For decades, The ICCA Best Marketing Award has been recognising the excellence and outstanding achievements of organisations in marketing their product and services. Entries ranged from full-scale campaigns and branding exercises to individual promotions and events. 

In the last couple of years, we have been witnessing extraordinary challenges and changes while the meetings industry has been adjusting and transforming with them. 

The 2022 ICCA Best Marketing Award is centred on ‘disruption in marketing’ related to the ICCA core pillars of inclusion, diversity, legacy, and sustainability.  We are looking forward to receiving entries that showcase world-class innovation across all aspects of marketing. The ICCA Best Marketing Award is not only about emerging technology and digitalisation; it celebrates inspiring work in strategy and creativity. The winner will be recognised as an organisation that truly understands today’s complex marketing landscape and embraces the constant evolution demanded in our rapidly changing world. 

The ICCA Best Marketing Award is not only about creativity, ground-breaking ideas, and marketing. The award is mostly about shared learning and inspiring other organisation to break out from the norm, think, and do differently to start shaping tomorrow’s bigger success, right through the creative dynamics of teamwork.

Why participate?

Entering a project for an award competition can be costly in terms of efforts and resources, especially nowadays that the meetings industry is busy again planning and hosting many events. So why enter the ICCA Best Marketing Award? 

Put simply, the ICCA Best Marketing Award is the premier recognition for the associations’ meetings industry marketers and the marketing community. It is the most widely respected award in the field and truly gives recognition to the excellent, outstanding, and most creative achievements of organizations. The bestowment of the Best Marketing Award is the benchmark worth having. 

ICCA invites our association community and meetings industry members  from all sectors and regions to submit campaigns, projects, and initiatives that demonstrate ‘disruption in marketing’ in relation to the ICCA core pillars of inclusion, diversity, legacy, and sustainability in:
  • Content branding 

  • Cultural shift

  • Social storytelling 

  • Brand evolution

  • Power of partnerships

  • Internal brand transformation

  • Mobile innovation 

  • Pioneering technology

  • Data creativity

  • Targeting excellence

  • Best use of technology

  • Crisis management 

  • Effective brand building

  • Marketing in the moment 

  • Open submission 

Judging Criteria 
Judging panellists will evaluate entries according to the following parameters: 
  • Research & rationale (10%) – evidence-based information supporting the necessity and importance of the marketing initiative

  • Determining and measuring success (30%) – the objectives of the marketing initiative should be outlined, and the application should be very specific about the following items: 

- What level of engagement will be required – by the organization, the community, customers, etc.
- The objectives of the initiatives – what do you intend to achieve
- How will success be determined, i.e. more business leads, greater awareness, more contracts, etc
- How will that success be measured – i.e. data, customer or partner testimonials
  • Innovation & Creativity (30%) – the marketing initiative must demonstrate a level of innovation, which could include fresh ideas, pursuing a new market, leveraging new technology, creating new processes to increase effectiveness and/or efficiency.  The award application need not address all of these elements of innovation, but should be sure to include some.

  • Long term impact (15%) – the marketing initiative should ideally embody more than a short term, one-off celebration, but rather, a long-lasting impact of the project 

  • Communication/presentation (15%) – is the presentation of the award submission clear and compelling.

Submission process 
 
1. Submission
 
The competition is open to all ICCA Members and associations (individual members, or groups of members working together).
  • Entries should be submitted in digital format through the application link and must include: 

- A written proposal of max 1000 words
- Answer to criteria objectives (included in the submission form) 
- A  personal video presentation of max 1.30 mins that synthesize the key messages and outcome of the initiative. Video production should be consistent with the following criteria:
>Personalised touch. We want to see ‘you’, your team and recognise your efforts.
>Casual tone of voice and engaging delivery. Captivate the judges in a fun and dynamic way.
>No state-of-the-art video production. Video quality should not exceed the quality of smartphone video standards.
>Big budget does not equal victory. We want to recognise the creativity and outstanding achievements of initiatives implemented with little to no budget 
 
Submissions must be completed through the application link by 23 September 2022, 23.59 UTC -12.  
 
2. Selection of finalists
 
The judging panel will select the finalists from all the entries/submissions received. The finalists will be announced before 30 October 2022.  
 
3. Winner announcement 
 
The selected finalists will be allocated 10 mins each for a live presentation of the submitted project during a dedicated session of the ICCA Congress. 
Finalists are warmly encouraged to attend the ICCA Congress in person. 
 
4. Winner’s recognition and legacy
 
The ICCA Best Marketing Award is not only about creativity, ground-breaking ideas, and marketing. The award is mostly about shared learning and inspiring other organisation to break out from the norm, think, and do differently to start shaping tomorrow’s bigger success. The winner project will be featured on ICCA website and prominent media and will gain a speaking opportunity at the next ICCA congress so that can inspire best practices and relevant strategies for other community members in their marketing efforts. 
 
For entrants:
  • Opportunity to reflect on a project/campaign/initiative and build a case study for promotional use

  • Raise the organization individual’s profile

  • Opportunity to showcase your efforts and projects to internal and external stakeholders

  • Have the work judged and externally benchmarked by leading professionals in the business.

  • Potential space for global visibility

  • Boost staff morale and reward individuals and teams for their hard work

  •  Chance to inspire others and develop best practices for industry and sectors

  • Work on a fun and exciting project: Teamwork!

For Finalists:

  • Profiling on ICCA communication channels (website, newsletter, social media -LinkedIn)

  • Mention during the announcement session to all of the delegates at ICCA congress

  • Worldwide recognition from peers and colleague

  • Featured recognition on ICCA website

  • Dedicated global PR (newsletter, press release, social media)

For winner:

  • All the recognitions perks

  • Personalized logo- (BMA winner 2022) to use on their website, emails or promotional material

  • Speaking opportunity at the next ICCA Congress

  • Interview/podcast with President or ICCA CEO about the winning project

 

Submit your application

 

For questions or queries contact bestmarketingaward@iccaworld.org