The Hindu Business Line : What the ad gurus say

"Clients are not stupid that they cannot differentiate between one-off ads and great campaigns. As far as morale-boosting is concerned, that also helps if the work has been widely acclaimed." _ Piyush Pandey

Piyush Pandey, Chairman, Ogilvy & Mather

Is it important to win awards? Building brands is the cake and awards are the icing, says Josy Paul, Head, David. "They make us look more desirable. They create a buzz and get younger agencies like ours to look more exciting than larger older agencies. They are a great equaliser and maximiser! More importantly, they give you access to a larger parallel club of international players. Recently, I was part of the WPP cadre which brought me in contact with great creative minds. This would not have been possible if we had not won all those One Shows and D&Ads. These meetings inspire you and pushes you to do better," he explains.

Piyush Pandey, Chairman, Ogilvy & Mather, says winning awards is not an objective to woo clients, but one of the measures of an agency's work. "Yes, it does help in winning the confidence of a prospective client if the client has seen that work and appreciated its impact. Clients are not stupid that they cannot differentiate between one-off ads and great campaigns. As far as morale-boosting is concerned, that also helps if the work has been widely acclaimed."

According to Bruce Matchett, Creative Head, JWT, "People in advertising feel good when they win awards and it's pretty depressing if you enter awards and don't get a look in. But is it good for the industry or good for the clients? This is a frequently asked question. Some clients feel good about winning awards as long as it is a by-product rather than the main focus. But what impresses them more is if the ad is effective and is creative enough to win awards."

"But for me the answer is clear. Advertising exists to sell. And great ideas executed well can sell even more. And if they're good enough to enter for into awards and they catch the judges' eye, even better," he adds.

M. G. Parameswaran, Executive Director, FCB Ulka

M.G. Parameswaran, Executive Director, FCB Ulka, however, has a different opinion. He says, "As in any industry, awards are a good morale booster for the team. But having been a client for a significant part of my life, I can say with confidence that clients are not swayed by awards. How do you explain that some of the biggest and most successful ad agencies are not always the big winners at award shows? Awards have a role, but often their importance are overblown."

In fact, Parameswaran says that the role of advertising agencies' role in partnering clients to build their business in the long term is getting overshadowed due to their hankering for awards. "We are aware that many agencies spend in terms of tens of lakhs of rupees for creating advertising (that client has not paid for), releasing them (in friendly low-rate papers and channels) and entering them in award shows around the world. Obviously they see a logic in spending all this money, not counting the manhours (that should have been working on legitimate client business), to pursue a few minutes of glory on stage and a few col/cm of media coverage."

Giving an advertising forum's perspective, Neeraj Nayar, CEO, FAB Awards, says that it is always emotionally satisfying to compete and win.

On whether awards are a yardstick of an agency's efficiency, for clients to measure an agency's efficiency, Nayar says, "The supply of creative ideas is the single-most important purpose of all agencies, whether they are an advertising agency, a direct agency, or a digital agency. Although we are not sure about how it is done nowadays, there certainly was a time when the biggest advertiser in the world, Procter & Gamble, had its own internal resources for almost every aspect of marketing communications, from media planning and negotiating to packaging design. The one thing they always refused to try to bring in-house was creative work. So if it's that critical an issue, then anything an agency can do to support its creative expertise is of real value - and winning awards is a major contributor, because it requires the winning of a competitive event against other agencies and the work those agencies have created for their clients."

Latha Krishnaswamy, India Representative, Mobius Advertising Awards, says that recognition by way of awards always goes a long way in projecting the capabilities of agencies and production houses to the next client or even the same client. "The agency constantly needs to show its creative talent to the world and what better way than getting into the limelight by winning awards. It is like the importance of the `Hero Image' for an actor no matter how good an artist he is."

Do art and impact go hand in hand?

"Not all award-winning ad campaigns are effective nor are all successful campaigns award-worthy. It is when you find a combination of great creativity and widespread impact — that is where the magic lies," says Pandey of O&M.

Prathap Suthan, National Creative Director, Grey Worldwide

Prathap Suthan, National Creative Director, Grey Worldwide classifies advertising into under two categories, one that is award-winning and effective, and the other which is award-winning but not effective advertising.

"While the first kind of advertising gets the support of mega marketing budgets and gets splashed across the world, the second gets legal status because it gets released in one or two small publications usually gratis or with a micro budget that the creative team rouse up."

"Award-winning campaigns are usually judged by creative people (and not by the management types) and ads that win awards usually have nothing to do with whether it sold more, sold less or even whether the product or service actually exists," adds Suthan.

Should creatives be judged on the basis of impact?

Says Paul of David, "The role of a judge at Cannes, One Show or Abbys is not to check on the sales or legitimacy of the ad or campaign. It's purely a creative exercise. Is the idea original? Is the execution exceptional? Is it pathbreaking? Does it move me to say wow?"

"Let the Effies do that," says Suthan of Grey. "Creative awards are purely for creativity. Period."

Similarly, Nayar of FAB Awards also says that creative and effective awards have their own distinct roles. "It's possible that the creative work did indeed deliver consumers to the point of purchase, but it didn't translate into sales because of other non-creative factors. We know of campaigns which have faced a major competitor reaction such as a vicious price retaliation which has effectively stopped the creative work translating into sales. So should the agency be cast down because it couldn't control that? Of course not."

Advertisers are not really bothered whether their agency comes up with an award-winning idea. All that matters to them is that the idea capture the attention of the target audience.

But the advertising fraternity believes that there are many clients who consider an agency's award-winning ability a sign of lateral thinking that is required to fight today's marketing battles. In the words of Suthan of Grey, "The more awards an agency has won, it also means that the agency has a collective mind that's more adept at handling challenges than a duller agency. Not to mention that magic power awards have for new talent and the best talent."

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