As mentioned in a previous post, I had the great honor of being asked to join the jury for the Asia Marketing Effectiveness Awards 2011 – a unique opportunity to check the barometer on what the marketing world believes to be the highlights of effectiveness from the last twelve months and to participate in the awarding of the Asian Effies!
Aside from being shocked by the sheer number of entrants (twice as many as last year) and just how long the judging process takes (I personally had over a hundred entries, and each took around twenty minutes to evaluate) – I learnt many things, saw many fabulous pieces of work, and had the pleasure of enjoying the AME festival in Shanghai this week. Here are my key learnings from the process:
Agencies don’t really get ROI.
Only a handful of entries even bothered to quote ROI, and of those that did, only one actually calculated it correctly. Many looked at a sales uplift, divided by the cost of the campaign, as the ROI (“incremental sales of five million, versus costs of one million – that’s an ROI of 500%). No, it isn’t. There may be many measures of effectiveness, but only one ROI. That is, the profit returned by an investment.
The value of “The Idea” part one
When it works, it really works. The magical ability to take data, and insight, and then make the creative leap to something which really connects with people and motivates action is alive and well in Asia. Thank the lord for that.
The value of “The Idea”, part two
It appears that many agencies muddle up “The Idea” with “an idea”. Deciding to put the brand on Facebook is the latter, not the former.
Nobody is thinking about the shopper
A little parochial perhaps, but very little reference at all was made to the shopper, or to shopper marketing. Even in “best use of packaging” very few entries commented on, or showed pictures of, the packaging where it arguably has to work hardest – on the shelf.
There is no common understanding of what effectiveness really is
This was a massive learning. Even in the judges’ room, there was big debate about what effectiveness was, and whether a campaign that delivered great results but was not “creatively brilliant” could be judged as a gold winner in a marketing effectiveness campaign. One judge was heard saying that “Effectiveness could be taken for granted”; I think suggesting that if it was “brilliant creative” we as judges should assume it would be effective. I’m afraid not. Some entries made a pretty good job of evaluating their activities; others didn’t.
