IBM, Mashable and AOL among judging panel for The Drum Content Awards
Leading figures from IBM, AOL and Mashable will be among the judging panel honouring the top talent in content marketing at The Drum Content Awards 2015.
The newly launched awards will be held on Wednesday 18 November 2015 at the Emirates Stadium in London and will recognise the brands, agencies and publishers who have created the most engaging and innovative content in the marketing industry.
Companies based anywhere in the world can enter and have until midnight on Friday 7 August to submit their applications via The Drum Content Awards website.
The event is comprised of 30 categories which include Best Branded Content Campaign, Best Use of Mobile Content and Best b2b Content Marketing Strategy/ Campaign.
The entries will be assessed on clear strategic thinking across four key areas: innovation, tangible results, proof of effectiveness and creativity.
A campaign has been created to drum up interest in the awards, led by an ad from the BAFTA-award winning duo Heydon Prowse and Jolyon Rubinstein. The ad riffs on the rise of content in the marketer’s lexicon, featuring Prowse and Rubinstein as ad executives as they have a conference call with an unseen client about creating “content that’s going to win you awards”. The conversation is peppered with panicked exchanges between the two and during the video, the Heydon and Jolyon pitch ridiculous ideas around Drum Content Awards categories.
As well as helping to stand out from competitors, the awards will give those who enter the opportunity to have their work judged by a highly esteemed judging panel.
The head of marketing for IBM Global Business Services UK & Ireland, Owen Tebbutt, has 20 years’ experience in senior business to business marketing and strategy and will serve on the panel of judges.
Discussing the upcoming awards, Tebbutt said: "I'm really looking forward to helping to judge the inaugural The Drum Content Awards. I'm anticipating being wowed by some amazing entries, which genuinely push the boundaries of creative thinking, innovate customer engagement and commercial success - built from the foundations of sound business strategies."
Also on the panel is Justin Kirby who heads up strategic content marketing at the new interactive US agency Tenthwave, whose clients include Facebook, Google and eBay.
Kirby highlighted the importance of The Drum Content Awards in showing how important branded content is. He said: “Branded content is predicted to be at the heart of every marketing strategy, and one of the best ways to understand how it can help clients meet their business challenges is to highlight the most effective and inspirational examples."
Other notable figures amongst the judging panel include Ben Maher, executive director of advertising for EMEA at Mashable, and Steve Payne who leads the Commercial Planning, Insight and Research function for AOL businesses outside the US and Canada.