International AME Awards announces 2012 winners

Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, London earns AME Grand Award & AME Regional Platinum Award; Bindu Sethi, chief strategy officer, JWT India was AME Grand Jury member

BestMediaInfo Bureau | Delhi | March 19, 2012

The International AME Awards®, now in its 18th year of honoring The World's Best Work in Advertising and Marketing Effectiveness™, has announced the 2012 competition award winners. The Grand Jury presented the AME Grand Award and AME Regional Platinum Award/Europe to Abbot Mead Vickers BBDO, England. Grey Melbourne, Australia/Asia-Pacific; Lowe & Partners, Columbia/South America; and Proximity Canada/North America were also honored with AME Regional Platinum Awards. All in all, the 2012 AME Grand Jury awarded 11 Gold AME Awards, 15 Silver, and 12 Bronze Awards to entries received from 27 countries worldwide. Social media marketing engagement strategies were a huge trend amongst this year's AME award-winning entries, and companies using engaged participation dominated the winner's circle.

Abbott Mead Vickers BBDO, England earned the coveted AME Grand Award and the AME Regional Platinum Award/Europe with “Sandwich,” for client PepsiCo. The award-winning campaign for Walkers proved that any sandwich is more interesting with Walkers Crisps—including the sleepy village of Sandwich, England. Celebrities turned the small town of 6,800 into Britain's most exciting place to be and generated 350 pieces of coverage across press, TV, and online along the way—a £3.3million advertising equivalent that helped Walkers grow their revenue from the “singles” segment by 26%, beating the target by 11%.

The AME Grand Jury awarded three additional global agencies the AME Regional Platinum Award:

Grey Melbourne, Australia earned the Platinum AME Award/Asia-Pacific for “The Ripple Effect” for the Transport Accident Commission. The campaign uses a real fatal crash and social media to demonstrate how 'Everybody hurts when you speed,' not just the people involved in the accident. Prompted recall of the campaign rose to 83%, one of the highest figures ever recorded. The media launch generated over AUD$1,500,000 worth of free media coverage and was captured on every major TV network.

Lowe & Partners, Colombia became the first South American agency to bring home a Regional Platinum AME Award with “Operation Christmas,” created for Program for the Humanitarian Attention to the Demobilized. To encourage FARC guerillas to come home and re-enter society, anti-guerrilla troops brought Christmas deep into the Colombian jungle… by covering trees with Christmas lights. The messaging resulted in the demobilization of 331 FARC guerrillas—a 30% uplift from the previous year, worth $3.5m to the Colombian government.

Ken Epstein, AME Grand Jury member and senior director of advertising and media for Electronic Arts, USA, was deeply affected by “Operation Christmas,” saying "That was amazing. I had no idea things like this really happened in the world." AME Grand Jury member Tom Sather, director of professional services for Return Path, USA had this to say: “I absolutely love this campaign. It shows the power of advertising and how it can affect society in a positive way.”

Proximity Canada was awarded the AME Platinum Award/North America for “M&M's Find Red” for client M&M's Mars. The agency created a first-of-its-kind, digital treasure hunt challenging Canadians to find the popular M&M's mascot by hiding clues hidden throughout Toronto, on Facebook, YouTube, product packaging, and Google Street View. The prize? A Smart Car (a red one, of course!). Players spent an average of over 19 minutes on the site, and within 30 days there were 8.4 million PR impressions, over 7 million QR Code poster views, and over 225,000 Twitter impressions, for a total of 15.6 million. The campaign also earned an impressive five AME Gold Awards.

“This was a great idea. Great example of extending a campaign in new directions,” commented Ken Epstein, AME Grand Jury member and senior director of advertising and media for Electronic Arts, USA. Grand Juror Filippo Dell'Osso, international planning director, TBWA France commented on “M&M's Find Red,” calling the campaign “A great example of how—when a brand has clarity—opportunism combined with storytelling can serve a brand without the need for a brief.”

The 2012 AME Green Award was earned by Jung von Matt, Germany for “Save as WWF” for client World Wildlife Fund for Nature. The campaign encouraged people around the world to actively reduce their paper consumption by introducing an unprintable file format. The campaign recorded over 200,000 clicks in four weeks on the microsite. The file format has been downloaded by over 61,000 companies and organizations from 183 countries, laying the foundation for sustainable protection and raising awareness of the connection between personal paper consumption and the clearing of primeval forests.

Other award-winning green-themed entries focusing on sustainability and conservation of natural resources include: Critical Mass, USA, earning a Gold AME Award for “The New Car” for NissanLEAF; and DDB Canada/Vancouver, earning an AME Bronze Award for “BC Hydro” for Power Smart.

The 2012 AME Grand Jury awarded a total of 11 Gold AME Awards. Proximity Canada's “M&M's Find Red” for client M&M's Mars took the lead, earning five—the most Golds earned by any country and in any single campaign. Germany tied Canada with five Gold Awards: Kempertrautmann GmbH, Germany earned three AME Gold Awards for Initiative Deutschland findet Euch (“The Missing Child”) for client Initiative Vermisste Kinder (“Missing Children's Initiative”); Jung von Matt was honored with two Gold AME Awards, “Save as WWF” for client WWF, and “Konzertmilch,” for Dortmund Concert Hall. And Definition 6 earned the United States a Gold AME Award for the “Where Will Happiness Strike Next” campaign for client Coke.

AME Grand Jury member Bindu Sethi, JWT India chief strategy officer, referred to Jung von Matt, Germany's “Konzertmilch” as “Simple and fantastic.” And juror Tom Sather, director of professional services for Return Path, USA commented, “This is an absolutely brilliant campaign! I love the science behind the idea and how they used it for their messaging to grab the attention of a completely new audience. The ad slogan was also nothing short of great and the results made it clear that it worked. Bravo!”

The International AME Awards for Advertising and Marketing Effectiveness receives entries from over thirty countries. Since 1993, the competition has honored award winning campaigns that successfully demonstrate groundbreaking solutions to challenging marketing problems.

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