Pepsi ON takes Grand Prix crown in Digital Strategy Awards

Pepsi ON takes Grand Prix crown in Yahoo New Zealand Digital Strategy Awards

Campaign judged ‘best of the best’ in digital advertising in 2014

Auckland, New Zealand, 12 May, 2015 – The Pepsi ON campaign by OMD New Zealand has won top digital honours in the 2014 Yahoo New Zealand Digital Strategy Awards.

OMD developed a customised site within Yahoo Entertainment as a digital hub for teens. It brought together content from ambassadors, Yahoo and social media, and hosted three Pepsi parties during the year – created by teens, for teens, and with teens.

Judges praised OMD for a strategy that delivered real value to the day-to-day lives of teens, and commended the way content including photos, social media, music and videos was curated to create an integrated digital platform that has become a real go-to hub for New Zealand teens.

“OMD’s Pepsi ON campaign harnessed curated content from real teens to create authenticity and a sense of ownership. It was successful in increasing social engagement levels and brand equity, as well as creating opportunities for ongoing activity through a new teen channel on Yahoo,” said judge Helen Baxter, Managing Directrix of Mohawk Media.

The campaign exceeded all expectations by doubling Facebook engagement within a month of going live and achieving 22,930 unique user impressions against a target of 8,000, up by 287 per cent.

Pepsi beat out strong competition from PHDiQ for Monteiths and a combined campaign from OMD for Tourism Australia and Air New Zealand, who were joint winners of the second judging round.

Monteiths’ Meat Pack Hunt campaign saw the creation of a Smartphone augmented reality game with location-based data. Ms Baxter said it was a “clever, creative and gamified campaign using augmented reality and location-based placements to create an interactive 'urban hunting' experience.”

The Savouring Australia campaign from Tourism Australia and Air New Zealand aligned an original content series across online and print media, to increase awareness and desire to travel to unusual Australian destinations.

First time judge and CEO of IAB New Zealand, Adrian Pickstock, was impressed by the campaign’s “intelligent use of research and the breadth of digital elements utilised, which resulted in excellent niche content creation and added real value to its audience.”

Louis Niven, General Manager Sales, Yahoo New Zealand, said the awards are an opportunity to recognise innovation in digital strategy.

“Digital campaigns are now central to media strategy and it’s fantastic to see New Zealand brands continuing to push the boundaries in the digital sphere. We congratulate OMD and PHDiQ on their brilliant work, and look forward to seeing what innovative campaigns the year ahead will bring.”

The 2013 Yahoo Digital Strategy Grand Prix award was won by PHDiQ for its Tui Beer Plumber campaign.

Entries for the 2015 Yahoo Digital Strategy Awards are now open. For more information, please visithttp://nz.advertising.yahoo.com/awards/dsa/.

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