AMA Cincinnati Pinnacle Awards 2019

• When: Thursday, May 30, 2019, 5:30 p.m.
• Where: The Woodward Theater
• Register: Tickets will be released by March 2019. Check back soon!

Important Dates:

• April 5: Early Bird Submission Deadline (price goes up after this date)
• April 12: Late Submission Deadline
• Thursday, May 30: Pinnacle Awards Ceremony

Submission materials must be sent to Pinnacle@AMACincinnati.org. Payment must be submitted via online form.

Eligibility

The Pinnacle Awards are open to all marketing professionals in the Greater Cincinnati area. Those who submit for an award must submit original work or work they directly supervised. The work submitted must have been created/managed from January 1, 2018, up until the start of the submission period, February 5, 2019.

It is required to pay submission fees at the time of submitting materials. Work submitted without payment will not be judged and therefore not eligible for an award.

Submission Requirements

A summary is required for submissions for categories; supporting materials are highly recommended. See the below section, “How to Submit,” for instructions. The Marketing Legends category does not require submission or payment, just simply a completed nomination form here.

Fees & Payment

Submission fees are to be paid through our website form. The form allows payment for multiple submissions, up to six submissions.

EARLY DEADLINE – Entries Submitted until 11:59 p.m. EST on April, 5, 2019:

• 1 Submission = $60
  • Each submission after that is $30 apiece
• Nonprofit & Student Rates = $0

LATE DEADLINE – Entries Submitted until 11:59 p.m. EST on April, 12, 2019:

• 1 Submission = $75
  • Each submission after that is $37 apiece
• Nonprofit & Student Rates = $0

Deadlines

For the Early Deadline, submissions must be sent and payment must be received by 11:59 p.m. EST on Friday, April 5, 2019.

For the Late Deadline, submissions must be sent and payment must be received by 11:59 p.m. EST on Friday, April 12, 2019.

Judging

Pinnacle submissions will be judged by an American Marketing Association chapter outside of the Cincinnati region. Finalists will be notified in advance of the Awards Ceremony, but winners will not be disclosed until the Awards Ceremony. Scores and feedback will be emailed to those who submitted after the Pinnacle Awards ceremony.

Prepare Your Submission

For all categories except the “Cincinnati Marketing Legends*,” submissions must be accompanied by a summary describing the below points. Please keep the summary to 1,000 or fewer words and saved as a PDF.

• Opportunity / Problem: Provide a brief situation analysis of the opportunity or problem your marketing work addressed.
• Objectives: What were you trying to achieve? Who were your target audiences? What did success look like? Don’t forget measurement!
• Planning & Execution: How did you make it happen?
• Results: Did you achieve your goals and objectives? Did your initial vision of success
  come to fruition? Don’t forget measurement!

It is highly recommended to include relevant supporting materials to accompany the summary. These supporting materials can be any of the following:

• Final creative proofs or examples
• Multimedia: Photos, videos, audio files, etc.
• Printed collateral (saved as a PDF)
• Social media posts and/or metrics
• Measurement documents
• Testimonials or letters of recognition
• Relevant website links for reference
• Or… surprise us! As long as it can be sent over email, we’d be happy to review it with your submission.

Save ALL supporting materials and your summary and compress or zip them into the same folder. Name the zipped file” “Your Company_Award Category.”

How to Submit

1. Fill out the payment form on our website.

Note: If you are entering multiple submissions, it is recommended that you fill out ONE payment form that accounts for the total quantity of submissions (plus, you save money).

2. Email compressed/zipped file(s) to Pinnacle@AMACincinnati.org. In the body of the email, please include:

• Name
• Company
• Category/categories submitted
• Credits for category/categories submitted:
  • If this submission is selected as a winner, please indicate how it should be read (ex: “And the winner is ….. The Epic Rebranding of AMA Cincinnati, by the AMA Cincinnati Board of Directors and Partners!”).

Note: Most email inboxes cannot accept files larger than 25 MB. If your compressed/zipped file is larger than 25MB, please say so in the body of email and you will be contacted to submit the large file through an alternative source such as WeTransfer, Dropbox, or hard drive delivery/pickup.

3. Save the date for May 30 and purchase your ticket once registration is live!

*The Marketing Legends Award only requires completing the nomination form. You can nominate for the Marketing Legends Award here.

2019 Pinnacle Award Categories & Descriptions

Best “Non-Marketing” Marketing Program

Marketers wear many hats, and sometimes that means stepping out of some disciplines and into different ones like internal communications, employee relations or recruitment, or community involvement, to name a few. Share your best “non-marketing” marketing and how it drove value for the organization.

Best Collegiate/Student Marketing Plan, Campaign, and/or Program

Calling all students! Many have term papers, projects or capstone courses that require the creation of a marketing plan, campaign, and an extent of execution. Share your work with us to be recognized! Please include results on any execution of marketing plan.

Best Brand Launch or Rebranding Effort

Cincinnati is Brand Capital, USA. Whether you’re a startup or a decades-old company going through a turnaround or rebirth, share your brand or rebrand process with us–from old versus new, graphics, messaging, rollout and education. Oh, and don’t forget applicable metrics!

Best Content Marketing

Valuable. Relevant. Consistent. Content marketing has become the foundation of successful marketing programs. Whether it’s blogs and white papers or podcasts or videos, share with us how your brand tells a story and spark engagement with intended audiences.

Best Customer Experience Execution

Customer experience has been revered as the ultimate marketing tool. This category welcomes submissions in which organizations facilitate the pathways (channels, experiences, you name it) that anticipate wants, needs and problems and addresses them in a way that made a difference.

Best Digital Strategy & Execution

We live in a world of constant digital innovation and transformation. From a website that attracts the right kind of traffic and inspires action with its user experience to the variety of campaigns (paid or unpaid, on established or emerging channels), share with us your best digital work, with the metrics to back it up.

Best Integrated Marketing Campaign

This category welcomes submissions for the best thought-out marketing campaigns that use a variety of channels and vehicles (video, print, web, social media, PR, traditional paid media/advertising, events) with carefully tracked metrics to accomplish their business objectives or solve a marketing problem.

Best Sales Enablement

When marketing and sales work together, everyone wins, but that journey can have hurdles of the organizational, technological or philosophical kind. Share with us your organization’s sales enablement journey, including goals, results, and creative solutions.

Best Scrappy Marketing Campaign

Are you a non-profit operating your marketing initiatives on a shoestring? New manager in a large organization trying to build a business case for something new and fighting for every budget dollar? Startup with lean funds to promote your new business? We want to see what you accomplished! Tell us what you had to work with, how you tackled the creative challenge of getting the most bang for your frugal buck, and how far it went in the end.

Special Merit: In-House Warriors

Not every organization hires an agency partner. Great marketing can come from within the company. Based on entries submitted, this special recognition is for the in-house warriors who led a campaign from brainstorm to execution and measurement, regardless of budget. Consider this a “no agencies allowed!” space. To qualify for consideration for this special merit, check the box “Consider me for In-House Warrior Special Merit” on your submission form and write about it in your summary for the judges.

Special Merit: Research or Insight Catalyst

Who doesn’t love a good backstory? Based on entries submitted, this special recognition is to recognize the research and/or insights that helped spark the effort for a successful marketing campaign, initiative, rebrand, operations innovation, etc. To qualify for consideration for this special merit, check the box “Consider me for Research or Insight Catalyst Special Merit” on your submission form and write about it in your summary for the judges.

Note: Because research may be done well in advance of execution, this recognition is not time-bound to 2018.

Cincinnati Marketing Legends Award

We are happy to welcome a third class of Cincinnati Marketing Legends for the 2019 Pinnacle Awards. This prestigious award is like a “lifetime achievement” award, not time-bound. Who has made a lasting impact, and brought acclaim to the city or the profession of marketing? Please complete the nomination form with the name, current role, social media handles or links to published work (if available) and 300 words or less on what makes them a Cincinnati Marketing Legend for award recipient consideration. Self-nominations are discouraged. Nominees do not have to be AMA members.

Nominate for free here.

Past Cincinnati Marketing Legends:

• Class of 2017
• Class of 2018

Curious about past Pinnacle Award winners?

Learn about them here.