The ROI of Advertising Industry Award Shows

Within the advertising industry, the pursuit of creative excellence has been celebrated on award show stages since at least the 1950s. Far from just ceremonies, these bustling events have always been an important hub where innovation is celebrated, benchmarks are set, and the trajectory of the industry is shaped; but nowadays, when that’s often paired with high entry fees, confusing categories, and lengthy application processes, what really makes advertising awards worth it for a participant company?

Emma Wilkie has witnessed the evolution from within. An expert in advertising industry awards and creative excellence, she’s co-director of The Immortal Awards and former publisher of The Gunn Report – a retirement project started by Leo Burnett legend, Donald Gunn – which she helped transform into a globally recognised authority and benchmark for best in class advertising.

Little Black Book sits down with Emma for an insider’s advice. She sheds light on the benefits of advertising award shows for the industry as a whole, as well as the return on investment they can offer participants in the form of client acquisition, career opportunities, and creative inspiration, all while remaining candid about the barriers that get in the way.

For a history of advertising industry award shows and tips on how to enter, check out ‘The LBB Insider’s Guide To Advertising Awards 2024.’ If you want to learn more about LBB membership in order to enter the Immortal Awards click here or buy membership here.

LBB> From the early ‘00s, starting at The Gunn Report and now at The Immortal Awards, you’ve dedicated your career to recognising creative excellence in the advertising industry. What’s changed in the way we celebrate creativity across that time?

Emma Wilkie> When The Gunn Report started in 1999, it was a very simple idea of combining lists from the important local, regional, and global award shows in order to identify and showcase the best creative advertising. Back then, traditional media still ruled the day, so the main product of The Gunn Report was The Showreel of the Year, which was a collection of the 100 best commercials from around the world. 

The biggest change since then is that technology has moved on and categories have multiplied enormously. Thanks to new technology, there are a million and one different ways of reaching the consumer through advertising, and that has to be recognised and reflected in the industry’s award shows. There are far more categories in which to be recognised. 

The number of rankings has also proliferated. The Gunn Report started its rankings purely as a byproduct of the research we were doing, as we published its results just to share it with the industry. Over the years, however, rankings have taken on their own significance and there are now multiple done by the industry, the main ones still being the WARC Rankings (the new name for The Gunn Report).

LBB> The industry has long had a legacy of advertising awards, with Cannes Lions (then International Advertising Film Festival) first hosted in 1954. Why? How does this culture of evaluating and celebrating its own work benefit the industry as a whole?

Emma> The truth is that every industry from hairdressing to house building celebrates the most successful people and companies who are doing the best work - so advertising is actually no different in that respect. Every industry has its own award shows as they set the standard for the year ahead, and introduce groundbreaking ideas that can then move the whole industry forward. The benefit is that the industry can then point to it and say, "right, this is the benchmark. We now have to take the industry forward from this point."

LBB> Despite this, many companies hold back from entering advertising award shows. What’s putting them off making the investment? 

Emma> In a lot of cases it simply is the budget. Participation is expensive and time-consuming, especially when you have to pay per entry and subcategories number in the hundreds. Big networks have the funds and manpower to enter at volume - some even employ people specifically to understand awards categories and work out where the best chances of winning are; a smaller company may not have the kinds of budgets to pay for multiple entries, let alone hire a dedicated awards person. That's part of the reason why The Immortal Awards is levelling the playing field by being free to enter for Little Black Book members, and limiting companies to five entries. 

We also have to look at the standard of work seen in advertising industry award shows. I think in a lot of cases, people will see it and think, "actually, the work we're producing on a day-to-day basis doesn't reach this threshold, so what’s the point of entering?" They can recognise they’re doing the work they need to do for a client, but it may not be moving the industry forward in terms of its creative concepts. That’s the key difference between good work, and work that’s good enough to win awards.

We address that at The Immortal Awards by making sure no entry goes to waste. Each one gets recognised and scored, which feeds into a company’s placement on our League Table of Creativity, a transparent ranking of the world’s most creative companies within Little Black Book's members network. This serves as an indicator of the health of a company's creativity, and allows companies to show where they’re at in the industry against their peers, with individual rankings for networks, agencies, production companies, post production, sound, editing, etc.

Some companies may also produce work that needs to be assessed by people who understand its context. With The Immortal Awards, we’ve responded by judging in a different way. We begin locally, with a jury from the same market as the work, as we think it's very important that cultural nuances are taken into account. Then a piece of work goes to the regional jury and through to the global jury, granting companies many more opportunities to actually get their work recognised and appreciated in its original context. For many years, the perception was that the US and UK were very much leading the way in creative advertising, but look at The Immortal Awards 2023: we had entrant companies from 55 different countries and out of the 12 Immortals and Commendations, we had work from Australia, Canada, Chile, Colombia, France, New Zealand, the UK, and the US.

The London International Awards (LIA) similarly strives to ensure work is judged fairly with diverse perspectives by inviting representation from across regions, companies, networks, holding companies, independent companies, and clients - no two jurors on the same panel are allowed to be from the same company or network. It also promotes full transparency by granting press, global excellence teams and young creatives (mentees involved in its Creative LIAisons program) access into the jury rooms for observation during judging.

LBB> In the face of that, what are some of the returns an individual company can still get from investing in entering advertising award shows in order to justify it?

Emma> The justification is that it's good for business. Recognition on a respected, often global stage can generate new client activation, it can motivate their existing clients to get more engaged, it can lead to new clients who've seen the work they've been doing. And for the individuals involved, it can accelerate a promotion or give them a new career opportunity elsewhere.

Fame is the biggest driver of business - that’s a proven marketing concept. So the more fame you can gather, the better your business is going to be, not only in terms of what you're advertising, but also for the people who are making the advertising.

LBB> And what about the benefits of the ceremonies themselves - why should a company attend?

Emma> There’s the benefit of being in the room and seeing the reaction to your work. It always gets discussed in great detail - either positively or negatively - and not everybody agrees with the juries, so there's always a good conversation to be had.

Networking is also an important part of it. Ceremonies are a wonderful opportunity to get people together, especially if you're a part of a global company with regional offices as you might not see each other in your day to day work. It’s an important opportunity to swap ideas about what's going on - what may be going on in Latin America could be very different to what's going on in Asia, North America, or Australia.

A number of award shows also involve a whole festival of events. Cannes Lions, ADFEST in Asia, D&AD in London, and The One Show in New York all have festivals around the awards where people can get inspired. It helps you understand what’s gone before, and what should come next. It also gives you a chance to put yourself on the radar of journalists who can help platform you and grow your fame - the biggest driver of business.

In the case of Cannes, you’ve also got a lot of brands going. P&G was the first big company to go and has since been swiftly followed by others including Unilever and Diageo. Now tech platforms have come along too, like TikTok. It's where a lot of business gets done and important conversations are had, and hopefully we'll see the results of that in the next round of amazing creative work. You’ve also got the beaches, where a lot of people from production and post companies who aren’t going to the festival itself still come to network and celebrate.

LBB> Over your career, have any campaigns or companies stood out to you that have seen a notable ROI from their awards entries?

Emma> There are many outstanding individual campaigns I've admired over the years - you only have to look at the collections reels on Little Black Book to see that Guinness and Apple have consistently produced incredible award-winning work, and we know that that has tangible business results. Other brands that spring to mind are companies like Nike, Volkswagen, Sony, Burger King, and IKEA. Awards help the agencies and their clients to move their businesses forward.

There are also several agencies with a legacy of a very high benchmark internally for the work they produce. In the current crop you've got a lot of new independent agencies, like GUT or more established independents like Wieden+Kennedy, who traditionally have always been excellent. One feeds the other: they produce a lot of award-winning work, get a reputation for shaping their industry, and show their potential client base that top tier creativity is their priority. Or take Droga5. Talent attracts talent, and if you're producing the best work, the best people want to work with you, which is  self-perpetuating, and you become the benchmark that people aspire to.

LBB> And finally, what advice would you offer participant companies when it comes to awards season? What work do award shows want to see?`

Emma> What I would suggest, especially to those small businesses that struggle with entry fees, is not only to choose your projects wisely, but also to test it out locally first. Test it out in your local award show, see if it gets traction, and if it does, move onto a regional show before you start investing in global shows. See whether your work resonates. It needs to be a genuinely fresh idea that is going to grab the attention of a jury that sees huge volumes of work, so it's got to stand out. Make sure you also understand the categories and identify which ones will be most relevant for your campaign. 

At the end of the day, though, award shows want to celebrate work that moves the industry forward, and that can achieve the kind of fame that grows a client's business. That's the bottom line, and that's the work awards shows want to see and want to celebrate.