January 2, 2019
It’s the start of a brand-new year and I’m sure that like me, people are already asking you if you have any resolutions for the coming year. Though I struggle to stick with my own resolutions (oops!), the new year is a perfect time to pause and evaluate how you communicate your public image, for individuals and companies alike. The World Media Awards’ Corporate Influencer category has led our team and our jurors to identify the particular challenges that corporate and B2B brands have when building and communicating their image for an international audience of government and business leaders, investors and influencers.
One of our esteemed jurors, Johanna Krantz, Commercial Director for the EMEA region at Reuters, has said that she’s looking forward to reading through this year’s entries for the Corporate Influencer category as “they’ll be different to the larger, perhaps more money rich, B2C campaigns we regularly see”. Alison Tyrell, Head of Content (Marketing and Media) at Spark Foundry, explained that “there is very little data and insight on this
audience which makes partnering with the right publishers key.” Alison also admitted that “utilities and banking are not sexy and generally not trusted – this is another major
challenge to overcome in a heavily red-taped industry.” Beyond targeting the correct audience in the most productive manner, Raquel Bubar, Director of T Brand Studio at the NY Times, suggested that even identifying the most effective ROI can be challenging in the corporate sector. As the campaigns are often designed to raise awareness, it can be difficult “when measuring the success of a campaign, as it can’t be linked directly to product sales.”
However, the increased challenges often make for the best and most innovative solutions. We’ve had some great winners in this category in previous years [which you can read in our Hall of Fame] which have demonstrated creative solutions on a tight budget, a deep understanding of the targeted audience, and clear success measures. Do you have a campaign from 2018 that can make some of these claims, or more? Perhaps it was a campaign that promotes an organisational focus on sustainability. Or perhaps the campaign was intended to draw in investors to support a new initiative. Maybe it was designed to build the corporate brand behind the products in an entirely different sector. Or perhaps it was a campaign marketing a business product or service. Whatever it is, we want to see the creative solutions to the challenges that are inherent within B2B and influencer marketing as entries for the World Media Awards 2019.
Both Raquel and Alison have suggestions as to what a truly great corporate influencer campaign should include. On the one hand, Raquel says that corporate brands should focus on “raising awareness of their profile, increasing positive sentiment, telling a unique brand story and taking on a thought leadership position – all of which will make the brand truly stand out from the competition.” She also suggests that she would be interested in seeing “entries that tackle challenging but relevant topics in today’s world.” Alison believes that a winning entry would demonstrate “intelligent data-led solutions to find the audience and deliver value-led marketing.”
We look forward to hearing how your own advertising and communication strategies have overcome the challenges and obstacles in front of them to create campaigns of award-winning potential!
Enter the World Media Awards at www.world-media-group.com/awards by 7 February 2019.