Entries in this special Ethics in Sales Award category are welcome through January 25

Nominations for the 2023 (17^th annual) Stevie® Awards for Sales & Customer Service, considered the world’s top honors for customer service, business development, and sales professionals, will be accepted through January 11 at StevieAwards.com/Sales.

For the fourth year in a row, Sales Partnerships, a leading provider of outsourced sales solutions, will sponsor the Sales Partnerships Ethics in Sales Award in the competition. The award will recognize outstanding examples of ethical sales practices since the beginning of July 2020. The entry deadline for this special category, for which there are no entry fees, is January 25.

Complete details and the nomination form for the Sales Partnerships Ethics in Sales Award can be found at https://stevieawards.com/sales/nominate-2023-sales-partnerships-ethics-sales-award.

Fred Kessler, Sales Partnerships founder and Chief Executive Officer, said, “Recognizing excellence in sales has never been more important than today. These awards judge the best of the best ranging from Fortune 500 companies to small businesses. It is the highest recognition in the field of selling for both performance as well as systems and support of world-class selling organizations. We take pride in sponsoring the Ethics in Sales Award. Recognizing the best of the best who sell ethically and are responsible to their communities aligns with Sales Partnerships' guiding principles. We find the organizations that are the most productive tend to also have a focus on doing the job ethically—spotlighting this helps the industry as a whole."

Stevie Awards President Maggie Miller said that she looks forward to having the longtime Stevie Awards sponsor present this award again. “We are thrilled that Sales Partnership wants to recognize those who not only succeed in sales at their organization, but who do so with integrity and through ethical practices. The judges are eager to read through these Ethics in Sales nominations.”

The Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service recognize achievement in business development, customer service, and sales worldwide.  Eligible nominees include departments, teams, and individual professionals. New products and services and solution providers used by those professionals are also eligible. The 2023 awards will recognize achievements since July 1, 2020. Explore the full list of categories.

View full details for the 17th annual Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service at StevieAwards.com/Sales.




About Sales Partnerships      
Sales Partnerships, Inc. is a contract sales organization founded in 1997 with the mission to combine best practices in sales recruitment, training, management, quality assurance and selling technologies into a complete services platform that consistently delivers exceptional results for our clients. The firm has been recognized and awarded multiple times as the best sales outsourcing firm in North America, for innovation in the fields of applied sales technology, best service offerings, one of the best places to work, and for the individual accomplishments of its sales professionals and key leadership team members. Learn more at SalesPartnerships.com.

Stevie-winner Meg Languages uses technology to transform language programs in schools, creating culturally aware, multilingual global citizens for an increasingly globalized and interconnected world.

Australia-based Meg Languages offers live, interactive language programs in Mandarin and Spanish to over 50,000 school students all over the world weekly. By live-broadcasting native language teachers directly into the classroom, Meg Languages helps nurture language proficiency while immersing students in a new culture.

Second-Language Learning in Australia
In an increasingly interconnected world, students need to become culturally aware. Global citizenship is more important than ever, and yet the study of languages in schools is increasingly under threat. In fact, Australia has seen a steady decline in foreign language proficiency over the last 60 years.

About 40% of Australian students studied a language in the 1960s; now it’s closer to 10%. One of the key reasons for this is a serious shortage of local language teachers. For schools, it’s become increasingly challenging to introduce a sustainable language program. 

Meg Languages Learning Model
Recognizing that learning should not be restricted to the four walls of the classroom, Meg Languages tries to simplify the initiation and maintenance of a foreign language school program. Their language programs are purpose-built for state curriculums and involve live, interactive virtual lessons with native language teachers streamed directly into the classroom. Not only does this solve the teacher shortage issue, but it also serves to deliver a more equitable education experience, with those in disadvantaged school districts gaining access to tier-one language programs.

With an enthusiastic and highly skilled team of 90 native language teachers based in Columbia and Beijing, this learning model creates a fully immersive and authentic language experience, which plugs the student into the context of the language. Students get to regularly speak to a native speaker on the ground in Latin America or China, which is the next closest thing to being there. Students get real-world insight into what life is like in that part of the world by connecting with someone who lives and breathes that language and culture every single day. Students can enjoy the Beijing cityscape out of their teacher’s window or join their teacher for a virtual meal in a Bogota restaurant, which increases student excitement and curiosity, and engagement and motivation by extension.

Meg Languages is driven by its purpose to create a more interconnected, peaceful, and empathetic global community. This can only occur with cultural education, an accommodating outlook, and respect for the shared human experience. Language study can be powerful, especially when grounded in cultural context. Meg Languages rigorously pursues this purpose through its mission of creating global citizens via language and intercultural experiences.

Additional Support Services
Complementary to its Mandarin and Spanish language programs, Meg Languages’ Going Global offering supports schools to become globally competent through a variety of initiatives such as festivals, language competitions and virtual excursions. A core part of Meg Languages’ ethos is to recognize that learning is more effective when meaningful communities are created and engaged with purpose. By facilitating cross-border and inter-school connections, they are building strong communities of global citizens.

Meg Languages’ achievements in the past two years include:

• Largest provider of online Mandarin language programs
• Expanded offerings to Spanish language programs
• Continued expansion across Australia, New Zealand, USA and UK
  
• Partnered with school networks to expand teaching services 
• 50,000 students now taught weekly 
• 20% growth achieved in the last 12 months

Looking Ahead
Developing global citizens has never been more important, and schools across the Asia-Pacific region are increasingly looking for ways to use technology to expand the classroom beyond physical limits.

Since winning their Gold Stevie Award, the team at Meg Languages has continued to innovate their World Language programs and provide access to languages for a growing number of schools that have typically struggled to employ language teachers.

Meg Languages has spent the last 12 months developing a program of Virtual Excursions that will take students on live journeys through the Forbidden City in Beijing as well as other exotic places throughout the world. These activities are designed specifically to provide context to students about why learning a language and learning about culture are important.

Meg Languages won a Gold Stevie Award for Excellence in Innovation in Business Product & Service Industries - Up to 100 Employees in the 2022 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards.

Interested in entering the 2023 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards?

Stevie-winner Home Credit Philippines is digitizing as many human resource tasks as possible to better support employees professionally and personally.

Home Credit Philippines is part of Home Credit Group, which focuses on responsible lending primarily to people with little or no credit history.  Home Credit endeavors to promote the principles of financial inclusion and safe lending, providing world-class financing services to customers, who are often first-time borrowers.

So far, their 77.4 thousand employees have served 56.5 million customers through their vast distribution network comprising 195,379 points of sale, loan offices, branches, and post offices.

In the years since Home Credit Philippines began operations in October 2013, they have modernized their human resources (HR) practices and platforms to adapt to the evolving financial and social environments. The Covid pandemic, in particular, prompted rapid digitization of many services and sectors worldwide, which Home Credit Philippines fully embraced.

Home Credit Philippines leaders seek to consistently support the creative thinking of their more than 12,000 employees. An effective leadership style, they assert, should magnify the strengths and potential of their team members, making their weaknesses insignificant. They believe there are no small roles, and that everyone’s contribution is important. Leading a large, diverse group of people means there is no one size fits all. However, one thing common to all is the need to be appreciated.

Enabling Human Connection
The COVID pandemic underscored the importance of reliable communication systems and software. In 2022, they deployed an internal HR chatbot to provide 24/7 service to employees, which can connect employees with HR even if there is no intranet access. They hope that HR will no longer be just a department but a culture that will be embedded in each employee. You don’t need to be an HR department to be a human resource, according to Home Credit Philippines.

Nurturing employees’ talent and development requires thorough understanding of their skillsets, functions, and background. Home Credit Philippines believes that data is power; gathering and deciphering actionable insights from that data can transform people systems.

Their team uses a tool called Power BI, an analytics platform powered by Microsoft. Power BI is a collection of software services, apps, and connectors that work together to turn users’ unrelated sources of data into coherent, visually immersive, and interactive insights. 

Home Credit Philippines also uses the CliftonStrengths assessment for personal and team development. The CliftonStrengths assessment is a performance-based tool that builds self-awareness and strength. It helps individuals discover their top five strengths and can help organizations improve company culture and performance. The underlying philosophy of this assessment design is that all individuals can be more engaged and successful when we are able to use our strengths to achieve personal and professional goals. 

Where They Are Now
As Home Credit Philippines looks for new opportunities to strengthen its HR support for existing and future employees, the company continues to trust in the latest technology to further improve operations.

Since implementing the above and other digitization efforts, Home Credit Philippines has increased its Talent Acquisition rate from 56% to 89%. They also reduced the average time to fill positions across all levels by an average of 44%.

Improvements have also been made within Operations. Through its automated employee verification tool, HR document control center, SharePoint Automation, JIRA Deployment, and PIP automation, Home Credit Philippines reduced its transaction rate by 26%, having all important materials and documents readily available to employees. They also improved their received rate by 9%, increased service level attainment by 24%, and decreased total processing time by 22%.

Home Credit Philippines won a Gold Stevie Award for the Innovative Use of Technology in Human Resources - Financial Services Industries in the 2022 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards.

Interested in entering the 2023 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards?

 

Stevie-winner OfficePartners360 (OP360) is a specialized outsourcing company focused on providing custom back office and customer service solutions for small to medium-sized businesses and Fortune 500 companies.

US-owned and managed, OP360 was founded in 2006 by entrepreneurs with strong experience in technology, HR, IT, and finance. Today, they are a full-service, fast-growing solutions provider with thousands of global employees and clients ranging from mid-sized corporations toFortune 500 firms.

Because the owners have been clients of offshore and outsourced services, they understand first-hand the benefits of outsourcing. For clients who require personnel, OP360 ensures the outsourced team not only performs but also operates as an extension of the client’s existing teams with the same shared values, training, and culture. In addition, OP360 operates out of premium facilities in tier-two cities thereby reducing client costs.

Principles in Action
OP360 leaders are committed to building and maintaining a transformative, high-performing culture. They hope to do this through effective communication, genuinely caring about their team (and the communities where they live and work), ensuring rapid career development for strong performers, and providing well-above-average compensation. Their methods seem to work, as they consistently have an exceptionally high management retention rate.

When the pandemic thrust the world into a state of disarray, leaders in the Philippines office responded by tapping into OP360’s core values of compassion and cooperation, as well as its ability to stay agile and adaptable to changing circumstances in order to guarantee employee health and well-being. 

By March 2020, 99% of staff were successfully pivoted to remote work. Computers and portable WiFi kits were sent home with employees, and those who did not have a suitable home office were housed in hotels from where they could work. A corporate telecommuting package was also offered for staff to have wired internet at home. Remote IT support was available 24/7, and when needed, IT staff were deployed to homes to swap out or repair damaged assets. A resiliency hub was also maintained to cater to employees who, due to emergencies, were unable to continue working remotely. 

When onsite work resumed, staff were shuttled to and from the offices to limit exposure to the commuting public. Free meals were provided to limit the need to leave the offices during breaks. A stringent office sanitation and disinfection schedule was maintained; more staff were certified in first aid and safety; and additional clinic nurses were hired to ensure safety. A mental health program was also launched to support employees’ mental well-being. Employees who tested positive for Covid-19 were given paid time off and received a care kit.

As soon as vaccines were available in 2021, OP360 rolled-out its vaccination campaign, “Together & for Each Other.” Joining a public-private venture, OP360 offered free vaccination to employees and their dependents. Within 3 months, 78% of staff were fully inoculated through the company’s efforts, exceeding the Philippines’ then-national average. The company also extended its care externally by distributing face masks and vitamins to 5 beneficiary-schools of its philanthropic arm, OP360 Cares. 

While the situation exacerbated vulnerabilities, OP360 never stopped operating with the health and safety of its community in mind.

OfficePartners360 won a Silver Stevie Award for Most Valuable Corporate Response to COVID-19 in the 2022 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards.

Interested in entering the 2023 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards?

The fifth annual Women|Future Conference brought together hundreds of ambitious, forward-thinking women across industries and career stages to connect and discuss key issues that impact their industries, careers, and lives.

The agenda featured more than 25 discussion panels and breakout sessions hosted by 80+ women CEOs, founders, small business owners, entrepreneurs, thought leaders, coaches, and executives from organizations such as Accenture, Goldman Sachs, Hilton, IBM, LinkedIn, Microsoft, Nestle, T-Mobile, and others.

Attendees gained powerful insights to help them in their professional and personal lives through sessions ranging from entrepreneurship to workplace diversity, mental health, overcoming imposter syndrome, how to think like an investor, social media best practices, and more.

The #WomenFuture22 agenda was divided into seven tracks: Diversity, Equity & Inclusion, Entrepreneurship, Future of Work, Leadership, Marketing, Personal Development, and Technology.

The Opening Keynote
Rashmi Verma, Global Head of Diversity & Inclusion at HUGO BOSS, was the 2022 Opening Keynote Speaker. HUGO BOSS is one of the leading companies in the premium segment of the global apparel market, employing 13,800 individuals representing 112 nationalities. As the Global Head of Diversity & Inclusion, Rashmi develops creative methods to increase team engagement while establishing an inclusive culture across the company globally.

Keeping with our tradition of past Stevie® Award winners keynoting the conference, HUGOBOSS is a multiple-time Stevie winner in the Stevie® Awards for Great Employers for COVID Response and HR Achievement in 2019 and 2020.

In her Women|Future Conference Keynote, "Dream Big & Chase It," Rashmi shared how she navigated these work and life challenges, including managing cultural differences and experiences, and ways to carve out possibilities and dreams along the way.

Rashmi’s life and career have spanned continents. She grew up in India in a conventional family yet managed to excel in the tech industry. She started her career working for General Electric (GE) where she led and drove multiple high-profile strategy projects within various GE businesses. She also launched her own business recently called YogaDaan, a charitable organization that offers yoga classes to raise money for a school for the underprivileged and differently abled children in India.

Rashmi walked attendees through this journey, explaining how she navigated through each challenge that brought her to where she is today.

Top Attended Sessions From the Week​
Throughout the three-day conference, Women|Future Conference attendees heard sessions about business networking, work-life balance, wealth attraction, overcoming adversity, mentorship, and more.

Below were the top conference sessions at #WomenFuture22:

• Building Your Community of Mentors
• Find Your Voice: Insider Secrets from Seasoned Speakers
• Dream Big & Chase It!
• Think Like An Investor: How to Get the Funding You Deserve
• Resilient Leadership in a Changing Business Landscape
• The Ever-Changing World of Social Media

On Tuesday, November 8, in the opening session “Building Your Community of Mentors,” speakers shared  their stories and wisdom on how to find a mentor, types of mentors, creating a community of mentorship, and getting the most from a mentor relationship—whether as the mentor or mentee.

Brenda Jimenez, Chief Executive Officer of MENTOR (New York, NY), noted that “one in three individuals in this country grow up without a mentor.” She said we need to step up for those younger women, but the onus is also on young professionals to seek out mentors and maintain the relationship.

Brenda acknowledged that there is a cultural aspect around asking for help, and some may feel like they are seeking a mentor out of weakness, to which she asserted: “When you're asking for a mentor, you're asking for an additional superpower to the superpowers you already have.” This superpower, though, is contingent on the mentee’s attitude and openness. The mentor relationship must be built on trust and integrity on both sides if women hope to have their mentor go the extra mile for them:

“For someone to activate their social capital, they have to value not only who you are but trust that you're going to be a good steward of that relationship that they're activating on your behalf, so you have to be authentic–you have to be very clear on what you're moving toward and you have to show up with dignity, integrity, and authenticity.”

Director of Brand Personality at Hilton, Whitney Knight, MBA, shared another type of mentor relationship she initiated with her close friend and fellow business woman. “I have a mentor who serves as my accountability partner. We were friends for over a decade before we said we'd like to have more conversations about our careers. We started having dedicated time together each month to focus on what are you doing this month, what are the challenges you’re having and maybe I can help.”

Brenda reiterated: “The magic sauce is the relationship, and that's always complex because relationships themselves take time and evolution.” No matter the type of mentor relationship, she encouraged attendees to reflect on their needs and bring their authentic selves to networking and mentorship relationships.

In another popular panel session on Wednesday, speakers discussed “Strategic Storytelling: Advertising and PR Tactics for Your Business.” The conversation centered around storytelling as it relates to a company value proposition as well as individuals’ personal story and brand.
Research shows that, when people are in storytelling mode, their brains are in a different space where they are more likely to receive and remember information. “When you have your own story and when you own that, people pay attention….There is a way to create commonality in a room of diverse people and beliefs through that storytelling,” noted Star Bobatoon, Business Storytelling Coach and Founder of Own Your Stage Training.

Founder and Chief Executive Officer of The Why Group Inc., and Ciara Ungar Coaching & Consulting, Ciara Ungar shared that businesses and individuals often need to take a step back and really reflect on their core purpose. “People can feel how authentic you’re being. You’re always performing….If you’re not understanding that first ‘why,’ then it will be hard to deliver that authenticity and form a true connection.”

Star explained that we need to adjust our thought habits to draw from our authentic self:

“Because we are so often making ourselves small and taking the back seat, we are not comfortable sharing the wonderful things about us, and that starts to become normalized within us….The way we live our lives is a result of the stories we believe about ourselves…there is the story that we are repeating inside our minds all the time and that story is directing our work,” she said.

Women-Owned Business Pitch Competition
The third annual Women-Owned Business Pitch Competition at the Women|Future Conference provided a platform for five women-owned businesses to compete for a chance to win funding. Pitch Competition finalists included Equability, Good Mood Treats, The Village App, Tiny Fish Co., and XpertPatient, LLC.

During this live, “Shark Tank”-style competition on November 9, a panel of judges and attendees watched each finalist present a three-minute pitch and then answer questions from the judges about their business model, target market, and operations strategy

Judges ultimately determined that Equability was the winner, an online clothing modification service for individuals with disabilities. It was launched in 2020 after their research had identified lack of adaptive clothing as a barrier to social and professional participation. Equability gives people the ability to conveniently modify clothes to suit their style and lifestyle.

Founder and CEO, Hilary Pham, won a $5,500 cash prize funded by the Stevie Awards and Autumn Consulting, LLC, as well as a certification from Certify My Company (a $4,800 value).

Access the 2022 Conference Sessions On-Demand
Did you miss this year’s conference? You can register to watch the replays of over 25 panels, workshops, including our opening keynote for just $39.

On-demand attendees will have access to the 2022 virtual Women|Future Conference platform through November 2023. The platform includes three days of sessions and lists of speakers, attendees, and sponsors that participated in #WomenFuture22.

Special Thanks to Our 2022 Sponsors and Partners​
We are proud to partner with the following publications, media outlets, and organizations that share our mission in supporting women in business.

If you are interested in sponsorship opportunities for the 2023 Women|Future Conference, sign up here to get notified of the 2023 prospectus release.

 

We are pleased to welcome two new representatives to the Stevie® Awards team: Emre Gulecoglu, Founder of Digitallica, and Saynur Onen, Senior Consultant. 

Based in France and Greece, respectively, Saynur and Emre will serve as representatives for international Stevie Awards programs. Both Saynur and Emre are multiple award winners and have been working with international award organizations as participants, consultants, and judges for approximately 15 years. 

Saynur is an independent entrepreneur with over 25 years of experience in learning, leadership development, talent management, succession planning, employee engagement, and performance systems. She has a proven track record in the transformation of organizations and cultures through analyzing business needs to provide innovative solutions that contribute to the overall strategic agenda. She operates her own consultancy firm in France.

Emre founded the digital learning company Digitallica in 2015. He has more than 20 years of experience in learning technologies and 8 years of experience in award consultancy. He has developed a wide business network through business ventures in Turkey and Greece, and also works with local and international companies, focusing on those in France, Greece, and Azerbaijan.

Stevie Awards President Maggie Miller said: “We are thrilled to have Saynur and Emre join the Stevie Awards team to help reach outstanding organizations in Greece and France. With their combined experience and business networks, we know they will spread the message on what winning a Stevie Award in 2023 can do for brand recognition, employee happiness, and more. We look forward to working together on our international competitions."

Stevie Awards competitions receive more than 12,000 nominations each year from organizations in more than 70 nations, honoring organizations of all types and sizes and the people behind them. Stevie Awards representatives work across the globe to discover and help innovative companies and leaders enter the global arena and elevate their brand recognition.

We look forward to recognizing more innovative companies in France and Greece this year!

Sign up for the Stevie Awards Update Newsletter to get updates on awards competition openings, deadlines, winner listings, and ceremony event details. 

Stevie-winner Nurch is looking to enhance the stability and consistency of learning environments in the Australian childcare market through a loyalty rewards program for families.

Nurch founders Brent Thompson, Glenn Noy, and Kara Smyth have over 15 years of experience in childcare each. They all agreed that the common promotional strategies used by childcare centers are antiquated, and the strategies typically only benefit a new family, never an enrolled family who has been continuously supporting the childcare center.

With this in mind, they developed and launched a loyalty rewards program in 2019 that would not only help centers increase enrollments but also help centers retain their most loyal families through rewards. With no sign-up fee, there are only benefits for families in this program as well.

How It Works
Partnering childcare centers invite families to sign up for the Nurch loyalty program at no cost. The high-tech platform synchronizes with each center’s software to automatically download the details of enrolled families, including attendance records and fees. After signing up, families automatically earn 1 point for every $1 they pay to the childcare center. Loyalty reward points can be redeemed at leading Australian retailers.

This model organically attracts new families to participating childcare centers and helps centers maintain current enrollment. More consistent enrollment allows centers to better plan for fluctuations and frees their time to focus on enhancing the quality of childcare services. This contributes to better consistency of care and more stability for children, providing a better environment to improve their learning, development, and wellbeing.

Nurch is 100% compliant with childcare subsidies and Australian consumer laws. It is constantly updated and automated to meet government regulations, laws, and changes. With the Nurch platform and collaborative model, children, families, childcare centers, and the broader community all benefit.

Growth and Values
Nurch takes an ethical and transparent business approach by providing a Childcare funding declaration. Center groups can do their own risk assessment and have fair terms and conditions that allow centers to freely operate. For example, they have a 2-year agreement term, but centers can cancel anytime.

In addition, Nurch aims to promote diversity and healthy labor practices. Employees are respected and provided with the flexibility they need to balance work and home life. Employees are given the option of where they prefer to work and what hours. Career development is highly supported by adjusting roles to specific interests.

Since receiving their Stevie awards, Nurch has now assisted over 8,000 families and more than 50 childcare centers across Australia in retaining and growing enrollments. 

In a recent study, Nurch found that 67% of members would choose a Nurch-partnered childcare center or remain enrolled at their current center due to the Nurch program. Also, 80% of users saw more value in the Nurch program compared with leading retailer loyalty rewards programs. Nurch is currently on track to partner with 300 centers and have over 30,000 members by 2025. 

Nurch won a Gold Stevie Award for Most Innovative Startup of the Year – Business Service Industries, and a Silver Award for Most Innovative Startup of the Year – Business Product Industries in the 2022 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards.

Interested in entering the 2023 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards?

Stevie-winner Agribid Private Limited is a farmer-friendly business-to-business marketplace specializing in the sale and purchase of agri-commodities with every stakeholder along the agribusiness chain, including farmers, traders, corporate consumers, and global buyers.

Launched in late 2020 by Ashutosh Mishra, Manoj Suvarna, and Chetan Suvarna, it is their company vision to be the most preferred marketplace for agri-products globally. Since launching, 300 farmer producer organizations (FPOs) have signed up to benefit from Agribid’s business model.

Agribid sees that the plight of small farmers across India is due to fragmented land holding. In the market, a small farmer does not have any control on price—not due to a lack of trading options—but in accordance with the concept of economies of size: the average cost per unit of production decreases as the size of the farm increases. With an average land holding of 2 to 3 acres each, a small farmer can produce a crop of 2 to 5 MT. Such a low quantity would never interest a big trader who is looking for 1 truck load (10 MT) minimum size for optimizing logistical costs.

According to Agribid, the solution is aggregation. Using their integrated platform, they seek to empower farmers by aggregating them in order to achieve the best price from buyers across India and globally.

In addition, as a company policy, Agribid does not charge farmers for their services—aggregation will be free for life to all participating farmers. In fact, the company has committed to sharing a portion of revenue with the FPOs who have joined. Agribid expects the farmers to utilize these extra funds to improve farmer welfare, machinery, and storage facilities.

Agribid plans to expand the Indian base from 11 to 23 states and its global presence from three countries to nine. Since winning their Stevie Award, they have been named one of the 20 Most Promising Startups to Watch in 2022 by Business Connect. 

Agribid won a Bronze Stevie Award for Most Innovative Startup – Business Services Industry in the
2022 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards.

Interested in entering the 2023 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards?

 

 

Stevie-winner BCW is the global communications agency built to move people. BCW partners with clients in the B2B, consumer, corporate, crisis management, healthcare, public affairs, purpose and technology sectors to set strategic direction for all communications and create powerful and unexpected ideas that earn attention.

Through an “earned-plus” offer—earned media plus paid media, creative technology, data, AI and an expanding suite of innovative capabilities—BCW moves people with power and precision to move its clients forward.

One such client is Chinese laser projection specialist Formovie. Formovie planned to launch its “T1” flagship laser projector in an effort to reinforce its leading position in the highly competitive China laser market. Formovie and BCW came together to develop a comprehensive marketing campaign, which earlier this year won a Bronze Asia-Pacific Stevie Award for Innovation in Cross-Media Marketing.

Considering the wide array of existing product choices and increasingly discerning consumers, Formovie faced some big challenges in building a unique product story and developing effective touch points with consumers. What they did was initiate a cross-media launch campaign that aimed to:

• Exposure goal—generate 30 million impressions total.
• Engagement goal—engage with 40 key media & influencers in the consumer projection segment with positive endorsement on product experience.
• Business goal—help with T1 product sales on e-commerce platforms.

According to research, more than 60% of potential laser projector consumers are enthusiastic about an “exquisite lifestyle” that integrates history, art, symphony, etc. Based on this insight, instead of a traditional press event, Formovie launched a cross-over campaign titled “Breathing life to Dunhuang” integrating imagery and connotations of one of the most famous cultural relics in China: The Mogao Caves in Dunhuang. Dunhuang was the first trading town reached by foreign merchants entering Chinese-administered territories along the Silk Road from the west. The city is the site of the renowned Mogao Caves, which form a system of 500 Buddhist temples, some of which were dug out as early as AD366, which were designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987.

Dunhuang was the first trading town reached by foreign merchants entering Chinese-administered territory from the west. The city is the site of the renowned Mogao Caves, which were designated a UNESCO World Heritage site in 1987.

At its foundation, the marketing campaign was a tech-centric, projection-based mini-art show. Commercial laser shows are often used for illumination projects like this; instead, Formovie’s new cinema-pro quality, consumer laser projector T1 was utilized to reproduce the historical relics of frescos from Dunhuang.

By merging the most advanced laser technology with traditional Chinese culture, the team created an appealing product story across media channels, including traditional media, digital platforms, advertising, as well as e-commerce channels.

As a cultural icon with nation-wide recognition, Dunhuang successfully helped attract attention from audiences with large-scale advertising placement. Dunhuang images were also utilized to produce the boot screen picture, product packages, and a scarf gift as exclusive incentives to boost sales. Riding on the momentum generated from media and influencers, the topic “digital representations of Chinese cultural heritage with T1” led to larger scale exposure and discussion as a result.

The campaign was a success, surpassing all targets:

• Exposure goal— 32 million impressions were generated from all media platforms; search engine data show that the number of searches about T1 increased 1,378% within a month.
• Engagement goal— More than 60 key influencers in the consumer projection industry shared articles, videos, or posts with positive endorsement, generating 100K+ engagement.
• Business goal— Dunhuang-themed packages and gifts helped drive sales by more than $500k within 24 hours on Tmall (formerly Taobao Mall), a Chinese-language website for business-to-consumer online retail, operated in China by Alibaba Group.

The integrated campaign “Breathing life to Dunhuang” created a unique story of how traditional Chinese culture from centuries ago can be revitalized today by innovative Formovie products. Cross-media approaches including traditional media, digital platforms, advertising, as well as e-commerce channels were utilized to communicate with audiences throughout their decision-making journey with excellent results.

BCW won a Bronze Award for Innovation in Cross-Media Marketing in the 2022 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards.

Interested in entering the 2023 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards?

 

 

Stevie-winner Aussie Broadband is a rapidly growing, Australian internet service provider with a reputation for providing high-quality internet and transparent customer service. In 2020, Aussie Broadband launched Carbon, a free self-service portal that allows customers to control all of their Aussie Broadband services from one central location.

Carbon is designed to take the delays and confusion out of ordering new services, with many products and services able to be ordered directly in the platform and with transparent pricing displayed.

Rather than wait for months to order and receive new business services, Carbon users can access free quotes, place their own orders, and control everything from hardware dispatch to service activation, all from a central portal. Carbon enables businesses to turn on a service at any location where NBN (Australia’s National Broadband Network) has been before; activation is extremely fast thanks to Aussie's clever, efficient integration with NBN's systems. 

Customers using Carbon can now:

• Purchase and customize their products and services online, including internet services, data center connections, MPLS networks, SD-WAN networks, hosted PBX and more. 
• Manage and test their services at scale, allowing them to create simple internet services, while managing billing, technical support and ordering. 
• Apply configurations to their services within seconds, as well as take advantage of single-click tests and diagnostics, real-time monitoring of bandwidth and data use, and centralized notifications, billing and support. 
• See immediately if there are any known outages affecting their service.

In addition to simplifying and shortening the ordering process, Carbon also provides users with a bevy of features for managing existing services, as well as handling billing and troubleshooting issues without the need to call customer support. Users can apply their preferred custom configurations to business telco services, which is especially useful for enterprise customers looking to build and manage their own networks and cloud platforms.

Aussie Broadband engineered Carbon to tackle some of the biggest pain points experienced by business and enterprise customers, and the company believes they are the first telco in Australia to offer account features and self-service at this level.

Carbon is not the only tool that Aussie Broadband offers to customers to enhance the customer experience. The MyAussie App offers a range of innovative features for customers that had never been seen before from a major player in the Australian telco industry. Among many other features, MyAussie offers customers the ability to “kick” their internet connection all the way back to the network, which would have required assistance from a technical support staff previously.

Another tool developed by Aussie Broadband is The Proactive Fault Detector, an in-house designed and developed software that automatically detects faults and proactively resolves them before a customer contacts Aussie's support team. They found that more than 50% of dropout and speed faults were identifiable before the customer contacted support. One of the main benefits is that it significantly reduces both the duration and volume of calls, giving their support staff more time to focus on better customer experience. If a fault is detected with a customer’s connection, the system begins running troubleshooting tests and attempts to restore services immediately. The automated fault identification system is currently identifying and triaging over 200 faults per day. 

Since winning their Stevie Award, Aussie Broadband has completed the acquisition of Brisbane Telecommunications and IT solutions provider Over the Wire (ASX:OTW) for $344 million dollars. In addition, they have signed a 3-year deal with Mitsubishi Motors Australia to provide Enterprise NBN and on-net services to its corporate and regional locations across the country.

Aussie Broadband won the Gold Stevie Award for the Innovative Use of Technology in Customer Service - Telecommunications Industries in the 2022 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards.

Interested in entering the 2023 Asia-Pacific Stevie Awards?