This year I have been asked to help judge the DMA awards for 2010. This is a great opportunity to see some of the best work in Asia, and get some insight from fellow judges on how they perceive the work. So I am very happy to do it, although it is not something I have done since my days back in London when I was part of BIMA. Of course we hope to enter a few things too. At the DMA’s last year we won Gold and Silver (Dell and Intel) and helped Intel & Dell win joint Digital Brands of the year.

Intel was announced a winner for ‘corporate reputation & professional services’ at the recent worldwide Effie awards. The award was given for the ‘Sponsors of Tomorrow’ campaign.

And graciously they acknowledged all their global agency partners help in bringing the campaign to life.

• Venables Bell & Partners
• Tag Worldwide
• OMD
• The Upper Storey Pte Ltd
• Bates 141 HK

For us it was great fun to put together the ‘rockstar viral’ work for India.

The Upper Storey has been nominated in the Top 10 for two categories in this years “Marketing Magazines Agency of the Year Awards”. This is an interesting award as it is nominated by clients and peers. It is hard to influence and thus, in the end, is a pretty fair judgment of agencies.
For TUS it is our first time in these awards – we are very happy to to make it to this list of great agencies.
Also nice was the fact we are nominated as Local Hero for both categories.

Creative Agency of the Year – Advertising for Non-Traditional Media
Finalists
* BBDO/Proximity
* Blue Interactive
* Euro RSCG
* Kinetic
* McCann Erickson
* OgilvyOne
* TBWA\Tequila
* The Upper Storey
* Tribal DDB
* XM

Local Hero Finalists
* 8RewardsRoad.com
* Kinetic
* The Upper Storey

Creative Agency of the Year – Digital Creative Services
Finalists
* 8RewardsRoad.com
* Arc Worldwide
* BBDO/Proximity
* Blue Interactive
* Kinetic
* OgilvyOne
* TBWA\Tequila
* The Upper Storey
* Tribal DDB
* XM

Local Hero Finalists
* 8RewardsRoad.com
* Kinetic
* The Upper Storey

Dell Swarm has just won “Best Use of the Digital Landscape” at the Festival of Media Awards in Valencia Spain. This is a very prestigious award up against some very stiff (big spending) global competition.

I am glad it is doing the rounds, winning global awards (while we are hard at work :p)

Our Intel Tomorrow Stars, Today wins greater recognition with a Bronze Award for Best Breakthrough Site and Most Outrageous / Humorous Online Ad or Campaign.

Meanwhile, the buzz from Dell Swarm continues, as we picked up a Bronze Award for Best Social Media Campaign at Asia Interactive Awards 2009.

Dell Swarm - award winner for Intel & Dell

We do love awards. While we know the whole process is a game, and you have to look beyond the immediate glitz and drill into the details of the campaign – it is great for us to have some recognition of our work.

But now we know it is an even greater thrill to win an award for your client. And not just one client but two!

So this week helping Dell & Intel become joint Digital Media Brands of the year is probably one of the best pieces we have heard in 2009. And it is well deserved, it is not just an isolated campaign, they are out there pushing the boundaries in new marketing practice all the time.

We are looking forward to meeting more brands like them in 2010.

Dell Swarm is having a nice run at various award shows. Last week picking up a Bronze at the Spikes – and excitingly it picked up 3 awards at the SMA’s including the Grand Prix last night.

This is very encouraging, as this was all based on the Singapore version. The version 2.0 in Canada has major improvements and additions – so wait until we tell the world about that.

You can read more about the awards here… nothing about The Upper Storey – but hey – its only a Media agency show anyway

Our “Tomorrow’s Stars, Today” site for Intel wins Site of the Day for August 8th over at the prestigious design portal Favorite Website Awards. Yay! Thanks guys.