Finalists announced for the 2015 Annual AdFocus Awards

Finalists

Fourteen awards will be presented.

Agency Awards:

• Overall Agency of the Year (from any agency category)
  
• Small Advertising Agency of the Year
  
• Medium Advertising Agency of the Year
  
• Large Advertising Agency of the Year
  
• Media Agency of the Year
  
• Branding and Design Agency of the Year
  
• Digital Agency of the Year
  
• Specialist Agency of the Year
  
• African Agency Network of the Year

Individual Awards:

• Partnership of the Year
  
• Lifetime Achievement Award
  
• Industry Leader of the Year
  
• New Broom Award
  
• Student of the Year

The former Advertising Agency of the Year has been split into three categories: small, medium and large; and the Agencies' Agency of the Year incorporated into a new award, for overall Agency of the Year. The winner of this award will be decided jointly by the AdFocus jury and by agency votes.

Small Advertising Agency:

• FoxP2 Johannesburg
• House of Brave
• King James The Second
• OpenCo

Medium Advertising Agency

• 34
• Havas
• Promise Brand Specialists
• Shift Joe Public
• Y&R Cape Town

Large Advertising Agency

• TBWA
• Y&R Johannesburg
• Ogilvy & Mather
• M&C Saatchi Abel
• King James Group
• Joe Public
• FCB Joburg

Specialist Agency

• Playmakers
• Hot Dogz Marketing (HDI Youth Marketeers)
• Burson Marsteller Holdings
• Narrative
• Atmosphere Communication

Digital Agency

• Hellocomputer
• Native
• Gloo@Ogilvy

Branding & Design

• Black Africa Group
• Grid WorldWide
• Interbrand
• Shift Joe Public
• Jupiter Drawing Room Cape Town

Media Agency

• Connect (an M&C Saatchi Company)
• HAVAS Media South Africa (Pty) Limited
• Initiative Media South Africa
• MediaCom South Africa
• MEC Group
• Mindshare
• OMD South Africa
• The MediaShop
• Vizeum South Africa

African Agency Network of the Year

• Burson-Marsteller Africa
• Dentsu Aegis Network
• Ogilvy & Mather Africa
• Publicis Africa Group
• TBWA

Partnership of the Year

• FCB SA
• Hardy Boys
• HAVAS Worldwide
• Jupiter Drawing Room (Johannesburg)
• Mediacom

Student of the Year

• Sarah Mitchell, Vega Durban
• Kirsten Bennett, Red & Yellow
• Megan Brits, Stellenbosch Design Academy

The agency awards were scored on new business, business retention, client relationships, awards, industry recognition and transformation. The judging process, in which jurors score in secret, was audited by Deloitte.

The jury chairman is Festus Masekwameng, managing partner of MKT Media and former chairman of the Loerie Awards.

Other members of the main jury:

• Prof Nicola Kleyn - Dean, Gordon Institute of Business Science
  
• Gary Leih - CEO, OFyt
  
• Denford Magora - CEO, The Jupiter Drawing Room (Zimbabwe) & Partner
  
• Zibusiso Mkhwanazi - CEO, Avatar
  
• Jerry Mpufane - Group MD, M&C Saatchi Abel
  
• Julian Neuberger - CEO, Mediacom SA
  
• Emmet O'Hanlon - CEO, DDB SA
  
• Craig Page-Lee - MD, Posterscope SA
  
• Vanessa Pearson - ECD, House of Brave
  
• Richard Procter - Joint MD, Vizeum SA
  
• Thulani Sibeko - Managing executive, group marketing, communications and corporate affairs, Nedbank
  
• Patrick Conroy - MD, eNCA
  
• The Media and student awards were judged by member of the main jury as well as specialist jurors.

The editorial theme of this year's Annual AdFocus publication is the growing importance of integration and collaboration in advertising and communications.