• by September 23, 2005

To some general market media strategists, b-to-b often reads like "boring-to-boring." This year's finalists provide new reasons to think of industrial media as both creative and industrious.

WINNER

Agency: StarLink Worldwide

Client: Hewitt Associates

The Starlink media team sought to connect with an elusive target -- Fortune 1000 CEOs -- by creating an original online concept called The Hewitt Golf Challenge. This virtual golf competition enabled participants to play golf on their own time, competing with one another via an online leader board. The program offered one-of-kind prizes like luxury golf equipment and the chance to golf with Arnold Palmer and Annika Sorenstam. It also offered integrated on-line/offline engagement through exclusive invitations, direct marketing, and outbound contacts. All of these elements allowed Hewitt to initiate relationships with the 130 ceos who responded to the program, more than double the goal. The Hewitt Golf Challenge ran for two months and represented $66 million in incremental revenue opportunities for the company. The Challenge has become a branded property that Hewitt has turned into an annual event. CAPTION Business Jump Start: The Yahoo! campaign featured Sheraton' s Laura Cicchelli, VP and CMO.

Agency: MPG North America

Client: Agilent Technologies

MPG found a way to break through what it calls "boring science advertising" by creating a long-format Web commercial that was humorous, yet had a strong product message. The effort, "The Science of Attraction," was designed to introduce the Agilent Total rna Isolation Mini Kit to scientists in the life sciences arena. This was a unique effort to reach scientists, who are typically targeted via trade magazines and trade shows, and are skeptical of advertising. After just five weeks, the target audience viewed the Web commercial on Biocompare.com more than 10,000 times. As of last February, there had been over 25,000 views, with 60 percent of those from scientists who received the link from a colleague, confirming the commercial's viral marketing success. The first video was so successful that Agilent funded two additional humorous spots.

Agency: SoHo Square, Yahoo!

Client: Yahoo!

In January, 2005, Yahoo! launched a major trade ad initiative aimed at advertisers. The Soho Square and Yahoo! team set out to show that while Yahoo! is a "life engine" for millions of consumers, it is also an effective business marketing engine. To attract the attention of influential media professionals, the business- to-business media campaign featured well-known executives from many leading brands who were current Yahoo! clients. For example, online and print executions featured the top marketers from Pepsi, Sony, and Sheraton. Yahoo! is planning to include more industry categories in future versions of the campaign. Fun headlines like "Yahoo! is a Fizz Engine" accompanied each execution. The ads targeted brand managers, chief marketing officers at Fortune 500 companies, and ad agency executives. The effort also deployed Yahoo!'s own targeting technology to deliver ads to Yahoo! visitors that came from a targeted list of domains (i.e., pepsi.com, hyatt.com, etc.).