2011 Platinum PR Awards: Event Marketing

Co-Winner: Bowling Proprietors of America – 2010 Celebrity Bowling Hall of Fame Campaign

The premier trade association for the bowling industry tapped MWW Group to help elevate the sport and clear up misconceptions of bowling as a dying business. MWW group devised a campaign to encourage fans to cast votes online to induct a celebrity bowling-lover into the International Bowling Museum Hall of Fame. Combining digital grassroots outreach through the candidates’ fan blogs, Web sites, Facebook pages and Twitter feeds, the results were striking: 1.3 million Hall of Fame votes were cast and 776.7 million media impressions were earned. The Hall of Fame 2010 celebrity inductee: Taylor Swift. —SVC

Co-Winner: Cohn & Wolfe with Buick – The Regal Remix: Flipping the Script to Reach a Younger Prospect

Buick isn’t a car brand that one associates with bright lights, loud rock, hot clubs, trendy art centers and killer cocktails. But that is exactly what Cohn & Wolfe and Buick achieved with Regal Remix—injecting life into a product of which the average owner in 2010 was age 72. With the objectives of getting a younger demo, driving buzz and spurring sales of the 2011 Buick Regal, Cohn & Wolfe engineered a digital-driven effort that focused not on the Regal’s features but trendy venues, tasty food and top-name bands. Focused on six events across the country, C&W leveraged a microsite and social media to reach a younger audience. And, the agency succeeded. The average age of a Regal owner since Jan. 2011? Sixty-one, and the brand sits No. 8 on the list of auto brands’ “likability (up from No. 17). —SVC


Honorable Mentions:

Cone Inc. – Yoplait Save Lids to Save Lives - Sheryl Crow Breast Cancer Awareness Concert: Aggressive local and national media outreach drove home Crow’s concert and encouraged fans to send in pink Yoplait lids that go toward the Susan G. Komen for the cure donation.

Cramer-Krasselt – Tork Cleans Up with Guinness World Record: Touting the Tork hand sanitizer product, C-K engineered a Guinness record of 2,151 soccer fans cleaning their hands at a 2010 Major League Soccer game in Philadelphia, gaining coverage from ESPN and The Associated Press.

Chase Card Services & Ketchum– Chase Sapphire Creates Mad Cardmember Experience: Mad Men Partnership: Promoting its card member services, two events were created in conjunction with the popular TV show Mad Men, ultimately increasing awareness of the card.

Ogilvy Public Relations Worldwide and Nestlé Raisinets – Raisinets City: Ogilvy PR turned the California Central Valley town of Raisin City into Raisinets City for a day.


Back to the 2011 Platinum PR Awards

September 14, 2011