13. Unlucky for some

In the interests of both balance and breadth we have had to sacrifice award-winning campaigns including “One Box To Rule Them All” for IBM from OgilvyOne Copenhagen, “We Have Your Charity” for the Protestant Churches Association from OgilvyOne Frankfurt and “Pull the Plug” from Clemenger BBDO Sydney for Vodafone.

Sorry, sorry, sorry to everyone who submitted any of the sixty-eight campaigns that haven’t made it. Please don’t lose heart. We need your work and if Directory is to continue to be the valuable resource it is, please keep sending it in.

On the bright side, we have more thought-pieces for you. Andy Owen’s article, ‘Returning to DM from Digital’, is guaranteed to raise debate. And quite possibly a few hackles as well. Either way, here is someone whose craft skills and whose passion for DM is evident in every splendid sentence he writes.

As well as 35 case histories covering the whole spectrum of direct, a major feature of this issue is the showcase of the top winners from this year’s UK DMA Awards from pages 7 to 18. This means you actually have 45 case studies to look at and every one has something you can learn from.

22 DMA Golds

We were delighted when the DMA asked us if we would like to show some of this year’s best work. And we have picked ten campaigns, which, between them, picked up no fewer than 22 Golds at the ceremony on December 9^th.

How do the winners look when compared with the best work from elsewhere in the world?

Of them all, while 20:20’s ‘Thmbnls’ campaign is brilliantly conceived and executed, it is the RNLI campaign which excites the most. It really is a benchmark piece, reflected in the fact that it won no fewer than eight Golds on the night.

It is a glittering example of how direct has the power to influence and even steer peer-to-peer communications when the idea is simple and relevant. For me, momentum marketing of this sort is becoming increasingly important as brands learn how to start and maintain conversations with people.

Elsewhere in Issue 13 there are ground-breaking online campaigns from OgilvyOne Malaysia for Guinness and from Rapp New York for The Travel Channel, both of which use Facebook ingeniously. As the Rapp submission puts it, the hard thing to do in social media is to support a brand without actually being seen to be supporting it.

Patrick Collister

Editor