Australian agencies Grey Melbourne and independent shop Belgiovane Williams Mackey both won golds, for ‘Rabbits’ for Telstra and ‘Wipe off 5, save lives’ for the Transport Accident Commission, respectively.
Ogilvy Hong Kong, for its ‘Burning one calorie is unbelievably easy’ campaign for Coca-Cola, and Saatchi & Saatchi China for ‘My inspiration, my libang’ initiative for Nippon Paint, were the leading lights for Ogilvy and Saatchis. DDB and Grey were the next most-awarded networks, with two Effies apiece.
DDB Singapore aside, Naga DDB won a bronze for ‘Viva loves you’ for Perodua Sales, while Grey Bangladesh added silver to Grey Melbourne’s gold, with ‘Lost in translation’ for Nokia.
Of the most-awarded countries, India nabbed three bronzes, while Singapore won a gold and a bronze. Japan, New Zealand and Taiwan also ran out winners.
The event drew 150 campaign entries - not as many as the Effies might have expected - from 18 countries. Around 1,300 delegates attended to hear speakers including Shelly Lazarus, the worldwide chairman and CEO of Ogilvy & Mather; Simon Clift, the global chief marketing officer of Uni-lever; and president and CEO of TBWA Worldwide Jean-Marie Dru. Clift spoke of the importance of taking risks, pointing out that the world’s largest advertiser had changed more in the past three years than it had in the last 30. “Courting controversy is a new discipline for Uni-lever,” he said, referring to Dove’s ‘Campaign for real beauty’, which uses regular women instead of models in its advertising. “Avoiding risk is probably the most dangerous strategy if you want your marketing to be effective.”
Unilever recently restructured to give its global brand directors more power to sanction advertising without interference from above. “There is no great idea that someone senior hasn’t tried to kill,” said Clift. “So we removed the layers of people most likely to say ‘no’.”
In a speech on the decline in repetitive advertising, Dru pressed home the importance of constant reinvention by marketers. Only “disruptive, big ideas” will win through, he said, citing his agency’s work for Pedigree, adidas and Sony Playstation. Simplicity is critical, too. “There is a fear that if an idea is simple, it might be empty,” Dru added, insisting that loud proclamations by brands are increasingly ignored by consumers.
Dominic Proctor, worldwide CEO of MindShare, said that media agencies are having to change in order to stay relevant. “We are now employing musicians and producers, not just media planners and buyers,” he said. “We have become content creators overnight, and, in a sense, we are going back to the future - to the days of soap operas.”
