• by Joe Mandese , January 2, 2007

For the fourth time in the four years since MEDIA magazine has bestowed the honor, Publicis' Starcom has been named "Media Agency of the Year" for its industry-leading work over the past year. Actually, Starcom MediaVest Group--the parent-level unit comprising Chicago-based Starcom and New York-based MediaVest--took top honors for 2003 and 2004, but in the 2005 awards competition, MEDIA's judging forced the units to compete separately. MediaVest was once again a strong finalist in 2006 and helped influence Starcom's win. Other strong contenders included OMD, which demonstrated creative media excellence; MindShare, which had some of the best systems and people of any media agency; and Aegis Group's Carat--which seemed to have it all, and one of the best new business records of the year, despite being thrown into a renewed "re-pitch" for Wal-Mart's media account.

In fact, 2006 was an excruciatingly tough year to judge. The competition was close, and the margin of difference among these best in class media shops small, but in the end Starcom came out on top once again by delivering on the main criteria MEDIA magazine uses to judge these awards: innovation, vision--and perhaps most important, leadership.

In the end, these were very close decisions, but by articulating specific examples of leadership--coming out a year ahead of the rest of the industry on TV commercial ratings and being willing to dig deep to support them; organizing a seamless video upfront; and reorganizing around the concept of activation--Starcom set itself apart.

We selected Crispin Porter + Bogusky as Media Department of the Year; Initiative's Innovations & Entertainment unit as Media Boutique of the Year; WPP's GroupM as Media Agency Holding Company of the Year; and Toyota as Media Client of the Year. Each in its own way led the industry in 2006 and inspired others to follow suit.

Also at MediaPost, OMMA magazine and Marketing Daily have announced their annual awards for the best in class of 2006.

AKQA was named OMMA's agency of the year. OMMA awarded Digitas its "Silver" award for the year. Best creative agency honors went to RPA Interactive. R/GA was named the best Web design/development agency. Reprise was named best search agency. And Universal McCann got OMMA's top honors for media planning and buying.

Marketing Daily named Apple Computer its Marketer of the Year for 2006. In vertical marketing categories, Toyota was named Automotive Marketer of the year, Unilever (Dove) was named Consumer Packaged Goods Marketer of the Year, Bank of America was named Financial Services Marketer of the Year, McDonald's was named Restaurant Marketer of the year, and Target was named Retail Marketer of the Year.

MEDIA's and Marketing Daily's awards will be bestowed during a ceremony in New York on the evening of Jan. 23. OMMA's awards ceremony will take place in New York on the evening of Jan. 17.