Public Relations Awards

Owned by PR expert Jocelyn Johnson, Gravitas Communications of New York, New York, USA, won a Stevie Award for Communications Campaign of the Year in the 2010 Stevie Awards for Women in Business.  The 2011 edition of this global program, which honors women executives, entrepreneurs, and the organizations they run, is accepting entries through September 30.

Hard Times in Detroit

2009 was a dark year for the American automotive industry, with US automotive manufacturers desperately shuttling between Washington, D.C. and Detroit in an effort to save their businesses and get back on track.

In the context of this bleak environment, the editors at Motor Trend magazine decided that the 2010 Car of the Year (COTY) award—announced in November 2009—needed to be a bigger event than ever before.

Motor Trend magazine recognizes the best of the automotive best each year with its COTY award. This venerable award, in its 51st year in 2009, was faced with an unusually narrow field of contenders, but there was a poignancy associated with the ultimate winner, the Ford Fusion.

As the nation and the world worried about whether Detroit could be saved, it seemed fitting that the oldest and strongest of the “Big Three” would emerge triumphant among the field of global contenders.

Motivating the American Auto Market

Gravitas Communications was tasked with launching a campaign for the 2010 award that would reach new levels of coverage and serve as a positive and motivating boost to the American auto market—but with half the budget of previous years.

The goal was to appeal to a mass audience with the widest possible national
and international media coverage.

Publicity Plan

There were several challenges to overcome, including tight timing from completion of testing to the announcement, maintaining the editorial integrity and ownership of the announcement, and executing a huge announcement with a relatively small budget.

The Gravitas team put together a comprehensive yet cost-effective publicity plan designed to reach the broadest audience possible, and using all major communications channels including print, television, radio, web, social media, and online video.

Social Media

The buildup began with social-media teasers two weeks before the COTY award
announcement. These appeared on the brand’s Facebook and Twitter accounts and included social-media press releases promoting the announcement date. The Gravitas Communication’s team coordinated and shot b-roll footage for use among local media and via satellite distribution.

Live Webcast

Gravitas also approached the winning manufacturer to stage a live Webcast from its global headquarters. Not only did this approach leverage the resources of the award winner to promote the COTY award, the event also served as a high-energy morale booster for Ford’s executive management team and employees.

This event also proved to be the ideal backdrop for Motor Trend magazine’s first live Webcast, and Fox Business also provided live broadcast coverage of the announcement.

Amazing Results

The 2010 Motor Trend Car of the Year awards program was considered a great success. It resulted in 1,200 Tweets, 175 television hits, 400 online articles, 4,187 streams on the Webcast—6 times more than was hoped for—and the winner’s video garnered more than 67,000 views on YouTube.

The story was nationally syndicated in an Associated Press article. It was the main story on FoxNews.com, CNBC.com, MSNBC.com, CNN.com, USA Today.com, and Yahoo.com.  MotorTrend.com broke a million page views overall, only the second time the site had achieved that level of traffic.

”The COTY award is one of the most prestigious awards in the automotive industry and we felt honored and motivated to make it the biggest announcement in the history of the awards,” said Jocelyn Johnson, founder, Gravitas Communications.  “It was thrilling to watch the press react and the coverage come in. The client was ecstatic and that is what counts.”

About Jocelyn Johnson

Jocelyn Johnson founded Gravitas Communications in 2005 with more than
fifteen years of experience building and executing smart, strategic public
relations and communications programs for her clients. Jocelyn has worked with
industry goliaths and start-ups alike. From Google to Thwapr, Jocelyn has
worked with nearly 100 companies over her career and has launched more than 36 start-ups. She has a passion for technology, digital media/entertainment, retail, and media companies and is obsessed with how technology is changing the way we communicate and interact. Jocelyn is also proud to be a co-recipient for several PR industry awards.

About Gravitas Communications

Gravitas Communications is a strategic communications firm that operates at the nexus of PR, social media, and search engine optimization. Founded in 2005 by Jocelyn Johnson, Gravitas understands the constantly evolving landscape of media and how technology has forever changed how we communicate and interact. 

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Atul Ahluwalia is chair of the final judging committee for the Corporate Communications and Public Relations Awards categories of The 2011 International Business Awards, the competition that's open to all organizations worldwide.  The entry deadline for this year's IBAs is May 11, and the IBA entry kit is here.

What are your top 3 tips on how to plan a PR campaign in India?
To be effective in India, a PR campaign should have a central big idea, which is derived from key stakeholder insights.

It is also critical to identify potential advocates at the outset, engage them effectively, and make them co-owners of the campaign.

Depending on the nature of the campaign, it will need to integrate a variety of media. India is a diverse country with a multilingual population. Consequently, integrating the multitude of media channels spanning print, television, radio, and social media across languages can be a real challenge for people not familiar with the country. 

What item of news recently caught your eye and why?
The Japan crisis involving the crippling of the Fukushima power plant and the resultant potential radioactive fallout is at the top of my mind. While being faced with the daunting task of containing damage at the nuclear plant, the Government of Japan has been measured in communicating with its citizens and with the international community, and I think this has helped prevent panic among the population at large. 

If you could choose another profession, what would it be?
Filmmaking, as it is also a creative profession.

What quality or qualities do you most value in your business associates?
A desire to excel in every aspect of work.

What do you think is the worst bad habit to have at work?
Lack of proactivity and a pushback attitude.

As someone at the top of your profession, what keeps you inspired or makes you hit the ground running in the morning?
An opportunity to make a difference to the discipline of Public Relations.

About Atul Ahluwalia:
Atul Ahluwalia joined Corporate Voice | Weber Shandwick when the Delhi office was first set up in 1994.  With an astute focus on client business outcomes and strong leadership, Ahluwalia rose to become head of North and East India operations for the agency, and was appointed president in 2009.

Ahluwalia's core strengths include corporate and industry-related strategic counseling, media, and crisis management.  During his time at Corporate Voice | Weber Shandwick, Ahluwalia has successfully won a range of impressive clients spanning diverse industries and has led many challenging assignments. With over 20 years in public relations, Ahluwalia's industry experience includes hospitality, consumer electronics, aviation, FMCG, information technology, telecommunications, and banking, among others.   Prior to joining Corporate Voice | Weber Shandwick, Ahluwalia spent five years in advertising.

Ahluwalia has been instrumental in making Corporate Voice | Weber Shandwick the most consistently awarded PR agency in India, winning such global awards as the IPRA Golden World Award, PR Week's Asia-Pacific Campaign of the Year, an Asia Pacific SABRE Award, the United Nations Grand Prize for PR Excellence, a Stevie in The International Business Awards, and a PR Silver Lion at Cannes.

Ahluwalia is an alumnus of St. Columba's High School and Shri Ram College of Commerce, Delhi University.  He is a founder member of The Public Relations Consultancies Association of India (PRCAI), and is a regular guest speaker at advertising and PR institutes.

About Corporate Voice | Weber Shandwick:
Corporate Voice | Weber Shandwick (CVWS) is a joint venture company owned by Weber Shandwick, a unit of The Interpublic Group of Companies (NYSE: IPG) headquartered in New York, and MAA Group Holdings headquartered in Bangalore. Founded in 1992, the firm has grown to become one of the largest and most-awarded consultancies in India, providing a suite of services in corporate reputation development, management, and public affairs.

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The final entry deadline for The 2011 American Business Awards is fast approaching (it's March 31, although late entries will be accepted through April 27 with payment of a late fee). The corporate communications and public relations awards categories are among the most popular in the competition, so we thought we'd take this opportunity to publish Hilton Hotels' Stevie Award-winning Communications or PR Campaign of the Year entry from last year, in order to remind you that virtually all of the past Stevie Award-winning entries are published on the awards' website. You'll find the 2010 honorees in the ABAs here.

Hilton Hotels was honored last year in the category of Communications or PR Campaign of the Year - Reputation/Brand Management. The nomination was submitted by Hilton's agency partner, Covalent Logic. 30-40% of all entries submitted to Stevie Awards competitions are submitted by agencies on behalf of their clients, and the entering agency's role in preparing and submitting the nomination is always acknowledged.

You'll find the entry kit for The 2011 American Business Awards here.

We recently published a tipsheet called 10 Tips for Winning PR Awards in the 2011 Stevies - get it here.

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IndoPacific Edelman of Jakarta, Indonesia, won the Stevie Award for Communications or PR Campaign of the Year in Crisis Communications in the PR awards categories of The 2010 International Business Awards. Here we look at their work that earned the Stevie.

On September 30, 2009, a 7.9 magnitude earthquake struck in the Indian Ocean, approximately 120 km offshore from the densely populated coastal region of Indonesia’s West Sumatra Province. Despite the epicenter being offshore, the earthquake caused substantial damage throughout the coastal communities, including in the region’s capital, Padang City.

Most of the inhabitants of Padang (population: 750,000), as well as an additional 884,500 people living in surrounding areas, were affected in some way by the earthquake. The final death toll came to 1,117, with an additional 1,214 seriously injured. The quake also destroyed hundreds of thousands of homes and businesses throughout the region and caused serious damage to the infrastructure of most remaining buildings.

When the government declared a state of emergency, however, national and international media outlets were quickly spreading exaggerated statistics about the quake’s aftermath.

Crisis Response Team
In order to prevent panic spreading throughout the entire population of West Sumatra, the Indonesian government, acting through the National Disaster Management Agency (BNPB), called upon IndoPacific Edelman to help get their message out to the public and restore order in the region.

IndoPacific Edelman’s crisis response team quickly mobilized and was on the scene within 72 hours of the earthquake. The team immediately established a media center that would provide accurate and reliable information to media outlets from around the world.

In addition to conducting extensive media relations, the team worked closely with relief workers, psychologists, doctors, volunteers, and donors to restore order. The crisis team also stayed in close communication with key government officials including Head of the Senate Taufiq Kiemas, Australian Prime
Minister Kevin Rudd, and U.N. Secretary General Ban Ki-Moon.

More than Just a Media Center
During this campaign, the media center became much more than a place that simply provided information to journalists. The center served as a reference point for all involved parties. This included members of national and international aid organizations, relief workers, major NGOs such as the United Nations, international volunteers, and members of the local community. In helping the
BNPB reassure the public, the crisis team was able to prevent a panic from making an already difficult situation even worse.

Providing Vital Information
The most tangible example of the media center’s contribution was the quantitative measurement of media coverage following the team’s arrival. Once the media center had been established, the number of articles with a negative tone decreased by 62.4 percent in only one week. This quick reduction in negative press coverage underscored the effectiveness of the crisis team in countering misinformation and making the public aware of the reality of the situation. In the month following the earthquake, the number of negative articles written had been reduced to just 9.6 percent.

More important still, the ability of IndoPacific Edelman’s crisis team to efficiently manage the media center and all crisis communications was essential in helping restore order following the disaster, and in providing vital information to all parties. This was essential in moving recovery efforts forward in the region.

In short, IndoPacific Edelman’s media center brought calm in the midst of chaos.

About IndoPacific Edelman
IndoPacific Edelman, a member of Edelman Worldwide, is Indonesia’s largest PR firm, with over 100 employees; it offers corporate communications, public affairs management, crisis management, and consumer PR. In the past six years, IndoPacific Edelman has won an IPRA Frontline Award, a Stevie Award, a Cakram Award as Indonesia’s PR Agency of The Year, a PR Week Award, and an Indonesian IPRA Award. For more information go to www.indopacedelman.com.

About the Crisis Response Team
Aditya Chandra Wardhana is currently IndoPacific Edelman’s Director for Public Affairs. He has been assisting many clients across industry sectors with his insights and strategic counsel. He completed his Ph.D. in Southeast Asian Political Economics at St. Antony’s College, Oxford, UK in July 2004.

Ezta Wahyudi is a senior consultant for the firm, providing key support for various programs including running the media centers for the Yogyakarta earthquake, the Mount Merapi disasters, and UNICEF’s Measles Campaign.

As a consultant in the Public Affairs division, Patria Pinandita specializes in industrial relations and issue and crisis management.

We've just published a new tipsheet called 10 Tips for Winning PR Awards in the 2011 Stevie Awards.  Get it here.

It summarizes the 10 best ways that public relations and communications professionals can be recognized in the four Stevie Awards competitions in 2011 (which include The American Business Awards, the International Business Awards, the Stevie Awards for Women in Business, and the Stevie Awards for Sales & Customer Service).  For the most part it recommends the public relations awards, web awards, and other categories that PR folks should focus on, and outlines the general submission requirements for those categories.

Gravitas Communications is a strategic communications firms that operates at the nexus of public relations, Social Media and Search Engine Optimization. Founded in 2005 by Jocelyn Johnson, Gravitas won a Stevie Award for Communications or PR Campaign of the Year in the 2010 Stevie Awards for Women in Business.  This public relations award was accepted by Jocelyn Johnson at the ceremony in New York on November 12, 2010.  See her acceptance speech here.

Gravitas won their 2010 Stevie for their campaign entitled "Motor Trend 2010 Car of the Year: Good News for US Automaker."  As Gravitas reported in their winning nomination:

"There was a poignancy associated with the winner of the 2010 Car of the Year award – the Ford Fusion.  As the nation and the world worried whether Detroit could be saved, it seemed fitting that the oldest and strongest of the “Big Three” would emerge triumphant among the global field of contenders. Gravitas Communications was tasked with launching a campaign for the 2010 award that would reach new levels of coverage and serve as a positive and motivating boost to the American auto market – but with half the budget compared to prior years.  The goal was to appeal to a mass audience, with the widest possible national
and international media coverage.  The Gravitas team architected a comprehensive publicity plan that efficiently reached the broadest audience possible and was inclusive of all major communications channels including: print, television, radio, web, social media and online video. "

The results of the winning campaign (as of early October 2010) included:

- 1200 Tweets
- 175 Television hits
-  400 online articles
-  4187 streams on the Webcast - 6x more than we hoped for; currently 17,100 views on YouTube
- The Contender video has garnered more than 67,000 views on YouTube
- Live broadcast on FoxBiz
- Nationally syndicated Associated Press article; front page of FoxNews.com ,
CNBC.vom, MSNBC.com, CNN.com, USA Today.com, Yahoo.com
- MotorTrend.com broke a million page views overall, only the second time the site has achieved that level of traffic

The next opportunities to win PR awards in Stevie Awards programs?  The PR awards categories of The 9th annual American Business Awards, and the PR awards categories of The 8th annual International Business Awards.

Coca-Cola HBC Romania, Bucharest, Romania was presented with the Stevie Award for Public Affairs Communications or PR Campaign of the Year, in the PR awards categories at The 2010 International Business Awards banquet in Istanbul on September 27.

When Romania became a member of the European Community in 2007, EU legislation required that Romania increase its waste recovery to 60% by 2013.

The main challenges for the country to reach this target were the lack of an integrated waste-management system with appropriate legislation—and the need to educate the population on separate collection.

Coca-Cola HBC Romania, part of the Coca-Cola Hellenic Group, took a leading role in Romania’s efforts to build an integrated system to recover packaging and to provide an awareness campaign for the general population. Separate collection and recycling represent the main sustainability directions of the company.

Objectives
Coca-Cola HBC Romania’s Community Programs team, led by Laura Sgarcitu, an experienced Public Affairs & Communications Specialist, had three objectives: to promote a legislative framework to support a waste management system; to make a significant contribution to attaining the national target set by the EU; and to promote the importance of separate collection and recycling at a national level.

A 2008 study carried out by the Institute of Marketing and Surveys in Romania (IMAS) had revealed that only half the Romanian population collected separately. In 2009, the Community Programs team at Coca-Cola HBC developed a platform on separate collection, the two major components of which were a lobbying program aimed at outlining a legislative framework for separate collection in Romania, and an educational campaign targeting the public.

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From scottgdouglas on twitter:

RT @cipr_scotland: The full list of winners from last night's glittering Scottish PR awards - http://ow.ly/34OTn (http://twitter.com/scottgdouglas/statuses/448484494811136)

Congratulations to all the winners in this year's Scottish PR awards.  Don't forget to nominate in public relations awards and communications awards categories in The 2011 International Business Awards!

Now that we're coming to the end of 2010 and we look back over the Stevie Award winners for the year, it's apparent that Weber Shandwick truly is the agency of the year for its haul of pr awards.

The agency won the Stevie for Public Relations Agency of the Year in The 8th annual American Business Awards back in June in New York.  You can read the full-text of their Stevie-winning nomination on the ABA web site.

Weber Shandwick Europe then won the International Stevie for Public Relations Agency of the Year in Europe in The 7th annual International Business Awards, which were presented in Istanbul, Turkey on September 27.  That award was accepted by Rose de la Pascua, Chair of Weber Shandwick Spain and Executive Vice President for Continental Europe.  Read the full-text of Weber Shandwick Europe's Stevie-winning entry on the IBA web site.

Members of the Weber Shandwick network around the world also won honors in Stevie Awards's public relations awards categories in 2010, including among others AC Sanafor in Finland, McCann PR in Romania, Corporate Weber Shandwick in India, and Weber Shandwick in Dallas, Texas among others.

In addition, the agency won a raft of other awards in 2010.

So who'll be the Stevies' agency of the year in 2011?

In 2010 we introduced a lot of new public relations and communications awards categories in The American Business Awards, and we haven't added any new ones for 2011.  But I thought I'd take a moment here to outline the categories that I think are the best fit for public relations, corporate communications, public affairs, and investor relations professionals, because not all of them are plainly labelled.

First off, there are those categories that are plainly labelled, and they include the many Communications or PR Campaign/Program of the Year categories we introduced in 2010.  Here are the main communications categories (the letter/nomination combinations are our internal category codes):

C01. Public Relations Agency of the Year

C02. Communications Department of the Year

C03. Communications Team of the Year

C04. Investor Relations Campaign/Program of the Year

C05. Communications or PR Campaign/Program of the Year
         a. Community Relations: campaigns/programs that aim to improve relations with communities in which the sponsoring organization has an interest, need or opportunity.
         b. Crisis Communications: campaigns/programs undertaken to deal with an unplanned event and requiring immediate response.
         c. Global Issues: campaigns/programs that demonstrate effective global communications implemented in at least two countries, one of which must be the United States.
         d. Issues Management: campaigns/programs undertaken to deal with issues that could extraordinarily affect ongoing business strategy.
         e. Low Budget (under $10,000): campaigns/programs that cost no more than $10,000 to plan and implement.
         f. Marketing – Business to Business: campaigns/programs designed to introduce new products or promote existing products or services to a business audience.
         g. Marketing – Consumer Products: campaigns/programs designed to introduce new products or promote existing products to a consumer audience.
         h. Marketing – Consumer Services: campaigns/programs designed to introduce new services or promote existing services to a consumer audience.
         i. Multicultural: campaigns/programs specifically targeted to a cultural group.
         j. Reputation/Brand Management: campaigns/programs designed to enhance, promote or improve the reputation of an organization with its publics or key elements of its publics.
         k. Public Affairs: campaigns/programs specifically designed to influence public policy and/or affect legislation, regulations, political activities or candidacies.
         l. Public Service: campaigns/programs that advance public understanding of societal issues, problems or concerns.
         m. Social Media Focused: campaigns/programs designed to be implemented primarily through online social media.       

C06. Communications, Investor Relations, or PR Executive of the Year

C07. Communications Professional of the Year (for non-executive communications, PR, and IR professionals).  This category has no entry fee.

These categories all require pretty much the same information:
a. An essay or case of up to 500 words about the achievements of the nominee since January 1 2010.  Depending on the category the nominee can be an entire department, a team, an individual, or the performance of a campaign or program.
b. A set of links to online work samples, news articles, press releases, videos, images, etc. that support the nomination.  This is optional but highly recommended.  You can provide as many links as you'd like, but up to 20 is optimal.
c. A brief biography of up to 100 words about the nominee or the leader of the nominated department, team, or campaign/program initiative.

As always we welcome your comments and questions about these categories and how to enter.

There are a number of other ABA categories that should be of interest to communications professionals, including many of the corporate literature and annual report awards categories, web site and blog awards categories, video awards categories, and live event awards categories.  I recommend that you take a look at these as well.