WARC Awards for Effectiveness 2023 adds five new categories

The WARC Awards for Effectiveness 2023, in association with Lions, are launched with five new categories.

Senior marketing leaders from Asahi, De Beers, Haleon, L'Oréal, McDonald’s, Salesforce and Unilever have been appointed as jury chairs.

A global marketing effectiveness benchmark, the Awards are judged using the Creative Effectiveness Ladder and the B2B Effectiveness Ladder – frameworks for planning effective marketing communications to drive specific Business-to-Consumer and Business-to-Business outcomes.

Particular to these awards, every shortlisted and winning entry will receive feedback on how they’ve performed on the relevant Ladder to help drive future success.

The juries will also follow the guidelines of the Unstereotype Alliance, which champions inclusive, empowering and forward-thinking ideas, in order to help identify any damaging content.

And new to this year, entrants can opt to include campaign sustainability actions in their submission as the industry comes together to tackle the climate crisis, although it’s not required for judging purposes.

The jury chairs and categories

• Wendy Walker, VP Marketing Asia, Salesforce, will chair the Business-to-Business category, awarding effective campaigns from one business targeting another.
• Jennifer Healan, VP, US Marketing, Brand Content and Engagement, McDonald’s, is appointed chair of both the Customer Experience category, honouring new ways of engaging with consumers and innovative experiences created to connect and immerse on the path to commercial success, and the Cultural Impact category, rewarding strategies and instances of brands entering or impacting on the culture that can demonstrate a business outcome.
• Chiradeep Gupta, VP, Personal Care Head of Media and Global Integrated Media Strategy Lead, Unilever, is chair of the Brand Purpose category, awarding marketing initiatives that have successfully embraced a brand purpose and achieved commercial success as well as benefit for the wider community.
• Vasileios Kourakis, Global Director, Marketing effectiveness (ROI) and Media, Consumer Products Division, L'Oreal, will lead both the Long-Term Growth category, awarding campaigns that have invested in building a brand over time (12 months or more), and the Instant Impact category, awarding short-term campaigns (with a duration of six months or less) that led directly to a sales increase.
• Beatrice Boue, Global Head of Media, De Beers, will chair two categories: Use of Data (new), recognising the role of data in an effective communications strategy, and Channel Pioneer (new), rewarding pioneering media practices, including the leveraging of emerging platforms, innovative uses of existing media, and efforts to invest in a conscious approach to media.
• Simon Peel, VP Global Media, Haleon, will preside over the Partnerships and Sponsorships (new) category, recognising how collaborations with third parties, including native advertising, sponsorships and influencer marketing, have helped brands meet business goals.
• Ross Sergeant, Global Head of Media and Touchpoints, Asahi Europe and International, will lead the Best Path-to-Purchase (new) category, honouring how brands have used omnichannel strategies to optimise the customer journey across the funnel, and the Channel Integration (new) category, rewarding entries that can show how sophisticated communications architecture and cross-channel planning have helped to boost campaign effectiveness.

For each category, the juries will award Grand Prix, Gold, Silver and Bronze accolades. Entries will be accepted until 29 March 2023. The winners will be announced at Cannes Lions in June.

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