ECHO Awards Entry a Blatant Self-Promotion But It Works!

February 14, 2011 — The 2011 International ECHO Awards Call for Entry campaign created by OgilvyOne in New York for the Direct Marketing Association (DMA) is not only a blatant play for an award itself, but a fully-fledged marketing campaign that delivers a tracking tool that lets those on the sideline judge the work as well.

Featuring two Creatives, shameless in their attempts to win an ECHO themselves, the headline to solicit agencies to submit work states: “You Enter. We Win. (And oh yeah you could win too).” You can enter and see the work here: http://dma-echo.org/enter.jsp.

With a new mobile and Web-based app, inspired by the real judging form, agencies can rate their own work — and others — to see if their work is good enough to potentially win. Every submission can get an ECHO number – the cumulative rating of strategy, creativity and results that benchmarks business impact. Like the real judging form, 30 points are given for each category plus a new innovation – an additional 10 points for sheer “mojo,” rewarding bold, innovative work.

“For the first time since its inception, we’ve updated the judging criteria for the ECHOs, creating the ‘mojo’ factor to recognize fresh, dynamic, direct response ideas that deliver outstanding results. It’s our hope that this new formula, combined with the novel tracking tools OgilvyOne has created for us, will attract new audiences and entries to the ECHO awards,” said Barbara Parker, awards program director, DMA.

The call for entries campaign will be promoted through YouTube videos, Facebook, direct response, email marketing and real world stunts. Additionally, a bookmarklet allows the user to be the judge, applying the ECHO number to advertising they see anywhere online from any agency. A gallery will collect the user-judged pieces — highlighting the crowd's thoughts on the best the industry has to offer.

“The ECHOs is underestimated as an opportunity for modern Creatives. There is so much great work out there that could win if more of the cutting-edge agencies could see for themselves how they’d fare. The app encourages you that it’s worthwhile,” explained Mat Zucker, chief creative officer at OgilvyOne in New York.

Introduced in 1929 as the “Best in Direct Mail” contest, the DMA International ECHO Awards honor excellence in creativity, marketing strategy, and response results in direct marketing campaigns. With over 1,000 entries submitted by direct response agencies worldwide, DMA’s annual ECHO Awards recognize every type of media used in direct and digital marketing campaigns.

For more information about the International ECHO Awards, which will be presented on Tuesday, October 4, 2011, during the DMA2011 Conference & Exhibition, please visit www.echoawards.org. To register or for additional information about DMA2011, being held October 1-6 Boston, please visit www.dma11.org.

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About Direct Marketing Association (DMA)

The Direct Marketing Association (www.the-dma.org) is the leading global trade association of businesses and nonprofit organizations using and supporting multichannel direct marketing tools and techniques. DMA advocates standards for responsible marketing, promotes relevance as the key to reaching consumers with desirable offers, and provides cutting-edge research, education, and networking opportunities to improve results throughout the end-to-end direct marketing process. Founded in 1917, DMA today represents companies from dozens of vertical industries in the US and 48 other nations, including nearly half of the Fortune 100 companies, as well as nonprofit organizations.

In 2010, marketers – commercial and nonprofit – spent $153.3 billion on direct marketing, which accounted for 54.2% of all ad expenditures in the United States. Measured against total US sales, these advertising expenditures generated approximately $1.798 trillion in incremental sales. In 2010, direct marketing accounted for 8.3% of total US gross domestic product. Also in 2010, there were 1.4 million direct marketing employees in the US. Their collective sales efforts directly supported 8.4 million other jobs, accounting for a total of 9.8 million US jobs.

About OgilvyOne

OgilvyOne Worldwide is the strongest, most experienced and most highly awarded one-to-one marketing network in the world, with over 120 offices in 50 countries. It provides clients with a full range of direct, consulting and interactive services to deliver profitable customer relationships. The roster of clients is equally balanced between global clients including American Express, Cisco, IBM, Lenovo, Nestlé, SAP and Unilever, and leading clients in our local markets. OgilvyOne Worldwide is a unit of The Ogilvy Group, a WPP company (NASDAQ: WPPGY), one of the world's largest communications services groups.

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