13th edition of the only marketing effectiveness awards program celebrating best-in-class work from the region comes back with a bang after a one-year pandemic-related hiatus.
The winners of this year’s MENA Effie Awards have been announced during an awards ceremony that took place on Nov. 24 at the Armani Hotel, Burj Khalifa, in Dubai.
The highly-anticipated industry event made its come back after a one-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic. It was attended by more than 800 marketing and advertising professionals from all across the region, who gathered to celebrate the best and most effective marketing work in the Middle East.
Another signal that the MENA Effie Awards was exceptionally well received this year by the industry as a whole was the 40% increase in the number of entries compared to the last edition in 2019, which already was a record year.
Winning an Effie has long become a global symbol of achievement. This year’s prestigious “Grand Prix” went to FP7 McCann Dubai for the “The Bread Exam” campaign it developed for the Lebanese Breast Cancer Foundation. Other top accolades included “Most Effective Advertising Agency Office of the Year” for FP7 McCann Dubai; “Most Effective Media Agency Offices of the Year” for PHD Dubai; and “Most Effective Agency Network of the Year” for FP7 McCann. The Honorary Award of the Year was handed to Fahd Hamidaddin, CEO of the Saudi Tourism Authority.
In terms of brands, Unilever, Burger King, and the Lebanese Breast Cancer Foundation left their mark that night, with respectively ten, eight, and five awards, including the Grand Prix for the Lebanese NGO.
The MENA Effie Awards 2021 program included a wide range of industry-specific categories, and saw its scope expanded to business ideas, performance marketing, and technology companies, thanks to a mix of new categories that better represent today's marketing and business challenges, and allow for more in-depth coverage of effective digital strategy. The new total of 50 categories allowed for more companies to enter the competition, with twice the impact as the eligibility period this year was from 2019 to 2021.
