Winners 2026
CAMPAIGN CATEGORIES
BEST AUDIENCE ENGAGEMENT
Making AutoSergei real with Meer-tech
Merkle
Client: Compare the Market
AutoSergei: The Meer‑tech that reinvented Price Comparison In a competitive market of annoying operatic singers, robots called Brian, and men dancing in suit jackets and high heels, the Meerkats played a critical role in CtM’s rapid growth in the Price Comparison market. But in an evolving world, where research shows ‘co...
Away Resorts App & Platform
Intelligent Mobile
Client: Away Resorts
The primary digital interface for the on-park holiday experience - powering 150,000 daily sessions and £8.3m in revenue. The problem Holiday parks are mobile-first. Guests move around constantly and make decisions in real time. The previous app didn’t support this: • Activities were hard to find and book • Guests missed a...
Building a Consumer Brand for Nest
Goodstuff and MiQ
Client: Nest Pensions
Nest, one of the UK’s largest workplace pension providers, has a built-in audience. The challenge isn’t reach but engagement. A persistent knowledge-to-action gap in pensions guided our approach. Ahead of a 2026 launch, we tested a new campaign designed to retain members by tackling three barriers: low brand awareness, financial intimi...
Unlocking the Power of Premium for Taylors of Harrogate
Goodstuff and Ozone
Client: Taylors of Harrogate
Facing growing competition from supermarket own-label brands, Taylors of Harrogate aimed to increase awareness of the Taylors masterbrand and its Coffee Bags range while reinforcing its premium positioning. The challenge was not only to drive brand metrics but also to demonstrate that premium media environments can deliver tangible bus...
BEST CREATIVE USE OF AI
Shell V-Power Feel Closer
Shell
Feel Closer was created to solve a fundamental problem for Shell V-Power: in the premium fuel category, performance messaging didn't differentiate brands or shift behaviour. The task was not to prove superiority, but to create an emotional reason to choose Shell. Shell’s 75-year partnership with Scuderia Ferrari HP provided the a...
From the Mountains to the City
R/GA
Client: Google x Moncler
In early 2025, Google launched its game-changing Veo 2 —- at the time, the most powerful generative video technology available. But, the constant advances in AI were making it hard to know what was possible from one day to the next, an important context to consider for this work. Meaning Google needed to showcase what was possible...
Allwyn's Euromillions 13 Millionaire Makers Event
Hearts & Science
Client: Allwyn
In June 2025, Allwyn needed EuroMillions to cut through a crowded, highly regulated lottery market during a compressed five-day Millionaire Maker event (9–13 June). With 13 guaranteed UK millionaires, a £200m+ jackpot and 13 luxury holidays unlocked by purchasing two tickets online or via the app, the opportunity was significant but on...
Carve Your Way
PMG
Client: FXTM
The United Arab Emirates’ forex market is immensely competitive, making it difficult to break through a category saturated with performance-driven messaging and visually similar creative. FXTM needed a premium, emotionally resonant campaign to elevate their positioning and capture the attention of ambitious investors and experienced sw...
Rethinking the Speed of Sound
AMA (A Million Ads)
Client: Sky Sports on NOW
As digital audio listenership surges, sports fans increasingly demand hyper-personalised, in-the-moment messaging. However, scaling traditional audio creative to meet the unpredictable, lightning-fast nature of live sport consistently shatters media budgets and production timelines. Enter A Million Ads' dynamic audio solution for...
The Royal Navy’s “Atlas”: Supporting Submariner Recruitment
Wavemaker UK
Client: The Royal Navy
The safety of our seas and water boundaries as a nation is always of paramount importance. With the geo-political instability of the world, the need for a robust, well-staffed Royal Navy was greater than ever. No more so, than when it comes to the Submariners. The Submariners are a highly secretive operation. Very few 16 – 24-y...
TripGo by Visa – The World’s First Branded Assistant
Tripadvisor
Client: Visa
TripGo by Visa is the world’s first Branded Assistant, a transformative AI tool that turns the functional task of travel search into an imaginative, conversational exploration. Developed by Tripadvisor, TripGo uses proprietary Agentic AI and Secure RAG technology to move beyond static results, allowing travellers to co-create bespoke i...
BEST INTEGRATED CAMPAIGN
Secret Menu
OMD UK
Client: McDonald's
Marketing orthodoxy tells brands to launch loud, explain fast, and maximise reach. We did the opposite. We hid. The Secret Menu wasn’t invented by McDonald’s… it already existed in fan culture. The Chicken Cheeseburger. Surf’N’Turf. Espresso Milkshake. We took something already whispered about and made it impossible not to talk about...
Tesco X Britain’s Got Talent: Big Screens. Big Rewards. Clubcard in the Spotlight.
DOOH.com, WPP Media, EssenceMediaCom
Client: Tesco
Tesco Clubcard turned Britain’s Got Talent into Britain’s Got Points. Viewers earned 500 Clubcard points every time they voted, announced live by Ant and Dec, while dynamic OOH screens brought live tallies, flashing points, countdowns, and playful animations to the streets. From TV to press, social, retail, and a wrapped bus tour, ever...
Sailing to Success
WPP Media – Wavemaker UK, P&O Cruises, WPP Media Solutions, DOOH.com, The Trade Desk
Client: P&O Cruises
In one of the most competitive UK travel markets on record, P&O Cruises faced an urgent challenge: defend its position as the UK’s #1 cruise brand while driving bookings during the crucial Wave sales window. With TV spend doubling year-on-year and more cruise brands competing for attention, the old approach simply wouldn’t cut it. ...
Side Missions
OMD UK
Client: McDonald's
McDonald’s had become a routine stop rather than the highlight of people’s days, so we set out to turn those everyday visits into something that could be celebrated. We called on gaming culture, realising that unplanned McDonald’s visits were already functioning as ‘side missions’ to every-day life. We elevated the tiny, joyful detou...
World Menu Heist
OMD UK
In a market crowded with new flavours, new apps, and shrinking wallets, McDonald’s needed more than a menu update. It needed a moment. So we engineered one. We didn’t launch new products… we stole them. Introducing The World Menu Heist: an audacious operation to smuggle McDonald’s global fan favourites into the UK. No test kitche...
BEST LOCATION-BASED OR PROXIMITY MARKETING CAMPAIGN
Your Bike, Right Now
DOOH.com, WPP Media, Wavemaker
Client: Transport for London
Londoners were cycling more than ever, yet Santander Cycles hires were falling. The issue was not demand, but visibility at the moment of need. Screens positioned near docking stations used live TfL data to show exactly how many bikes were available, how far away they were, and where to find them, in real time. By embedding real-time t...
Driving Awareness across the National-Local Divide
Sabio
Client: Hyundai
Hyundai faced a significant challenge during the launch of the new INSTER EV: delivering a high-prestige, national scope campaign that could simultaneously drive local footfall across its extensive UK dealer network. National mass-awareness campaigns often feel "distant" and lack the specific calls-to-action required to trigger dealers...
Endura - US Launch
EssenceMediacom a WPP Media Brand
Client: Endura
In July 2025, Endura partnered with REI to launch across 180 US stores, facing challenges including low brand awareness (12%), declining retail traffic, and a highly competitive sportswear market. To drive in-store sell-through and brand growth, we implemented a Location-Based programmatic campaign designed to deliver precision targeti...
Side Missions
OMD UK
Client: McDonald's
McDonald’s had become a routine stop rather than the highlight of people’s days, so we set out to turn those everyday visits into something that could be celebrated. We called on gaming culture, realising that unplanned McDonald’s visits were already functioning as ‘side missions’ to every-day life. We elevated the tiny, joyful detou...
The Gift of Giving
VIOOH, JCDecaux Norway
Client: Castello
Partnering with JCDecaux Norway, VIOOH, Vistar Media and The Barn: Arla Norway, Castello launched a programmatic digital out-of-home (pDOOH) campaign designed to master the last stage of the consumer journey. In a high-stakes period where Castello generates 20% of its annual revenue, the “Gift of Giving” campaign used precision proximi...
Turning Geography into Affordability
EssenceMediacom Scotland, a WPP Media brand
Client: Subway
Subway is a quick-service restaurant (QSR), a crowded category of burgers, coffee, fried chicken and sausage rolls – all delicious, and often impulsive, craveable food choices. Despite offering menu items from just £2.50, Subway under-indexed on affordability perceptions vs. competitors. Recognising that affordability is a mindset, n...
BEST OPERATIONAL USE OF AI
Breaking the fragmentation cycle with advanced AI
MiQ
MiQ Sigma set out to address programmatic advertising’s biggest challenge: fragmentation. It applies advanced AI to harmonise 300+ data sources and 700 trillion consumer signals annually, spanning what consumers watch, browse, and buy. This unified dataset represents 1.7 billion audience profiles, and combined with MiQ’...
Making AutoSergei real with Meer-tech
Merkle
Client: Compare the Market
AutoSergei: The Meer‑tech that reinvented Price Comparison In a competitive market of annoying operatic singers, robots called Brian, and men dancing in suit jackets and high heels, the Meerkats played a critical role in CtM’s rapid growth in the Price Comparison market. But in an evolving world, where research shows ‘comparing’...
NanoQ: The agentic media planner that thinks at the speed of intent
Nano Interactive
NanoQ: the agentic media planner that thinks at the speed of intent Nano Interactive is a global specialist in privacy-first, ID-free intent targeting, operating across 100+ markets and delivering 2,000+ high-performance campaigns for major brands worldwide. The challenge: Audience planning has always been slow, fragme...
Reprogramming Retail Visibility
CSA, Havas Media Network
Client: Matalan
Matalan competes in an intensely challenging UK retail landscape where larger players dominate visibility through scale and spend. With no ability to increase budgets, the brand needed a smarter way to grow. Google Shopping - its most important ecommerce channel - was underperforming, not due to weak media optimisation but because Mata...
TranscrAIbe: How AI Removed a Structural Quality Constraint in Transcription at Scale
Locaria
TranscrAIbe demonstrates how AI can deliver practical operational value when designed around real workflows and everyday constraints. At Locaria, transcription and subtitling were established operational tasks. Work was delivered on time and to specification. However, as volumes increased, the underlying limitations of the proce...
Where Context Becomes Intelligence: Operationalising Neuro-Contextual AI at Scale
Seedtag
Between January 2025 and January 2026, Seedtag embedded AI at the core of its operational model, transforming how advertising campaigns are planned, activated, and optimised at scale. Its proprietary AI system, Liz, operationalises Neuro-Contextual intelligence across the open web and Connected TV. Moving beyond keyword targeting...
BEST USE OF AR/VR
Beyond Borders - Augmented Highlights
City Studios
Client: Etihad Airways
City Studios and Etihad present 'Beyond Borders,' a pioneering initiative that made Manchester City the first Premier League club to utilise official skeletal player-tracking data to create immersive, destination-themed virtual highlights. The campaign was designed to spotlight Etihad Airways’ newest global flight destinations, includi...
3D Property Experience Platform
Intelligent Mobile & 3D Estate
Transforming how residential property is explored and secured through immersive 3D - at global scale. THE PROBLEM Property search still relies on static listings and floorplans. • Customers cannot understand position, layout or views • Decisions require physical visits • Leasing cycles are slow and costly C...
BEST USE OF CREATIVE PERSONALISATION
Churn risk programme: preventing supporter churn
The Guardian
At the Guardian, reader support is essential to sustaining independent journalism that remains free and accessible to all. With no billionaire owner and a unique, reader-funded business model, more than 1.3 million supporters make it possible for us to protect our independence. Protecting this model depends not only on bringing i...
Shell V-Power Feel Closer
Shell
Feel Closer was created to solve a fundamental problem for Shell V-Power: in the premium fuel category, performance messaging didn't differentiate brands or shift behaviour. The task was not to prove superiority, but to create an emotional reason to choose Shell. Shell’s 75-year partnership with Scuderia Ferrari HP provided the a...
100 Ways to Be More Relevant: How AI-Personalised Audio Built Awareness for Nioxin
Azerion UK
Client: Digitas, Wella - Nioxin
Nioxin needed to build awareness in a category where relevance matters as much as reach. Hair thinning is personal, emotional and easy to tune out if advertising feels generic. So instead of relying on one standard audio ad, Nioxin partnered with Azerion and AudioStack to create a personalised audio campaign designed to make the brand ...
How TTC won Black Friday through creative personalisation at scale
Brave Bison
Client: The Travel Corporation
In 2025, global travel leader The Travel Corporation (TTC) partnered with Brave Bison to transform its Black Friday strategy through creative personalisation at scale. Using unified paid and organic media across search and social, the campaign needed to outperform the previous year’s Black Friday period across three owned brands ...
Personalised guidance at scale for HSBC’s new banking app
Jaywing
Client: HSBC
When HSBC launched its redesigned banking app, millions of customers were about to experience a completely new interface, updated navigation and new tools to manage their finances. For most banks, a change like this risks confusion, frustration and spikes in contact-centre demand. Instead, Jaywing and HSBC saw an opportunity: use...
Share a Coke 2025: Turning personalisation into purchase
Uber Advertising/WPP
Client: Coca-Cola
Coca-Cola’s iconic ‘Share a Coke’ campaign was reimagined for the Gen Z audience in partnership with WPP and Uber Advertising. Through a highly personalised and creative activation, Coca-Cola achieved an impressive 15% uplift in SKU sales. WPP led strategy and creative development, uncovering audience insights and designing a ca...
BEST USE OF DATA – ENTERTAINMENT & RETAIL
Dr. Martens laces up data-driven insight to stomp out the competition
MiQ and Arena Media
Client: Dr. Martens
When Dr. Martens, known for being rite-of-passage break-in boots, brought out a soft suede, no laces comfort range called Zebzag we had to compete with leading global comfort footwear brands. We overcame a limiting data set by tapping into MiQ’s newly launched AI-powered technology, Sigma, to create postcode battlegrounds across the UK...
Finding the switchable viewer
Blis X Arena Media
Client: UK TV
UKTV faced a clear challenge: grow audiences and boost commercial impact. With linear viewing sliding 6% nationally, success meant outsmarting a shrinking market, not chasing the same entrenched, low‑growth opportunity viewers. Our hypothesis was simple but bold: growth would come from audiences with the highest propensity to...
How Kepler & route1.io transformed easyJet’s MMM with Causal Data
Kepler
Client: easyJet
easyJet’s Marketing Mix Model (MMM) drives multi-million-pound retail budget decisions. Yet social media’s contribution lacked statistical clarity due to high correlation with other digital channels, creating uncertainty in allocation and growth planning. Kepler and route1.io solved this by embedding causal experimentation direct...
BEST USE OF DATA – FINANCIAL & PROFESSIONAL SERVICES
Volume of Insights
RAPP
Client: Barclays
Performance advertising is vital to convert potential customers who are ready to buy, but traditional approaches like A/B testing or limited pilots aren't fit for today's AI-driven, algorithmic landscape, and can't keep up with the complexity and opacity of platform algorithms - the gatekeepers between brands and audiences. Recog...
Making AutoSergei real with Meer-tech
Merkle
Client: Compare the Market
AutoSergei: The Meer‑tech that reinvented Price Comparison In a competitive market of annoying operatic singers, robots called Brian, and men dancing in suit jackets and high heels, the Meerkats played a critical role in CtM’s rapid growth in the price comparison market. But in an evolving world where research shows ‘comparing’ ...
Reimagining First-Party Data Activation in Insurance Marketing
AUDIENCES
Client: Saga Plc
Saga Insurance redefined how first-party data can be activated for advertising in a highly regulated, privacy-first insurance market. Saga set out to unlock the full value of its rich customer data while retaining complete control and trust. In partnership with AUDIENCES, Saga deployed a cloud-native activation solution operating...
Turning Salesforce Sales Data into Revenue-Led Paid Search
OMD UK
Client: British Gas
Paid search is the engine of British Gas’s boiler acquisition strategy, accounting for the lion’s share of performance investment. Yet despite its scale, paid search performance had a fundamental limitation: success was measured by leads, not sales. In partnership with TRKKN, we set out to shift from volume-led optimisation to v...
Turning YouTube Signals into Carbon Decisioning
The GoodNet
Client: WPP & Indeed
YouTube is a proven performance driver for Indeed - but a channel that generates CO2 emissions roughly 20% higher than standard online video. Historically, the walled-garden nature of YouTube has made meaningful emissions optimisation almost impossible. Indeed gave The GoodNet the mandate to change that, with one non-negotiable conditi...
Using real-time flight data to drive brand uplift
VIOOH, JCDecaux Singapore, WallDecaux, Displayce
Client: Avaloq
Avaloq ran a programmatic digital out of home campaign at Singapore Changi Airport to build brand awareness and credibility among business travellers and financial decision makers. The campaign used live flight destination data to ensure messaging was delivered only when relevant audiences were present and travelling to key financial h...
BEST USE OF DATA – FOOD & DRINK
Serving up Segmentation Success
the7stars
Client: Gousto
As the recipe box category became increasingly driven by price and promotional messaging, Gousto faced a structural challenge. While value-led acquisition continued to drive scale, retention beyond the early lifecycle emerged as the key constraint on maximising lifetime value. Analysis revealed a clear pattern: Gousto’s highest L...
How Samsung Ads Deployed a Dynamic CTV Campaign to Capture New Revenue for Crumbl
Samsung Ads
Client: Crumbl
By mid-2025, Crumbl had become a fast-growing national dessert brand with a familiar challenge: social and search were driving the majority of app installs, but incremental growth was becoming harder—and more expensive—to sustain. While volume remained strong, returns were flattening. Crumbl didn’t need more of the same audience; it ne...
BEST USE OF DATA – OTHER CONSUMER GOODS
How HP transformed live football scores into an an extended pitch
VIOOH, WallDecaux
Client: HP
The HP Smart Tank “Comfort Seekers” campaign in Germany sought to shake up the brand’s advertising strategy through a clever mix of programmatic DOOH and data-driven, contextual marketing. Real-time football data fuelled this campaign - the first ever dynamic creative optimisation (DCO) campaign launched by HP’s In-House team in EMEA. ...
GumGum's AI-optimised European campaign for RWE
GumGum
Client: RWE and EMC
RWE is an energy firm that was looking to use digital advertising to strengthen its brand in the renewable energy sector. To do this, the company and its agency EMC engaged advertising technology company GumGum to create a sophisticated campaign targeting a highly specific B2B audience across key European markets, including the UK, Ger...
BEST USE OF EXPERIENTIAL TECH
StainedXSW
WPP Media
Client: Dirt is Good (Persil/Omo)
How do you make someone feel the soul of a game played on dirt pitches thousands of miles away? You don't just show them. You let them create the story on their own shirt. Dirt is Good (Persil/Omo) transformed SXSW London into StainedxSW, an immersive experience designed to connect a UK audience with the soul of Brazil's grassroo...
3D Property Experience Platform
Intelligent Mobile & 3D Estate
TRANSFORMING PROPERTY SEARCH INTO SPATIAL DECISION-MAKING THROUGH INTERACTIVE 3D EXPERIENCES THE CHALLENGE Residential property discovery still depends on: Static listings and 2D floorplans Physical viewings to build confidence Virtual tours disconnected from live availability and booking journeys Customers...
BEST USE OF GAMING
Philips OneBlade: Body Royale
Ketchum
Client: Philips Personal Health WE
Launched in June 2025, the Philips OneBlade Body Royale campaign engaged Gen Z men through a world-first: a custom, surreal Fortnite map built around a fully playable virtual human body. Forget skins. In Body Royale, body hair is the game. Developed by Ketchum UK, Fuse DE and OMD, this interactive 'grooming odyssey' turn...
The 78-Minute Gamer Break that Tropicana’s Naked Smoothie Timed Perfectly
Overwolf Ads x dentsu X
Client: Tropicana/Naked Smoothie
There are over 1.86 billion PC gamers worldwide, and Overwolf is home to 113M of them playing the most premium titles. Unlike mobile, bigger screens & deeper immersion equals wildly longer playtime sessions. When digging deeper, we discovered a recurring pattern: millions of players take a natural break around the 78-minute mark. ...
BEST USE OF INNOVATION
Shell V-Power Feel Closer
Shell
Feel Closer was created to solve a fundamental problem for Shell V-Power: in the premium fuel category, performance messaging didn't differentiate brands or shift behaviour. The task was not to prove superiority, but to create an emotional reason to choose Shell. Shell’s 75-year partnership with Scuderia Ferrari HP provided the a...
Real‑Time Signals Driving Real Revenue
MG OMD
Client: Halfords
Halfords came to us with a clear ambition: unlock new growth across their garage network in an increasingly competitive market. Their national Paid Search activity was still running, but performance wasn’t aligned with reality on the ground. Demand and supply were out of sync. Customers were sent to garages with limited immediate avail...
From Optimising to Optim-AI-sing: an innovative new omnichannel approach for Tu
PHD
Client: Sainsbury's/Tu
The Tu Omnichannel Bidding Test transformed our paid media approach by integrating in-store sales data into Meta for the first time. Traditionally, Tu’s performance campaigns optimised solely for website sales, despite the majority of purchases taking place in-store. By collaborating with Sainsbury’s MarTech team and harnessing Nectar ...
Genius Sports Investor Day 2025
Imagination
Imagination partnered with Genius Sports to deliver Investor Day 2025, a landmark event designed to reposition the sports data company as the architecture powering sport's digital transformation. Four years after listing on the NYSE, Genius Sports needed to move beyond financial reporting and viscerally demonstrate the capabilities ...
The Royal Navy’s “Atlas”: Supporting Submariner Recruitment
Wavemaker UK
Client: The Royal Navy
The safety of our seas and water boundaries as a nation is always of paramount importance. With the geo-political instability of the world, the need for a robust, well-staffed Royal Navy was greater than ever. No more so, than when it comes to the Submariners. The Submariners are a highly secretive operation. Very few 16 – 24-y...
TripGo by Visa – The World’s First Branded Assistant
Tripadvisor
Client: Visa
TripGo by Visa – Redefining Travel Guidance with Agentic AI Tripadvisor and Visa partnered to launch TripGo, the travel industry’s first Branded Assistant. Designed to transform how travelers discover and spend in-destination, TripGo moves beyond static chatbots to provide a conversational AI companion that offers real-time, pers...
When Rivals Become Partners
Arena Media UK
Client: UKTV
This campaign entry outlines how Arena Media helped UKTV overcome major challenges in driving growth for its streaming platform, U. Despite low category share and limited budgets, the core issue wasn’t trial but retention: 85% of U’s audience were light or lapsed users, and the streaming landscape lacked effective cross‑device targetin...
BEST USE OF INSIGHT
How Smart Insights Sparked Lasting Commitment
The Guardian
The Guardian’s CRM team set out to solve a clear challenge: converting one-time supporters into recurring supporters. While single donations are vital to sustaining our journalism, data revealed that 69% of these supporters never gave again, highlighting a missed opportunity to build deeper, long-term relationships with an already enga...
ClaireTalk: Turning Data into Dialogue
the7stars
Client: Iceland
Three hundred and forty-eight data studies. One thousand and forty-four audience cuts. Over five years, the7stars built a vast intelligence bank to understand Iceland’s core consumers. Until 2019, Iceland had an incredibly successful business but lacked an understanding of who their consumer was beyond purchasing at Iceland. In ...
BEST USE OF PAID SEARCH
Real‑Time Signals Driving Real Revenue
MG OMD
Client: Halfords
Halfords came to us with a clear ambition: unlock new growth across their garage network in an increasingly competitive market. Their national Paid Search activity was still running, but performance wasn’t aligned with reality on the ground. Demand and supply were out of sync. Customers were sent to garages with limited immediate avail...
Careline365's Hero Brand Strategy
Goodstuff
Client: Careline365
Goodstuff's hero brand strategy for Careline 365 was not just a cost-cutting exercise: it was a growth strategy. By cutting cannibalisation, we didn't just reduce spend by 31%, we improved the quality of traffic, which in turn drove +6% sales at a -35% CPA, these budget efficiencies have greatly helped the client in key stakeholder dis...
From Intent to In Stock: Volkswagen’s Search Transformation
PHD
Client: Volkswagen
Volkswagen delivered an industry-leading transformation in automotive digital marketing through the strategic deployment of Vehicle Listing Ads (VLA) on Google’s Performance Max platform. Confronted with the challenge of driving high-value stock enquiries from the online stock locator, we engineered a dynamic, data-rich product ...
BEST USE OF PAID SOCIAL
The Great British Bake Off
OMD UK
Client: Channel 4
The Great British Bake Off is an institution. A mid-week slice of joy for the nation. But loyal fans noticed the show drifting from its classic roots. Themed weeks like ‘Mexican Week’ and ‘1970s Week’ tried to shake things up but pushed the show further from its core audience. So, in 2025, Channel 4 reset the formula. The...
Powering Parkdean Resorts’ Social Success Through Personalisation
Goodstuff
Client: Parkdean Resorts
Parkdean Resorts and Goodstuff transformed a fragmented brand landscape into a social-first growth engine by escaping the "complexity trap." Facing high individual park recognition with low masterbrand awareness, we delivered "Personalisation at Scale" to reconnect with UK families and retirees. By streamlining cluttered first-party ...
Boosting ROAS by 195% on Meta through proprietary AI tools AudienceGPT and AdStudio
Brave Bison
Client: Trafalgar Travel
Trafalgar Travel faced a major performance challenge: up to $300,000 in paid social media spend was going unused due to a lack of insight-led creative that could convert demand at scale. Brave Bison partnered with Trafalgar to solve this using AI, not as an add-on, but as the engine behind performance decision-making. Using Aud...
Choice Hotels & Tripadvisor Highlights – Scaling Authenticity through AI Automation
Tripadvisor
Client: Choice Hotels
In partnership with Choice Hotels, Tripadvisor reimagined paid social by launching a first-of-its-kind automated creative-to-traffic pipeline. By leveraging "Tripadvisor Highlights"—an AI tool that transforms real-time traveller reviews into high-impact social video—and a unique automated trafficking solution, we bypassed traditional p...
How Yorkshire Tea’s Cherry Bakewell Brew Became a Social Sensation
Jaywing
Client: Yorkshire Tea
Cherry Bakewell Brew was one of Yorkshire Tea’s most unexpected product launches. Inspired by a familiar tea-time classic but delivered in black tea form, it had the potential to spark curiosity, and scepticism, in equal measure. The challenge was not simply to generate awareness, but to build credibility and drive meaningful com...
Making it pyjama o'clock on TikTok Shop
PHD
Client: Sainsbury's / Tu
Tu – Sainsbury’s fashion brand – building on a legacy of social media love for their Christmas Pyjama’s amongst a young, style savvy, audience launched their beloved collection on TikTok Shop, a first across both Sainsburys Group, and for TikTok Shop with a supermarket fashion brand. Fashion retail is predominantly driven by onli...
Scaling with Certainty
the7stars
Client: Postcode Lottery
People’s Postcode Lottery is a subscription-based charity lottery that has raised over £1.5bn for good causes since launch, with a minimum of 30% of each ticket price going to charities. Paid social, particularly Meta, has long been central to the Postcode Lottery’s growth. But towards the end of 2024, CPAs were on an upwards trajector...
BEST USE OF PROGRAMMATIC MEDIA
Sailing to Success
WPP Media – Wavemaker UK, P&O Cruises, WPP Media Solutions, DOOH.com, The Trade Desk
Client: P&O Cruises
In one of the most competitive UK travel markets on record, P&O Cruises faced an urgent challenge: defend its position as the UK’s #1 cruise brand while driving bookings during the crucial Wave sales window. With TV spend doubling year-on-year and more cruise brands competing for attention, the old approach simply wouldn’t cut it. ...
Dr. Martens harnesses the power of programmatic to give the boot to its biggest competitor
MiQ and Arena Media
Client: Dr. Martens
When Dr. Martens, known for being rite-of-passage break-in boots, brought out a soft suede, no laces comfort range called Zebzag we had to compete with leading global comfort footwear brands. We overcame a limiting data set by tapping into MiQ’s newly launched AI-powered technology, Sigma, to create postcode battlegrounds across the UK...
Driving network wide growth
Blis X Arena Media
Client: UK TV
UKTV needed to solve a tough dual challenge: drive tune‑in to new programme launches at a time when linear audiences continue to erode, and prove that programmatic media could actually shift real‑world viewing behaviour on the biggest screen in the home. Static, traditional TV promotion couldn’t deliver the agility or responsiveness re...
Launching the Mercedes-Benz Concept AMG GT XX
OMD UK
Client: Mercedes-Benz Cars
The launch of the Mercedes Benz Concept AMG GT XX marked a pivotal step in strengthening the brand’s electric performance credentials in the UK. As a halo concept, we needed a launch with scale, prestige, and premium presence at the top of the funnel. But with broadcast TV unavailable, we faced a critical challenge. How do we deliver t...
More Than A Game
The GoodNet
Client: Premier League
This campaign didn’t just tell people the Premier League is more than a game. It made them believe it – delivering a 34-point uplift in consumer perception through a programmatic buy that lived the League’s values in every impression. Premier League invests £1.6 billion into grassroots football and communities. Its programmes reach 2...
Psychographic targeting for State Street Investment Management
Alphix Solutions
Client: State Street Investment Management
Alphix Media Exchange (AMX), Alphix Solutions’ proprietary programmatic platform, leverages advanced targeting capabilities including psychographic analysis, AI-driven contextual targeting and firmographic data to move beyond traditional cookie-based approaches and deliver more nuanced, relevance-led advertising. Central to the entry...
Sky Sports Automated Real-time Personalisation
Sky Creative
Client: Sky Sports
Sky Creative redefined programmatic media by building an automated system that turned live Premier League data into real‑time, club‑specific creative at scale — delivering stronger performance, greater efficiency and a new, repeatable production capability.
BEST USE OF TECH IN CRM
Making AutoSergei real with Meer-tech
Merkle
Client: Compare the Market
AutoSergei: The Meer‑tech that reinvented Price Comparison In a competitive market of annoying operatic singers, robots called Brian, and men dancing in suit jackets and high heels, the Meerkats played a critical role in CtM’s rapid growth in the Price Comparison market. But in an evolving world, where research shows ‘co...
Foam, the OS for Talent Management
Foam, part of Whalar Group
Foam exists because talent representation has outgrown traditional CRMs. Modern talent managers and agencies aren’t just tracking contacts - they're curating narratives, shaping demand, and building careers in real time. Foam gives managers a unified workspace to do that. Talent managers (especially talent managers workin...
How a new Customer Data Platform is transforming the Guardian’s Martech ecosystem
The Guardian
The Guardian is open to all, funded by many, and beholden to no one. Our CRM team’s challenge is to encourage readers to become financial supporters so we can sustain our journalism while staying independent. By the end of FY24/25, we delivered record results by growing our marketing base and increasing communications to known au...
Use case CRM & AI decision making Orchestrate reduced marketing pressure and increased performance
Notify AI
Client: Clarins
Reducing Marketing Pressure while Driving Performance through AI Decisioning : Facing increasingly over-solicited consumers and rising expectations for personalization, Clarins partnered with Notify AI to fundamentally rethink its CRM activation strategy. The objective was clear: reduce marketing pressure while improving engagement, ...
BEST USE OF TECH IN OUT-OF-HOME
Your Bike, Right Now
DOOH.com, WPP Media, Wavemaker
Client: Transport for London
Santander Cycles harnessed live, hyper-local TfL data to put bike availability front-of-mind for Londoners deciding how to travel, in the moment. Dynamic six-sheet screens at docking stations updated every minute, showing bikes available, walking distance, and station location, displayed in hand-sketched, humanised typography. By combi...
Kwik Fit's 20,000 mile guarantee
Posterscope
Client: VCCP Media/Kwik-Fit
Kwik Fit’s 20,000 Mile Guarantee turned OOH into the hero by using technology not as a bolt‑on, but the creative idea itself. To demonstrate Bridgestone’s ‘Turanza All Season 6 guarantee’, we took OOH almost 20,000 miles from the UK, placing real‑world ads in Sydney, Tokyo and Texas using tech to bring it to audiences at home. T...
Magnertism
Bauer Media Outdoor
Client: Magners
This campaign utilised programmatic to its full ability to deliver a truly effective campaign. The campaign applied a multitude of technological capabilities programmatic DOOH has to offer, including geo-fencing, leveraging rich Retail and point-of-sale data signals to reach key cider drinkers, day parting as well as applying weather t...
Mercedes-CLA Launch
RAPP
Client: Mercedes-Benz
Mercedes-Benz was set to unveil its all-new, all-electric CLA. Our task was to raise awareness of this innovative new vehicle and ‘paint the town red’ in order to seduce a new generation of electric car buyers. Audience intelligence revealed that this new generation didn’t behave in the same way as traditional car buyers...
SAIL Amsterdam: Bringing nautical magic to the streets with programmatic DOOH
Vistar Media, Kinesso, Yune, JCDecaux, VIOOH
Client: Port of Amsterdam
SAIL Amsterdam is the world’s largest maritime event, occurring only once every five years to celebrate the arrival of spectacular tall ships into the city’s historic harbours. For the most recent edition, the Port of Amsterdam sought to extend the event’s reach far beyond the water’s edge. By partnering with Vistar Media, JCDecaux, Yu...
Sailing to Success
WPP Media – Wavemaker UK, P&O Cruises, WPP Media Solutions, DOOH.com, The Trade Desk
Client: P&O Cruises
In one of the most competitive UK travel markets on record, P&O Cruises faced an urgent challenge: defend its position as the UK’s #1 cruise brand while driving bookings during the crucial Wave sales window. With TV spend doubling year-on-year and more cruise brands competing for attention, the old approach simply wouldn’t cut it. ...
Sibuya feeds success through real-time DCO and programmatic DOOH
VIOOH, JCDecaux Spain, Glocally, Alium, Appcelerate
Client: Sibuya
For their latest campaign, Sibuya, VIOOH and JCDecaux Spain, deployed a bespoke technological bridge between social media dynamism and the physical urban environment, turning the fleeting visual impact of outdoor advertising into measurable restaurant visits. By utilising Dynamic Creative Optimisation (DCO) and real-time social data, a...
The Wonderfully Weird World of Gumball
Skyrise & BradleyDyerRaw
Client: Warner Bros. Discovery
2025 saw the return of The Wonderfully Weird World of Gumball on Cartoon Network. Warner Bros. Discovery wanted a multi-region campaign aimed at children aged 6-12 and their parents to make the launch an unmissable TV event for existing fans and new audiences. More specifically they were looking to re-establish Gumball as a top rated s...
TECH FOR GOOD
Pause for the Cause
WunderKIND Ads
Client: Franciscan Health & Doe-Anderson
WunderKIND Ads has a clear mission: Create better advertising experiences across the digital ecosystem, from desktop and mobile to Connected TV. Through our technology, we deliver incremental revenue for publishers, stronger performance for brands, and a more respectful experience for consumers. For our partnership with Franciscan He...
Responsibility Powered Performance
The GoodNet
Client: Dentsu
Digital advertising’s programmatic supply chain is carbon-intensive, opaque, and disconnected from the responsible business outcomes brands urgently need to deliver. dentsu UK, and its addressable media team, set out to change this by partnering with The GoodNet to integrate GoodIQ, a proprietary sustainability intelligence platform, d...
Turning the Tide on Carbon Emissions
Numodo
Client: Severn Trent Water
Severn Trent Water is one of the UK’s largest water companies providing a supply of water to over 8 million homes spanning the midlands of England, down to Bristol and north & mid Wales. This campaign was launched in Summer 2025 to engage All Adults across Severn Trent’s supply area with community and water saving messaging. Our chal...
GRAND PRIX
Making AutoSergei real with Meer-tech
Merkle
Client: Compare the Market
PEOPLE, AGENCIES & TEAMS CATEGORIES
START-UP OF THE YEAR
Vidium
Vidium Ltd
In today’s OLV and CTV ecosystem, "performance" has become a hollow metric. Ads are frequently served and completed without ever being noticed, trusted, or remembered. Founded in May 2024 by Joe and Elliot (both under 35), Vidium was born from a refusal to accept the industry’s "scale at any cost" status quo. These young founders set o...
Nibble
When it comes to deploying the next-generation of technology across PR and marketing, Stakked is already defining the future with Nibble. Developed and bootstrapped over four years by the company's founder Lizzie Earl, this SaaS product is powered by AI to match agencies and brands with pre-vetted PR, marketing, and social freela...
Stakked
When it comes to deploying the next-generation of technology across PR and marketing, Stakked is already defining the future. Although it's just two years old, the business has delivered major success for clients thanks to an impactful and innovative tech roadmap. Driven forward by founder Lizzie Earl and Non-Exec Chairman...
Veridooh
Veridooh launched in the UK in 2024 to bring Independent Verification to the out-of-home (OOH) sector. Veridooh is the world’s leading Independent Verification platform for out-of-home (OOH) advertising. With its proprietary SmartCreativeTM technology, Veridooh independently tracks, measures and verifies the performance of OOH advertis...
TECH LEADER OF THE YEAR
Shahrzad Rafati, CEO and Founder
RHEI
Shahrzad Rafati is the Founder and CEO of RHEI, a global technology powerhouse formerly known as BroadbandTV (BBTV). A visionary at the intersection of media and artificial intelligence, Rafati pioneered digital rights management models that transitioned the industry from litigation to monetization, enabling creators and media giants t...
Lizzie Earl, CEO
Stakked
When it comes to deploying the next-generation of technology across PR and marketing, Lizzie Earl is already defining the future. Although her business Stakked is just two years old, it's delivering major success for clients thanks to an impactful and innovative tech roadmap. Driven forward by founder Lizzie and Non-Exec C...
Ann Tarasewicz CEO
Axis
Ann Tarasewicz is the founder and CEO of Axis, a multi-product AdTech company building award-winning programmatic infrastructure for suppliers and advertisers. With over nine years in digital marketing and AdTech, Ann has grown Axis from a focused programmatic setup into a full ecosystem operating globally. Under Ann's leadership...
DJ Agahi, Managing Director, Global
Sabio
In just under two years, DJ Agahi has moved beyond the business’ initial UK market entry, to become a primary architect within the UK’s Connected TV (CTV) industry evolution. As Managing Director, Global at Sabio, DJ is actively pushing the boundaries of CTV’s capabilities and media planning potential, replacing outdated linear cont...
Greg Baird, Associate Director, AI Commercial Development
Tripadvisor
Greg Baird is at the forefront of the AI revolution in travel media, serving as one of the industry’s first leaders in AI Commercialisation. By externalising Tripadvisor’s unmatched dataset of 1 billion+ reviews, Greg has spearheaded world-first innovations that reimagine how brands and consumers interact. His leadership has delivered ...
Natasha Wallace, Chief Strategy Officer
Jellyfish
Since joining Jellyfish in 2023, Natasha Wallace has established herself as an increasingly influential voice within AI marketing and tech, co-leading the company’s $2B+ media operations while doing more than most to define the future of marketing. As the architect of an AI marketing transformation at Jellyfish, Natasha’s role as...
TECH TEAM OF THE YEAR
DOOH.com
In 2025 DOOH.com, launched the final phase of Deliver, a platform credited in standardising the industry, making campaigns more effective by double digits and channel leading ROI’s, growing the channel and establishing the UK OOH channel as the most innovative globally. Not only was it the team’s most successful year, but it als...
JCDecaux UK's Commercial Team
JCDecaux UK
In 2024, JCDecaux UK’s Commercial team, outperformed the digital giants, the OOH industry and the wider ad market. Entering 2025, the challenge was how to sustain momentum in a tougher trading environment while continuing to innovate and deliver for customers. The answer was a strategic focus on the fastest-growing opportunity of progr...
Search Solutions @ MG OMD
MG OMD
Search Solutions @ MG OMD has grown from a one‑person function into an eight-person strong centre of excellence delivering bespoke, revenue‑driving technology for clients. Built on the principles of going Beyond the Platform, making meaningful impact and fostering constant collaboration, the team creates innovative tools that transform...
Veridooh
Veridooh launched in the UK in 2024 to bring Independent Verification to the out-of-home (OOH) sector. Veridooh is the world’s leading Independent Verification platform for out-of-home (OOH) advertising. With its proprietary SmartCreativeTM technology, Veridooh independently tracks, measures and verifies the performance of OOH advertis...
INTERNATIONAL CATEGORIES
BEST USE OF AI
How DV Scibids AI Boosted Jameson’s Campaign Performance in Brazil
DoubleVerify
Client: Pernod Ricard
In Brazil’s highly competitive spirits market, Pernod Ricard needed to increase awareness for Jameson Irish Whiskey while ensuring every media dollar worked harder. Traditional programmatic strategies often rely on static rules and manual adjustments, limiting their ability to respond to the fast-moving dynamics of digital media enviro...
Linqia Introduces Marco AI to Make Influencer Marketing Campaigns More Efficient
Linqia
Linqia is the leading independent influencer marketing in the US. Our proprietary technology platform, Resonate, is built for discovery (connecting brands with 14MM+ creators across all major social platforms) and seamless execution, with custom work flows for influencer, brief, and content approvals, real-time analytics, and content l...
Turning Passive Viewing into Brand Action across Connected TV
KERV.ai & Paramount Australia
KERV.ai and Paramount Australia formed a strategic partnership to embed contextual AI and scene-level intelligence directly into premium connected TV (CTV), transforming passive viewing into scalable, interactive brand experiences. By analyzing video content at the scene level, the technology generates contextual metadata that enables ...
Viral Nation Secure - AI-Powered Creator Intelligence
Viral Nation
Viral Nation is a global leader in social-first marketing, helping leading brands to drive cultural relevance and ROI through data-driven strategies. We serve world-class businesses who are looking to authentically connect with their audiences across social platforms in the era of social. Viral Nation Secure was created to close a ma...
TECH AS PART OF A CAMPAIGN
TaDa Abandoned Nights
R/GA
Client: AB InBev
TaDa Delivery is ABinBev’s DTC beverage delivery app in Mexico. The brand is built around a key cultural moment called the juntada—a spontaneous get-together with friends, championing those random, unplanned nights that become lifelong stories. Abandoned Nights was born from a well documented truth—people regret the things that t...
Turning City Screens into Real-Time Safety Signals
Perion and OMD Mexico
Client: Uber
Uber Mexico and Perion transformed the Catrina Parade during Día de los Muertos into a real-time safety signal, demonstrating how technology-enabled media can connect meaningfully with culture. With more than 300,000 attendees filling the streets of Mexico City, the event creates a surge in transportation demand and crowded pickup envi...
TECH LEADER OF THE YEAR
Hovhannes Avoyan
Picsart
Hovhannes Avoyan spent his career taking risks, building companies, and expanding access to technology. Born in Soviet Armenia, he studied computer science at the State Engineering University of Armenia and international affairs at the American University of Armenia, where he also taught technology and entrepreneurship. After the fall ...
Hayssam Soueidan
Displayce
When programmatic DOOH began scaling rapidly, much of the market focused on expanding inventory. Hayssam Soueidan chose a different path. He believed the real challenge was not how many screens could be connected, but how well performance could be understood, anticipated and explained. For the past nine years, as Chief Technology...
Ryan McConville
NBCUniversal Advertising & Partnerships
Premium media has become increasingly complex – more signals, more platforms, more fragmentation. For Ryan McConville, that complexity represents opportunity. As Chief Product Officer & EVP of Ad Products & Solutions at NBCUniversal, Ryan is rebuilding the operating system of premium advertising – transforming a fragmented ecosy...
Simon Moss
Foam, part of the Whalar Group
Simon Moss had a near-fatal stroke early in his entrepreneurial career. Some people take it easy after a near death experience but Simon says, “It really propelled me to just go for it.” So he pitched to investors for the first time, raised capital, went on a seven-year fundraising and startup journey, burnt out, wound u...
