Take one for the team: The Agency of the Year Awards happens tonight

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By Rome Jorge

Few awards recognize ensemble efforts. But those that do are often the ones most cherished. They recognize the collective effort necessary in any success. Such awards bring teams and companies together instead of pitting them against one another as internal rivals. They are nothing less celebrations of esprit de corp. Truly, victory has many fathers and mothers, even titos and titas.

Such an award is Agency of the Year (AOY). This year’s AOY awarding happens tonight at the Makati Shangri-La Hotel. Find out which agency celebrates collective creative and marketing genius, diligence, cooperation, and camaraderie. True to its slogan, it is the award that really matters.

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Be there. Or don’t. adobo magazine will be reporting on location live online at the awards night as well as publishing it on our print magazine, giving everyone both immediate and insightful coverage of this year’s AOY.

The AOY is annually presented by the Association of Accredited Advertising Agencies-Philippines (4As-P) that promotes understanding and cooperation between advertising sectors as well as ethical business practices with the welfare of the entire advertising industry and the entire consuming public in mind.

Categories

Agency Of The Year Awards

Best In Management Of Business

Best In Market Performance

Best In Creative

Best In Industry Leadership & Community Service

Independent Agency Of The Year

Media Excellence Award

Best In Media Creativity

Best In Management Of Business

Production Excellence Award

Production Excellence Award For Film
Production Excellence Award For
Post Production Excellence Award For Audio

Digital Excellence Award

Best In Creative & Effectiveness
Best In Media

Best In Production

Activation Excellence Award

Best In Creative & Effectiveness
Best In Execution Excellence

Higher standards

This year, the AOY announced that it was no longer enough just to be the best among one’s peers for the year. Agencies competing for the awards have surpass the AOY award’s exacting standards. It stated: “To maintain the high level of excellence established by the 4As Agency of the Year Awards Show, a minimum score of 80 will be required to announce a category winner. In cases that no score meets that said mark, no winner will be announced for the said category.”

Furthermore, it announced, that client certification will be required for entries in the following categories: creative, market performance, and industry leadership and community service in media, digital, and activation. Eligibility in all categories is confined to agencies who are duly accredited members of 4As and in good standing.

Criteria

For the Agency of Year categories, the criteria are:

40% creative. “Outstanding creative achievements based on the quality of creative ideas across media vehicles as demonstrated by an agency’s body of work regardless of agency size or industry stature.”
25% management of business. “An agency group truly deserving to be a model of excellence to the rest of the industry is not merely a creative shop. Like any business organization, management excellence is intrinsic to its success. This award recognizes the agency that not only applied creativity to advertising materials, but went as far as utilizing creativity to achieve excellence in management of organization and its financial resource of people, of systems and of total agency services.” (Of the 25% for management of business, 30% is for growth strategy, 50% is for fiscal management, and 20% is for people development & management.)
25% market performance. “This award celebrates the agency that delivers unique solutions, powerful insights, and exceptional communications campaigns to solve challenging marketing problems.”
10% industry leadership & community service. “This award recognizes the agency that has contributed to the life, preservation and development of the industry through active leadership and significant participation in the industry’s goals and visions and concerns that affect it.”

For the Independent Agency Of The Year category, an independent agency is defined “as an advertising agency without any multinational network affiliation. It should not be owned by a multinational advertising or media agency network, whether in part or in whole, or controlled via a majority-stake.” The independent Agency of the Year is judged on four categories:

40% Best in Creative
25% Best in Management of Business
25% Best in Market Performance
10% Best in Industry Leadership & Community Service

For the Media Excellence Award categories, the criteria are:

The winner of the Media Excellence award will be judged based on two categories:

50% Best in Management of Business
50% Best in Media Creativity

There will be a winner per category of the Media Excellence Award. Each category will be given a score ranging from 75-100. To be eligible for the Media Excellence Award, an agency:

Must have entries in both categories
Be a category winner

Garner the highest aggregate score

The criteria for the Production Excellence Award categories are:

70% quality of work. This is in recognition of the production houses which best displayed excellence in execution when producing and crafting work within their respective field of expertise: Film, Audio and Post Production.

30% management of business. More than just suppliers that execute, production houses are looked at as business partners by agencies. They don’t just make ideas happen, they help in making business grow. How a production house manages its business is indicative of its excellence. This is in recognition of the production house that best managed the growth and development of its organization, its people, its technology and its services to agencies/clients. (Of the 25% for management of business, 50% is for personnel management and development, and 50% is for technology management and development.)

The Digital Excellence Award, “given to the digital agency or department who has best used the opportunities presented by the ever-changing consumer environment using digital means to deliver innovative solutions in the areas of creative, media and production that result in customer engagement for their clients, as well as quantifiable results directly related to their client’s business objectives,” has the following criteria:

20% strategy
40% creativity
40% effectiveness and results

The Activation Excellence Award is “given to the activation agency or department which delivered the best interactions between the brand and its consumers through live experiences engaging physical participation in the areas of creative and execution with measurable business results directly related to their client’s business objectives.”

For the Best In Creative & Effectiveness, the criteria are: