MediaCom North is celebrating after winning big at the prestigious Festival of Media Awards in Rome earlier this week. The agency beat leading media agencies and brands from around the globe to scoop the coveted Campaign of the Year award for its ‘Missing Type’ campaign with NHS Blood & Transplant.
Created by MediaCom North’s team in Leeds, the campaign also won two gold awards during a successful evening that saw MediaCom’s global network of agencies scoop a total of six golds along with the Agency Network of the Year Award, eight silver and three bronze awards.
The Festival of Media Awards recognise the very best media campaigns from around the world and are regarded as the leading innovation benchmark for brands and agencies. MediaCom North’s ‘Missing Type’ campaign with NHS Blood & Transplant won gold awards in the Best Communications Strategy and Best-Not-For-Profit Campaign categories.
The campaign ran in August 2016 to encourage people to sign-up as blood donors. Following a decline in blood donors during the last decade, the campaign needed to capture people’s attention across the UK and initiate behaviour change. This was achieved by removing the blood type letters; As, Os and Bs from the names, places and brands people interact with every day.
Simon Price, managing director of MediaCom Leeds, commented: “We needed to overcome the gradual drop off in the number of blood donors over recent years. Therefore, a disruptive campaign was required to immediately drive consumer awareness and action. The campaign strategy was built around building intrigue and creating meaning to motivate donor registrations. This was delivered via a series of national media partnerships and digital and social media executions that generated billions of impacts and resulted in thousands of new donor registrations.
“It’s a real honour to win the awards. The Missing Type campaign was made possible through a combination of strategic insight, creativity and close collaborative working with NHS Blood & Transplant and partner agencies Engine, Mullen Lowe, Carat, 23red and Twentysix to achieve full integration and deliver remarkable success.
“This approach is representative of the values that define MediaCom and the commitments we make to delivering better results for our clients. It is fantastic to see this recognised by renowned marketers.”
The Festival of Media Awards are judged by an innovative, respected and diverse panel of global and regional brand marketers. The final jury was split across two judging rooms, chaired by Sarah Mansfield VP Global Media Europe and Americas, Unilever and Gerry D’Angelo, global media director, P&G.
Stephen Allan, MediaCom’s Worldwide Chairman and CEO, said: “It’s always great to win awards for our clients, but these wins are especially pleasing as they come from across our network. That’s proof that our Systems Thinking philosophy is working. We’re delighted.”
As well as the UK, this year’s Awards saw agency winners from countries including New Zealand, Mexico, Israel, Costa Rica and Norway, Singapore, South Africa and the Dominican Republic.
