Society awards will mean a Star is born at long last

The Marketing Society Star Awards will be announced by TV presenter Laura Whitmore. Picture: Robert Perry

After months of blood, sweat and tears preparing entries for the prestigious Marketing Society Star Awards – then weeks of reading, scoring, debating and then ultimately deciding the finalists the shortlists can now be revealed.

More than 200 entries and nominations were received and more than 100 judges involved across 20 panels judging in five categories from Development Stars, Strategic Stars, Communication Stars, Sector Stars and Champion Stars.

The Star Awards recognise great marketing case studies that tell a compelling story – from bold and ambitious objectives, rigorous research and strategic thinking, original and creative execution as well as robust results and evaluation.

Points are also awarded for well structured, presented and written case studies.

In the Development Stars there are two student awards – one for the Star Marketing Student award and the Star Creative Student award. Universities from across Scotland nominated marketing students to take place in an Apprentice Day event where the candidates worked in groups in a series of strategic and creative tasks as well as taking part in individual tasks.

For the Star Creative Student award the candidates were selected for a range of universities, colleges and art schools across the country and were asked to respond to a brief on tackling gender equality in marketing.

Also in the Development Category there are three Rising Stars awards for marketing professionals under 30 years old. Nominations were received for Rising Marketing Star, Rising Agency Star and Rising Creative Star and the finalists will be interviewed and judged based on their achievements in the last year as well as their general experience, expertise and ambition.

In the Strategic category of awards more emphasis is placed on effective planning, research and analysis and in the Communication category the focus is more on the implementation and results.

In the Sector category there is a more balanced scoring system with the shortlisted entries demonstrating best practice across all areas in the key industry sectors.

In the Champions category – organisations and individuals are recognised based on their performance across the other categories.

A league table is created for both the client marketing teams and agencies with points allocated to their case study entries. four points for a Gold Star, three points for Silver Star, two points for a Bronze and one point for a shortlisted entry and Rising Star nomination.

There are also Chairman’s awards for First Time Entrants and Small to Medium Sized Entrants based on strong case studies.

The winners will be announced by TV Presenter Laura Whitmore at the Star Awards Gala Dinner at the Corn Exchange on 9 June with an anticipated audience of more than 500 marketing professionals in attendance. – a shining example of the vibrant marketing community in Scotland.

Full details can be found at www.starawards.marketingsociety.com .

• Graeme Atha is a Director of The Marketing Society