Last night the winners of the 2016 NZ Direct Marketing Awards were unveiled in The Great Room at The Langham. Close to 600 guests celebrated the campaigns that epitomised the Natural-Born Communicators. Air New Zealand (agencies FCB & True), and Foodstuffs (justONE) proved to be the champions of the night, taking out the top awards – the Grand Prix and the Nexus Supreme, respectively.
The judges applauded Air New Zealand’s game engagement, strong connection to sales, social metrics and evidence of results in their Great Mates campaign. They said it was a relentlessly on-brand programme that leveraged assets from across the business to deliver an effective cut-price competitive response without devaluing the brand. And it delivered a great return on investment.
Following their success as the Direct Marketing Organisation of the Year at the 2015 awards, Foodstuffs impressed the judges with their demonstration of a clear and strong strategic vision to create their own loyalty programme that took out the Supreme Nexus Award.
The judges acknowledged this as a large and very complex undertaking which was well-executed and which delivered excellent results with strong customer uptake and engagement.
This year it was Countdown’s time to shine, taking out the coveted Keith Norris Direct Marketing Organisation of the Year Award. The judges rated this an excellent entry that demonstrated the direct programme being at the heart of the organisation and a key strategic asset. “What is really impressive,” they said, “is the value data insights have had in not just driving communication but better business decisions that further deliver results.”
Michael Summers-Gervai, head of customer analytics at Genesis Energy, was awarded the Direct Marketer of the Year accolade.
“Michael is a self-confessed entrepreneur evangelist; who is extremely passionate about enabling a genuine customer-centric view,” said the judges. “He has delivered through a real commitment to the principle of data-driven marketing and applying customer insights across the whole business and has taken both management and the staff on this journey, while leading and influencing the required changes within the organisation to create tangible value.”
Other big winners on the night were FCB with 21 awards, justONE with 18 awards (10 of these with client AMP and four with Foodstuffs), and Colenso BBDO/Proximity who celebrated a total of 18 wins.
Chemistry Interaction shared 10 of their 16 awards with client Sovereign Insurance, while SpeakData and New Zealand Cricket proved a winning combination with seven shared wins. Similarly successful was Done By Friday with Gareth Morgan Investments.
The premier awards sponsor was New Zealand Post; ad category sponsors were Done by Friday, Orangebox, GrownUps, Mosh Social Media, Harmoney, iStock by Getty Images, Eight Loop Social and New Zealand Post.
- The full list of 2016 winners can be found here
- Photos from last night at www.facebook.com/MarketingAssocNZ
- www.nzdmawards.co.nz
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