September 9, 2022
‘The Ones Who… Keep Walking’ campaign wins this year’s Grand Prix
The 2022 World Media Awards Ceremony last night was shadowed by the sad news of the death of Her Majesty The Queen. WMG President Damian Douglas began the event by offering condolences on behalf of the World Media Group and invited the audience to take part in a minute’s silence to reflect on the news.
Despite the difficult circumstances, we felt it was important to celebrate the amazing work of all our finalists, and we are pleased to announce Johnnie Walker as the Grand Prix winner of the 2022 World Media Awards.
The awards, supported by Smartology this year, are the only global awards to recognise brands, agencies and media partners who, together, create the most effective cross platform, cross border, content-driven advertising campaigns.
Brands including Accenture, Citi, De Beers, Forbes, Hyundai, Lombard Odier, Mærsk, Reuters, Samsung / Samsung Galaxy, Sony Pictures Entertainment, Visit Sweden and Volkswagen were amongst those receiving accolades for their impressive category entries this year during the awards celebration at the Ham Yard Hotel in London.
The Grand Prix-winning campaign from Johnnie Walker, which also won the Luxury & Lifestyle category, was built around a feature documentary directed by Amarachi Nwosu, which sets out to explore what the spirit of Keep Walking means for creative and change makers in Africa. The film features more than 20 defiantly optimistic voices from the artists, designers and musicians shaping the cultural scene in Africa today. It delivers an insight into how fresh creative energy, sheer determination, and a pioneering spirit is bringing authentic African expression to the world.
“Despite a raft of strong contenders, the judges were unanimous when it came to voting for the Grand Prix. This disruptive campaign demonstrates the power of storytelling through content-driven advertising in the right media environment,” said Belinda Barker, Chief Executive of the World Media Group. “It uses storytelling to reimagine how we see Africa and the creative renaissance taking place there, highlighting those who embody the spirit of Keep Walking by igniting collective progress across Africa.”
A panel of 37 senior jurors from leading international advertisers, agencies and publishers co-chaired by Hamish Goulding, Head of Global Brand Strategy for HSBC and Ritu Lakhanpal, Managing Partner, IPG MEDIA BRAND, were tasked with selecting winners from the many global submissions. The full list of judges can be seen here.
The full case studies for this year’s winning entries, along with the winners of previous years, are available to read in the World Media Group’s Creative Vault here.
The winners of the World Media Awards 2022 are as follows:
AUTOMOTIVE Winner – The New Polo Challenger Series: Conquering New Stadiums Judges’ comments: The campaign addresses the issue of ad-blocking by its target market by going to where the younger audience is concentrated; the product is at the heart of the campaign. CORPORATE INFLUENCER Winner – The Upside Of Integrated Logistics Judges’ comments: A creative use of media, beautifully integrated with an elegant internal and external application. The campaign demonstrates humour in a potentially dry category and achieves excellent results. FINANCIAL SERVICES Winner – Revealing The Unexpected Value Of Nature Judges’ comments: A nice concept brought to life making the financial services category beautiful and interesting. The campaign stands out in the sea of the sameness; the choice of media highlighted the campaign and delivered results. Highly Commended – Treasury & Turbulence – Sanctions: The Makers & The Breakers Judges’ comments: This campaign creates emerging content for a niche audience but transferable to others and leveraged audio as distribution strategy. LUXURY & LIFESTYLE Winner – The Ones Who… Keep Walking Judges’ comments: A meaningful and disruptive campaign; a smart way to navigate regularity challenges and a strong brand alignment. MEDIA & ENTERTAINMENT Winner – The Source Judges’ comments: A highly competitive strategy. A strong sense of authenticity, a smart media mix based on strategy, using simple visuals, propelling the brand into the future. Highly Commended – Spider-Man Swings To Global Success TECHNOLOGY & TELECOMS Winner – The Phone Of The Year Captures The Man Of The Year Judges’ comments: Smart integration of premium editorial and premium commercial strategy; strong distribution across all platforms. Highly Commended – Creating Sustainably Judges’ comments: They found a unique angle to launch the campaign. A robust audience strategy as the backbone of the campaign and smart use of targeting. TRAVEL & TOURISM Winner – Discover The Originals Judges’ comments: A clever device that made people engage, comment and amplify the campaign, and possibly add Sweden to the bucket list! A real crowd pleaser and perfectly on brand. GRAND PRIX Winner – The Ones Who… Keep Walking Brand: Johnnie Walker SPECIAL CATEGORIES: BRAND & MEDIA OWNER PARTNERSHIP Winner – Okavango Eternal Highly Commended – Accenture Exchange Series And Partner Content Judges’ comments: A thoughtful insight-led, multiplatform strategy with longevity. SOCIAL GOOD Winner – Journey To Ithaca Judges’ comments: A well-considered, well-executed campaign that generated a genuine positive and demonstratable impact for Hyundai and Ithaca. The project paves the standard for sustainable short-form content production at the BBC. Highly Commended – State Of Black Entrepreneurship Judges’ comments: The project is highly commended for its ambition to rewrite history through the use of media today and going forwards. RISING STAR Winner – Ella Solomon Judges’ comments: Ella really impressed us with her entrepreneurial and sustainable efforts. She behaves as a leader in her agency and community. As such, we are keen to see where this takes her and expect Ella to help our industry progress on her net zero agenda. Highly Commended – Aimee Carpenter Cristina Correa POLITICO Europe Georgina Marshall Judges’ comments: All highly competent and an asset to their organisations. We fully expect to hear more about all over the next few years. CONTENT LEADERSHIP & INNOVATION This award is for the individual recognised by peers for their talent in creating exemplary content-driven campaigns with brand bravery, creativity and innovation. Winner – Khaled AlShehhi, Executive Director of Marketing and Communication for the UAE Government Media Office |
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About The World Media Group – Championing International Trusted Journalism
The World Media Group is an alliance of leading global media organisations united in providing trusted and renowned journalism. Its members include The Atlantic, BBC Global News, Bloomberg Media, The Economist, Forbes, Fortune, Insider, National Geographic, Politico Europe, Reuters, The New York Times Company, The Smithsonian, TIME, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, and associate member Euromoney, and partners Permutive and Smartology. To find out more about the World Media Group, please visit www.world-media-group.com.