One day, several bagels and more than 800 entries later, day one of Caples Awards judging is complete. Today’s pass/fail round was smooth and efficient and plenty of work passed through to tomorrow’s quantitative round.
During the mid-day forum, which featured Nick Moore, EVP and chief creative officer at Wunderman; Christina Knight, creative director at OgilvyOne Sweden; and Executive Creative Director Dylan Taylor of Australia’s BMF, the room of judges discussed mainly social and mobile. A common sentiment was the inability to nail social down as a dependable direct channel, though every client seems to want it regardless of whether it truly fits in their marketing mix. Knight made an interesting comparison, saying that hospitals have many kinds of specialists, but not every patient needs the services of each. Smart marketing should be about relevant messaging rather than trying to check the box next to each channel.
The other main topic of discussion was the lack of great social media work being done. Old Spice set the bar for this year’s viral work, but whether it qualifies as direct is up for debate. A brand’s place in consumers’ conversations should remain unobtrusive, agreed each creative director, which makes a channel like mobile complicated.
Mobile may be the next frontier, but how willing consumers are to let brands into that last bastion of privacy remains to be seen, and few agencies or marketers seem to want to test those waters at the risk of alienating customers.
