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From Cannes Lions to The One Show, the ad industry loves awarding itself. Now, there’s a new awards show on the block...but agencies (for the most part) aren’t invited.
What is it? The Association of National Advertisers (ANA) recently introduced its In-House Excellence Awards. Nine categories, like “Experiential” and “Best Media Thinking,” will honor campaigns created by in-house agencies in 2020. One category, “Best Collaborative Effort,” lets internal shops show off work they’ve done in partnership with outside agencies.
Gregory Wright, VP of content marketing at the ANA, told Marketing Brew that the organization has seen “year-over-year growth and interest” for in-house work, but didn’t provide specific figures. Plus, Wright claimed there’s “great demand” for an awards show that recognizes work created internally.
- According to Wright, the inaugural awards will let internal shops “showcase how much more sophisticated their in-house marketing and advertising work has become.”
- For instance, companies like Frito-Lay and Squarespace created Super Bowl 2021 commercials within their own walls.
Bottom line: Companies like Anheuser-Busch are building up their in-house agencies. And a survey of more than 200 marketers conducted by Digiday found that 64% of brands grew their in-house teams in 2020.
The ANA’s new awards are further proof that internal agencies are here to stay—and that they crave external validation just as much as regular old ad agencies do.