BizBash, Ad Age, Rolling Stone, Yahoo!, and US Weekly. Although the event lasted only four days, the buzz surrounding it carried on for much longer. Heavy social activity and PR buzz, conversations surrounding Merrell increased 900% during the event and remained elevated for the month following. This buzz led to increased shopping, with 4,000 incremental purchases of shoes on Merrell.com. This unlikely partnership resulted in over 187mm impressions, 175,000 engagements, and achieved the ultimate goal, raising consideration among experience collectors by 45%.

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[symple_toggle title=” Media All Star Award”]

This award recognizes a veteran media planner or buyer who has demonstrated an expert understanding of media planning and buying, who has contributed to the success and achievement of client goals, and who has imparted knowledge on the younger generation of planners and buyers.

 

Finalists:

 

Nicole Estebanell, DigitasLBi

A seasoned media veteran, Nicole Estebanell brings over 15 years of digital marketing experience for national and multinational brands to her work. Nicole oversees a growing capability of 80+ with clients across technology, retail, insurance, and e-commerce. Her team focuses on media innovation and cross-channel strategies that leverage audience insights and data across platforms. During her tenure at DigitasLBi, Nicole has significantly grown the Boston media practice via new business wins, including Education Management Corporation and several Fortune 500 clients. Nicole’s creativity and leadership can be seen in her brainchild, Fantasy Online College, a tongue-in-cheek institution that was the hallmark of her NFL campaign with Lenovo and SBNation. Nicole and her team also partnered with the Art Institutes to produce a multi-episode art competition to turn a shipping container into a work of art. DigitasLBi’s Global Chief Media Officer Baba Shetty says it best, “Nicole Estebanell is an incredibly strategic and tactical leader, focused on the work and client relationships. Her expertise across digital and emerging media make her a powerful asset to our team, agency, and clients.”

 

Katie Thompson, Trilia

Katie Thompson came to Hill Holiday Media, now Trilia, as a freelancer, but quickly became a full-time employee and a valuable member of the agency. In less than two years with Trilia, Katie has contributed to millions of dollars in revenue, the successful restructuring of their programmatic practice from managed service to self-service, and helped to hire and train her staff on all inventory streams. In all this time the only fault the agency has found is her proclivity for the New York Giants. Sports allegiances aside, her clients respect her for her transparency and broad knowledge. Because Katie’s team is fluent across inventory streams, her team has greater visibility into what’s working harder in real time so they can more quickly optimize all spending for stronger results. More than 80% of Trilia’s clients are placing spending through Katie’s team, and the results are equally impressive – 67% increase in search performance for an acquisition client, 31% more efficient cost per booking for a travel client. It’s no wonder she has already been recognized as a Media Maven Rising Star and a Media All Star by Media Week.

 

Jade Watts, Mediahub

Jade Watts spent 15 years in three cities building relationships at some of the biggest media agencies in the country, and has earned respect as a trusted source among her clients. When Royal Caribbean Cruise Lines decided to change digital platforms, they put their trust in Jade. When JetBlue needed to make every dollar spent feel like four to compete with the legacy industry leaders, Jade was promoted to SVP, group media director to oversee all of the media for JetBlue. Jade increased bookings by 27% by implementing a dynamic ad-insertion capability which matches warm-weather destinations to people browsing from cold locations. Her solutions also served to decrease waste by 10%. Jade ratcheted up the buzz for JetBlue this spring by leading their “Find a Better Wingman” effort, a fun, interactive experience in the heart of Manhattan where the consumer could feel how JetBlue puts “you above all.” It was a finalist in both the Omma Awards and the Outdoor Digital Awards. Jade truly embodies the Mediahub philosophy of going beyond media to provide business solutions. That’s why clients trust her and why Mediahub is proud to have her on their team.

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[symple_toggle title=” Rising Star Award”]

This award recognizes an up-and-coming media planner or buyer under the age of 30 who demonstrates a keen understanding and insight into the strategy behind media planning and buying.

 

Finalists:

 

Michelle Blaser, Mediahub

 

Liz Fermon, Mediahub

 

Liane Nadeau, Trilia

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