Could you be B&T Agency of the Year? Heather Jacobs
Has your agency had its best year ever? Have you won $80m in new business, hired great new staff and rolled out a number of globally applauded advertising campaigns using up to 45 channels wisely and effectively? Are you the envy of every other agency in Australia? Or have you turned your agency from a struggling enterprise that couldn't win a trick to the hottest place in town? Great, then you could be B&T's 2006 Agency of the Year.
In our official call for entries this year we've made a few changes. Firstly, we've brought the deadline forward slightly to Wednesday October 25.
The first round of judging is on October 27, so the October 25 deadline cannot be extended.
We'll announce the shortlist in B&T and on bandt.com.au on Friday November 3, and from there we'll call on our external judging panel consisting of 10 marketers and international creatives.
Winners will be announced on Friday December 1 in a special event at the gorgeous QVB Tea Room, so block out the date in your Christmas-party-filled diary. This is the first time B&T has held an event for Agency of the Year, and we thought it was time to give this very auspicious event some of the ceremony it deserves. Only 200 tickets will be available.
Profiles on the winning agencies, examples of work and judges' comments will be included in a 36-page supplement to be handed out at the event, and included in the December 8 issue of B&T.
There are 12 categories to enter as listed: Agency of the Year, Most Creative Agency, New Zealand Agency of the Year, Victoria, NSW, Other States, Media, Digital, Direct Marketing, Emerging Agency of the Year, Campaign of the Year, and B&T's Personality of the Year.
Entry applications are limited to one A4 page. It doesn't sound like much room, but being creative in a limited space is another way of proving you're just the thing. Most agencies used both sides and tiny type (one submitted a magnifying glass) and last year BMF won loads of brownie points for its great client testimonials.
Agencies submitting more than one page upset the marketers and were dismissed for not following the brief. Tough love!
Another thing coming out of last year's judging was how difficult it was to judge the work in isolation, that is, watching a TV reel, followed by a radio reel and then jumping onto the laptop to see the interactive work. I suspect the international judges concentrated on the TV reel and in the age of integration, this just won't do.
So, we've decided to dump the integrated category and ask every agency to enter their best five campaigns showing how they worked over the different channels. This means you only need to create one reel (we'll need four copies). Just think of it as entering this year's Titanium awards at Cannes before they decided integrated campaigns are merely state-of-the-art advertising and they were really after the Japanese take on the humble barcode.
Entry details will be posted on bandt.com.au and in the magazine. Meanwhile, good luck and may the best agency win.
