28th October 2021: Val Morgan and The Guardian have been announced as the winners of the 2021 IAB Australia MeasureUp Awards. Val Morgan was awarded Best Advertising Effectiveness for its ‘Hourly Outdoor Unified Reach (HOUR) Model’ developed to find a new way to model audience reach with hourly granularity for its programmatic digital OOH buyers. The Guardian won the Best Cultural, Societal or Consumer Behaviour award for its ‘The Power of Purpose’ research providing consumer insights supporting brands with purpose to drive growth and retain customers.
The IAB Australia MeasureUp Awards were established in 2020 to recognise and celebrate great Australian trade media research and to encourage further investment and rigorous thinking to lift the overall quality of media research in the market. The winners, who presented their research at a live announcement during the 5th Annual MeasureUp conference today, were selected by the members of the MFA Interactive Committee.
Sian Whitnall, Chief Digital Officer at OMD Australia and Chair of the MFA Interactive Committee commented “Measurement and research from media owners provide agencies with important insights to inform their buying decisions. In a year that has been incredibly challenging it has been wonderful to review and celebrate impressive research from such a strong field of entries.
The winners demonstrated original thinking, filling a knowledge gap, and providing new insights that were relevant and actionable for the whole market. Along with depth and clarity of insights, their research findings have had an impact on changing behaviour, influencing marketing or advertising practice or decisions for their advertising clients and business,” said Whitnall.
Natalie Stanbury, Research Director at IAB Australia said “Within a strong field of entries, Val Morgan stood out to the judges in the ad effectiveness category as being extremely applicable to a current measurement gap in the industry. It clearly defined the market challenge and effectively used data and data science to provide a greater level of media accountability.
“The Guardian’s quality in-depth cultural and societal research has demonstrated their connection with readers, understanding of their values and leveraged that connection to inform and benefit clients and advertisers. This unique and robust research has application opportunities from business strategy to media choices and creative development,” said Stanbury.
Val Morgan – Hourly Outdoor Unified Reach (HOUR) Model
Val Morgan identified an immediate need for audience measurement to provide marketers and agencies the confidence of accurate reach based real-time trading across all of Val Morgan’s Australian inventory in metro and regional areas. Using a privacy compliant, real-time, camera vision-based measurement solution integrated into VMO screens enabled it to create a unique first party audience data asset. This data on real world person-to-screen interactions forms the key input into advanced data science modelling to accurately predict and measure audiences of each VMO screen and provide audience metrics at a per-spot-play, per-screen and per-hour level.
Paul Butler, Managing Director, VMO commented: “We’re incredibly proud to win Best Advertising Effectiveness Research in IAB’s MeasureUp awards. The HOUR Model underpins our market leading approach to programmatic audience measurement and is a true reflection of VMO’s ongoing commitment to driving innovation in the outdoor sector.”
Braden Clarke, Programmatic Director, VMO said: “The culmination of 18 months of rigorous development, testing and validation, The HOUR Model sets a new standard for granular audience modelling in the programmatic outdoor space, providing clients and agencies with confidence when it comes to reach based real-time trading. The HOUR Model is widely regarded as the leading impression multiplier methodology in outdoor locally and demonstrates VMO’s pioneering approach to digital outdoor. This is a big win for Programmatic Outdoor and a sign of its rapid acceleration into the mainstream of media activation.”
The Guardian Australia – The Power of Purpose
The Guardian’s compelling research provides marketers a deep understanding of the cultural context in which brands are operating in, what purpose means to consumers, how purpose makes good business sense, why media plays an important role for delivery of purposeful brands and how consumers want brands to behave.
The five pillars of purpose identified in the research, centred on being progressive, trustworthy, impactful, authentic, and empowering, have been a useful tool for marketers in understanding the importance of (real) social responsibility and the impact that positive, purposeful brand messaging can have on consumer behaviour. It clearly showed, brand purpose increasingly matters to many consumers, to the point that purpose and social responsibility has moved to a ‘must-have’ or expected consideration and by unpacking the distinctive elements of purposeful brands The Guardian has provided guidance to build uplift in their authenticity and credibility.
Adam Axiak, The Guardian Australia Head of Audience, commented “It’s been a privilege helping businesses understand the mindset of a consumer as being purpose driven this past year. It’s a simple yet robust message that not only influences key business decisions but flows on to reflect decisions in our own personal lives. I’m humbly grateful that The Guardian Australia has been recognized for our efforts on this grounding narrative within the industry”
The award winning work can be downloaded below.