Grant Thornton and gyro were the big winners in this year’s Association of National Advertisers’ annual B2 awards competition, taking home top honors as Corporate Marketer of the Year and Large Agency of the Year, respectively.
In addition, Stephen Tisdalle, CMO at State Street Global Advisors, received the Marketer of the Year award for the company’s “Fearless Girl” campaign. This award honors individual rather than corporate achievement.
The awards celebrate overall excellence and performance in business-to-business marketing and were announced during a gala dinner at the ANA’s 2018 Masters of B2B Marketing Conference. Winners also included Hiscox for Small Corporate Marketer of the Year (Under $1 Billion) and Stein IAS for Small Agency of the Year (Under $25 Million). The win for Stein marked the agency’s third in a row.
“The ANA is proud to shine a bright light on business marketing with our annual awards recognizing industry excellence,” said ANA CEO Bob Liodice. “The winning entries represent the most exceptional work in the industry, and we congratulate them on their achievements.”
This year, the ANA Business Marketing division completely reimagined the judging process with the help of top business marketing CMOs and key partners. It was a two-pronged process that elevated both awards groups: the general categories were judged by an online panel of more than 80 business marketing practitioners, and the top awards were discussed and scored by a senior jury comprised of business marketing executives and chaired by Toni Clayton-Hine, CMO at Xerox. Judges did not participate in the evaluation of campaigns or categories in which they had any involvement.