The Gemas Effies 2010

This year’s entries were fairly balanced. Some of the categories had very strong, result driven entries which harnessed solid strategy unfolded via creative executions. On the other hand some categories were hugely disappointing – and we were reluctant to honor the entries in those.

The successful and awarded entries were clearly the ones which had relevant insights, specially local insights – something special that the brand and the agencies picked up and worked with – and reaped the results in the market place. Today’s informed consumer recognizes a good product and resonates to a good campaign built around solid consumer insight. The winning entries reflected this.

Overall, this year, we saw a huge paradigm shift in consumer engagement. The most successful entries were (not surprisingly) ones that used the power of 360° engagement – and most often digital engagement played a key role in those campaigns. With today’s consumer ever increasingly being engaged, entertained and empowered by brands in the digital and social domains, it wasn’t at all surprising to see some of the winning entries being pivoted around where today’s consumer is playing – in the digital and social fields. (Clever) Local insight combined with 360° engagement – with an emphasis and a nod to digital – that’s what 2010 has been about.