THE CREATIVITY AND EFFECTIVENESS PARADOX

 With most Indian agencies now awaiting the results of the Effies which are going to be held on 27th January, and before preparing for the euphoria of  the creative awards season which is just around the corner, life is going to be hectic for most agency folk.

Some of them who won’t make it to the creative awards are going to seek solace in the Effies. You tend to be kind to the award’s organisers when you win and vice versa.

The cynics of the creative awards will quote Dave Trott when he famously said in an interview last year, ‘You’re not doing advertising for six million people in the street anymore, but for ten people on the jury, and for a few clients.’ So the effectiveness awards are hopefully going to speak to the 6 million people or in our case the 100 million people. Also while the creative people are centre stage for the creative awards, the effectiveness awards are for the ad-fiddlers as Dave Trott acidly labeled our dear planners in the industry.

 How fair is fair? 

 But for a moment lets get back to the creativity and effectiveness paradox. The old polarity between creativity and effectiveness is no longer generally acceptable and somewhat of a false opposition. Times have changed and the Holy Communion between creative and effectiveness has reached a new high. But we must be absolutely clear that creativity as perceived by the industry cannot be a criterion in making the effectiveness awards. Trade awards for creativity on the other hand are clearly what the industry considers to be the most creative work produced by the industry.

In any case what really is the dependence on this nebulous thing called creativity for winning an Effie for example? If creative trade awards are almost 100% dependent on creativity as an art form, what then is the relative weight in the Effies?

The US Effies say that the scoring system is as follows:

Scoring System

Strategic Challenge + Objectives    = 23.3%

Idea                            =?23.3%

Bringing the idea to life                  = 23.3%

Results                                            =30.0%

100% of final score

For the US Effies, the Results section had the highest scores amongst entries for Gold Silver and Bronze. If one counted both the scores for ‘Idea’ and ‘Bringing the Idea to life’ as the creative component we may have as much as 46% of the weight devoted to creativity in one way or the other.

 Is the US different from Europe for effectiveness awards?

The European Effies says that in Round 2, the evaluation of the case is based 80% on effectiveness and 20% on creativity. Round 1 in the European Effies is done online. As the European Effies say ‘The final score for each finalist is an average of the effectiveness score and the creative score, weighted to emphasise effectiveness over the creative (80:20).’

Why the overwhelming emphasis on effectiveness in Europe? I think because the IPA in London has laid the benchmark for effectiveness awards and what they mean and what they are and had therefore led and influenced the other countries on the continent.

After all the IPA had the advantage of a global giant like Simon Broadbent to father the effectiveness awards to create a robust award in the UK. Although a doctorate in statistics, his poetry was published by Blackwell’s even when he was an undergraduate. We have to eternally thank him for giving us words like adstock that he invented.

In an interview with Tim Ambler of London Business School in 2000 Broadbent said ‘….the IPA wants cases where a campaign can be shown to be profitable. It is campaign evaluation with the profit motive in the foreground. We go straight to the accountant’s question: Did it pay back? Of course, we spend a lot of time discussing when it might pay back. In a week? Within the financial year? Perhaps I should have suggested the name Advertising Accountability Awards, it has a nice ring’.

A past review of IPA entries revealed that a large number of entries miscalculated payback, which is why you will find guidance notes on the IPA website on defining payback as

1. Calculate the value of incremental sales
2. Calculate incremental sales revenue
3. Calculate marginal contribution to profit
4. Calculate net profit

Enough said about the IPA and coming back to the Effies. How are they really different apart from being American rather than British? Well for one like most American products the Effies are global and have spread to the far corners of the globe unlike the IPA.

 Whither effectiveness?

I still continue to be a fan of the IPA and go back to the Charles Channon preface in Adworks 3 published in 1984 where he describes the purpose and format of the awards.

‘To demonstrate that advertising can be proven to work against measurable criteria and show that it is both a serious commercial investment and a contributor to profit’

Coming back to the question on creativity and effectiveness, is there a high correlation between the awards won at the Indian Effie and the other creative awards in the country as someone recently asked me? Well one only needs to check the Effie and the creative awards of previous years. If it were, it would suggest that what the industry considers creative might be winning the effectiveness awards as well. And that would be a big blow for effectiveness. However, for better or for worse all effectiveness awards are likely to destroy the folklore on the ineffectiveness of advertising and must therefore be applauded for the good it is doing for our industry.

And all you old fogies who are still arguing about the long-term effects of advertising, Hail! Brands are now proving effectiveness based on just one cricketing season. So the long-term effects of advertising may just be a forgotten phrase for the advertising museums. Remember everything is short term today? And in any case in the long term we are all dead as John Maynard Keynes once said.

This article was published in Advertising Age

Prabhakar Mundkur is an independent brand & marketing consultant. He has experience across a wide range of categories from fmcg, healthcare, technology, durables to corporate brand strategy. 

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