The success was one of three for the Ogilvy group: Ogilvy Africa also repeated as African Advertising Agency Network of the Year and Ogilvy Cape Town and its long-term client Volkswagen SA won the inaugural Partnership of the Year award.
Jeremy Sampson, arguably the most influential personality in South African branding over the last 30 years, became the first non-advertising personality to win the AdFocus Lifetime Achievement Award.
Trillion Dollar wins again
TBWA\Hunt\Lascaris Johannesburg was the first winner of the Chairman's Award for Excellence, a discretionary, non-annual award recognising outstanding achievement. The agency won for its extraordinary Trillion Dollar campaign on behalf of The Zimbabwean newspaper.
All the winners
The 12 awards were presented by Financial Mail editor Barney Mthombothi and AdFocus jury chairman Neil van der Weele.
Two more new annual awards
The other two new annual awards were Newsmaker of the Year and Specialist Agency of the Year. The latter - honouring the best in public relations, experiential, activation, direct marketing and other disciplines - was one of five agency-of-the-year awards. The others were advertising, branding & design, media and digital.
In each case, agencies were honoured for their work over the period July 2009-June 2010. Agencies were judged on four criteria: new business and growth; creative success and industry recognition; business retention and client relationships; and BEE and corporate social responsibility.
Winners were chosen after a rigorous jury process independently audited by Deloitte. Explains Van der Weele: "Our aim was to make the AdFocus awards the most professional in the industry, and to take objectivity and integrity in the judging process to a new level. All entries were discussed by the jury in an open forum before each submission was privately scored by each judge, and then submitted to Deloitte."
AdFocus annual
Profiles of all winners are included in the AdFocus annual, which is available to FM subscribers and through retail outlets this week.
Editor David Furlonger says the editorial theme of this year's AdFocus is "New Frontiers in Advertising": "It explores the lengths to which advertisers go to pursue customers, and reveals how they plan to find new means to get this message across. Soon even sleep may be no protection against advertising."
Other articles include a look at how alcohol producers and their agencies are preparing for a government crackdown on liquor advertising, questions about the quality of radio advertising, a snapshot of plans for 3D advertising in SA, and analysis of how a company responsible for dozens of SA's most popular brands has learned to compete against itself.
AdFocus 2010 also includes regulars such as rankings of top advertisers, best-liked commercials, leading agencies in the various categories, and a full list of local and international award-winners. There is also the annual directory of all agencies taking part in AdFocus.
For more, go to www.adfocus.co.za.
