It was a night of glitz and glamour with a unique gathering of major stakeholders in Nigeria’s marketing industry as the Advertisers Association of Nigeria (ADVAN) rolled out the red carpet to celebrate outstanding achievers in the country’s marketing space recently.
The 2016 ADVAN Awards for Marketing Excellence that took place last weekend at the MUSON centre, Onikan, Lagos which threw up new champions who will definitely relish their achievements for the next twelve months.
At the high-point of the awards night which is the announcement of “The Brand of the Year Award”, Nigeria’s leading noodles brand, Indomie carried the day as the brand emerged the overall winner in this premium category. This position also carries a dual award as the brand manager of Indomie automatically won “The Brand Manager of the Year” Award.
Coca-Cola and Heineken took the second and third positions respectively. Before the final announcement, some analysts had tipped Coca-cola to emerge the overall winner after some activations/brands from its stable had earlier carted away the highest number of Awards- three highly coveted Trophies. Coca-Cola’s COPA campaign, 5 Alive Pulpy and Share-A-Coke campaign picked The ADVAN Awards For Marketing Excellence -Experiential Marketing, ADVAN Awards For Marketing Excellecne 2016 –Innovation and ADVAN Awards For Marketing Excellence -Digital /Social Media Marketing respectively.
In other categories, Stanbic IBTC’s CSR Project “Together For A Limb” won the ADVAN Awards for Marketing Excellence – CSR, while Guinness’ Every Minute Made Of Black campaign also captured ADVAN Awards For Marketing Excellence – Consumer Promotion. ADVAN Awards For Marketing Excellence – New Brand/Brand Revitalisation went to Indomie Beleful while ADVAN Awards For Marketing Excellence -Campaign Of The Year went To Heineken Shape Your City Campaign. Akinwunmi Dickson of Brand Campaign magazine won The ADVAN brand journalist of the year Award while Goddy Ofose of Brandish and Princewill Ekwujuru of Vangaurd came second and third respectively.
Delta State’s 25th Anniversary Campaign that culminated into the creation of a new identity logo for the state to mark the 25th Anniversary of the creation of the state emerged the winner of the maiden Public Sector Marketing Category.
Delta State Commissioner for Information, Hon. Patrick Ukah, who received the award on behalf of the State Governor, Ifeanyi Okowa, dedicated it to all Deltans and praised them for giving the governor the opportunity to serve, stressing that Governor Okowa is determined to fulfill his electoral promises anchored on the S.M.A.R.T agenda.
According to Ukah, the 25th Anniversary campaign which was anchored on the foundation laid by the SMART agenda of the Governor was funded strictly by the public sectors’ investments.
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Appreciating ADVAN for the award, Ukah said “this is the first, and so far, the only award the governor is accepting because of the credibility of ADVAN and am not sure we would accept another soon until we can be properly judged”.
Earlier in his welcome address The President of ADVAN, David Okeme who acknowledged that the event was not a night of long speeches but about celebrating marketing excellence, highlighted the place of marketing in the growth of the nation’s economy and enjoined private and public institutions to take advantage of this opportunity to grow their businesses.
Presenting his paper at this well attended event, the Guest Speaker, Segun Ogunsanya, CEO Airtel Nigeria emphasized that the digital space is the new super medium for marketing communications and advertising that can be deployed as a very strong channel to reach the people and endear their brands and companies to the youths who constitute the majority in Nigeria’s bubbling population.
