ENTRY GUIDELINES
The aim of the IAB Australia Awards is to recognise and reward those campaigns that have met or surpassed their goals, while recognising the links between media planning, creativity and effectiveness. Please consider the following when submitting your campaigns.Submissions must be received online by Wednesday 5 May 2010. No extensions will be granted.
Ensure you submit all entry materials exactly as they are requested. Any missing materials or information may result in disqualification.
The written brief is the most important part of the entry because it frames the business challenge and illustrates the impact of the campaign and the role of the Interactive.
The most successful briefs explain the competitive environment, the campaign objectives and goals and clearly provide evidence of performance. A large-scale, expensive campaign does not necessarily impress judges; effectively demonstrating performance, results and the role of creative does. Please note that if the results provided do not match the objectives outlined in your submission, you will be heavily penalised in the judging process.
Submissions should be clear, concise and free of jargon and exaggeration.
There are three sections to the brief – The Problem (200 word limit) The Solution (600 word limit) and The Results (400 word limit).
The written submission must outline:
The Problem: This section is worth 10% of the score. 200 word limit.
Provide a clear statement of the problem, based on the initial brief:
- Briefly, provide some historical context (e.g., market position, competitive landscape, benchmarks vs. years prior).
- Clearly articulate the business and marketing challenge.
- Precisely state the campaign goals/objectives (e.g., increase market share, increase unaided or aided awareness, improve prospect engagement [such as time engaged on a microsite], generate $X from the campaign [unit sales, revenue, etc.], improve overall perception, improve cost of acquisition [cost/response, cost/customer, cost/revenue generated, etc.]).
- Provide details about the target audience and the actions that are expected from the target audience in response to advertising.
The Solution: This section is worth a total of 60% of the score. There are 3 sub-sections within The Solution. 600 word limit.
The Strategy – 20% of score. 200 word limit.
- What were the creative and media strategies? Judges will look for a solid strategy covering all aspects of the campaign that is in direct response to the business/ marketing challenge outlined in the problem section.
- What did you do to accomplish the goals and objectives outlined above?
- What interactive tactics did you use? Why and how were they used?
- Is there anything unique, noteworthy or interesting about how you executed the media component of the strategy?
- What percentage of the overall interactive budget was allocated to executing the campaign? If 100%, what percentage of the entire advertising budget was allocated to the program?
- Judges will be assessing how creative, innovative or sophisticated the campaign was in its use of media so it is important to demonstrate use of research, creativity, choice of media vehicles and integration with other non-interactive media if appropriate.
- Outline the creative approach to the strategy.
- Describe the user experience.
- The creative component is an important part of the execution and judges will consider such criteria as engagement, unique use of the medium, art direction, copywriting, integration with overall campaign and use of technology.
- While there are no restrictions on the creative samples you provide, they must be accessible via working web links. If the links are inactive for any reason during the judging process, disqualification may result. Keep in mind that each judge will be viewing dozens of campaigns and may therefore only be able to devote several minutes per submission.
- Please ensure the creative supplied is only applicable to the category entered. If you are entering multiple categories, the creative supplied must be tailored and relevant for each entry. For example, if entering the Rich Media & Digital Video category, only the rich media creative component should be supplied.
The Solution: This section is worth a total of 60% of the score. There are 2 sub-sections within The Solution. 600 word limit.
The Strategy – 20% of score. 200 word limit.
- What was the search strategy? Judges will look for a solid strategy covering all aspects of the campaign that is in direct response to the business/ marketing challenge outlined in the problem section.
The Execution – 40% of score. 400 word limit.
- What did you do to accomplish the goals and objectives outlined above? For example, did you employ SEM, SEO, a combination of both?
- What search tactics did you use? Highlight any unique, innovative or noteworthy tactics used to execute the search strategy. Why and how were they used?
- How did the search component support other components of the campaign eg display, other media?
- What percentage of the overall interactive budget was allocated to executing the campaign? If 100%, what percentage of the entire advertising budget was allocated to the program?
The Results: This section is worth 30% of the score. 400 word limit.
- Outline the results and ROI.
- How well did the campaign achieve what you set out to do? Ensure you provide solid empirical evidence to prove effectiveness and ROI (credible sources and dates of data or research – either third party or client’s own).
- Do the results tally with the initial understanding of the target audience and its attitudes and behaviours? How did consumer insights give rise to effective results?
- How did the performance of the campaign impact on your client’s business?
- How did the creative contribute? Ignore this question for the Search Category only.
- It is important to provide as much factual information and detail for comparison as possible – claims like “the campaign delivered 57% higher than the targets set in the brief” will be met with scepticism unless it is clear what those targets were, and how realistic they were.
- For IAB members, the first entry is $220 + GST ($242 incl GST). Any subsequent entries are $190 + GST ($209 incl GST).
- For non-IAB members, the fee for the first entry is $260 + GST ($286 incl GST) and any subsequent entries are $230 + GST ($253 incl GST).
- Entry fees may be paid by credit card only and must be paid online at time of completing submissions. If your submission/s have not been paid for at close of entry they may not be included for judging.
- A 1.8% merchant fee will be applied to entries paid by Visa and Mastercard and a 3.2% fee for entries paid by Amex. These fees will be added to your total and outlined in the payment form.
AWARDS
- Awards are specifically submission based. If a campaign is submitted by multiple companies in the same category, the submissions will be scored independently and only the highest scoring submission will be eligible to win.
- The Best in Show will be awarded to the best campaign in the entire show, selected from among all the category winners. The campaign that wins Best in Show will be automatically entered into the relevant US MIXX Awards category at no charge to the entrant.
- There is no entry requirement for Best in Show category,the judging panel will select an overall winner from one of the category winners.
- A minimum of three entries must be received into any single category for the category to be deemed robust enough to judge. Should a category not receive at least three entries, it will not be judged and no award will be presented on the presentation evening. In such a case, entry fees will be refunded to the entrant.
