Steph Pearson from DraftFCB and PHDiQ’s Brendan Hewitt have been named winners of the inaugural Yahoo! New Zealand Digital Stars Awards, beating out 16 other young digital media exponents.
The pair will receive an all expenses paid trip to Ad:Tech, one of Australia’s most prestigious marketing and advertising conferences, to be held in Sydney.
The competition was open to all digital media planners and buyers who have been working at a New Zealand media agency for less than seven years and the entries were narrowed down to five finalists who each submitted an article on the future of digital and how this will shape the advertising industry.
Entries were judged independently by a panel of local and international experts, including the Hyperfactory’s chairman and co-founder, Derek Handley, Idealog editor and industry commentator, Hazel Phillips and James Fleet, general manager of Australian online comparison website CaptainCompare.com.
Judges said both winners displayed a good understanding of where digital advertising is heading and how the many and varied online consumer touchpoints will enable advertisers to amplify brand experiences.
“Digital Stars is an opportunity to recognise those up and coming individuals who are at the forefront of digital media and we’d like to congratulate Steph and Brendan for proving themselves to be worthy winners,” says Yahoo! New Zealand sales director, Louis Niven. “The response we’ve had to the competition this year is encouraging and demonstrates that our young media planners and buyers have a real passion for the industry and an appetite to engage. This is fundamental in ensuring that New Zealand agencies keep apace with the constantly changing digital landscape and challenge themselves to understand the latest trends and innovations in the digital space.”
