Med Ad News Honors Healthcare Advertisers at 20th Annual Manny Awards

Source: Pharmalive
Original Article: http://www.pharmalive.com/News/index.cfm?articleid=620725&categoryid=16

NEWTOWN, Pa., April 23, 2009 — Canon Communications has announced the winners of the 20th annual Med Ad News Manny Awards 2009. The gala event held at the Sheraton New York Hotel and Towers culminated with the naming of Draftfcb Healthcare as Agency of the Year: Category I. The award honors the most outstanding healthcare advertising agency with revenue of more than $50 million. In addition, Donna Tuths, president, Ogilvy Healthworld NA, was named Med Ad News Advertising Person of the Year in recognition of her impressive achievements in helping to transform the agency into one that offers better, deeper, more interactive brand narratives.

Eleven additional awards were bestowed throughout the evening to agencies achieving excellence in a variety of categories.

“The Manny Awards have been around for 20 years because of their significance to the industry and because the awards acknowledge the agencies for who they are, not just what they do,” says Editor-in-Chief Christiane Truelove. “This year’s awards ceremony looked back to the past and to the future, to celebrate the healthcare advertising industry.”

Agency of the Year: Category I winner Draftfcb Healthcare experienced its best year ever in 2008, adding 21 accounts and increasing its talent base. The agency’s business units continue to grow, and Draftfcb is expanding its digital, managed markets, and medical-education offerings in 2009.

Draftfcb was also the recipient of the Manny award for Best Disease Awareness Campaign. The winning campaign was created for client Centocor Inc. to illustrate the psychological effects faced by psoriasis sufferers.

Fellow Agency of the Year: Category I nominee Cline Davis & Mann Inc. took home the Manny award for Best Professional Advertising Campaign. The agency was awarded for its professional ad campaign for Lucentis. The series of ads for client Genentech Inc. show how vision can be noticeably improved for patients who have wet age-related macular degeneration.

Euro RSCG Life MetaMax won the Manny award for Agency of the Year: Category II. This category honors agencies with revenue between $25 million and $50 million. In 2008, Euro RSCG Life MetaMax’s organic growth boosted the agency’s size, standing, and livelihood in the healthcare communications arena. The agency continues to expand its offerings while unifying processes, building greater digital muscle, and tapping into mass culture.

Agency of the Year: Category III honors agencies recording less than $25 million in revenue. The award was taken home by Wishbone/ITP Inc. Despite growing its staff during the year, Wishbone/ITP’s mantra of “big agency service without big agency bureaucracy” continues to resonate with clients, and the state of the economy has made this concept even more timely and relevant as clients seek to work more efficiently.

Saatchi & Saatchi Consumer Health+Wellness was the winner of the Most Creative Agency award. Candidates for Most Creative Agency were voted on by their peers and Med Ad News staff based on advertisements/promotional pieces that the nominees believed best reflected that agency’s body of work. Saatchi & Saatchi Consumer Health+Wellness presents clients with creative platforms across the digital, advertising, and customer relationship management divides.

Saatchi & Saatchi Consumer Health+Wellness’ creativity led to the development of the “Rooster” campaign for Sanofi-Aventis’ sleep drug Ambien CR. The iconic series of ads – which featured an inconsiderate rooster jarring people from sleep in unlikely ways – took home Best Consumer Advertising Campaign honors.

The award for Best Self Promotion went to The CementBloc for its print campaign conceived to announce the birth of four independent healthcare agencies: The CementWorks, The IronWorks, The StoneWorks, and The CementBond.

Ignite Health was awarded the Manny for Best Interactive Campaign for MyInnerstate.com. Created for client Centocor, MyInnerstate.com is an online film-screening experience centered around Innerstate, a documentary film that follows the lives of three people with chronic diseases of the immune system; Crohn’s disease, rheumatoid arthritis, and plaque psoriasis.

The Manny award for Best Philanthropic Campaign went to GCG Healthcare for a series of ads created for the Children’s Neuroblastoma Cancer Foundation. The campaign uses intimate photography to convey the unvarnished truth about neuroblastoma and the pressing need for research funding.

Impressed by the breadth of philanthropic work taking place within the healthcare advertising industry, Med Ad News created the Heart Award to recognize agencies’ social responsibility and agency cultures that embody a high commitment to philanthropic and social causes. The inaugural award went to Purohit Navigation. The agency is involved in helping women with fistula regain their health and self-esteem through a non-profit organization in Sierra Leone, West Africa. The agency helped establish the foundation, creating a 501[c]3 organization, with a nurse, two physicians, and local volunteers. Executives at Purohit Navigation reached out to private donors and physicians, and the creative team developed branding, an award-winning logo, and a Website. Since the foundation began, nearly 400 women have received the medical procedure that has changed their lives.

Med Ad News has also created a new Vision Award, given for the idea, concept, or initiative that best exemplifies the healthcare ad agency of the future. In deciding the winner of this award, the Med Ad News editorial staff reviewed what new idea, concept, or initiative launched by an agency in the previous year could have the greatest potential to transform the industry in a positive way and what was the most interesting and insightful step forward of the year. The Vision Award went to Havas Drive, a new entity within the Euro RSCG network. The agency delivers clients with a unique pay-for-performance approach. Havas Drive’s immersive, feature-rich 3D environments have allowed the agency to present client content in a way that allows for meaningful interaction and education.

About Med Ad News
The pharmaceutical industry’s publication of record for 25 years, Med Ad News provides broad coverage and incisive analysis of the issues, events, trends, and strategies shaping pharmaceutical business, marketing, and sales. More than 16,000 readers – comprising corporate executives, marketing, sales, and product managers – receive Med Ad News 12 times per year. Med Ad News is a publication of Canon Communications Pharmaceutical Media Group.

About Canon Communications Pharmaceutical Media Group
A division of Canon Communications LLC, Canon Communications Pharmaceutical Media Group is a provider of business and marketing information to the $500 billion worldwide pharmaceutical industry. The group publishes well-established business magazines, including Med Ad News and R&D Directions, and Pharmaceutical and Medical Packaging News, and the industry Website PharmaLive.com. The Canon Communications Pharmaceutical Media Group corporate mission is to be a leading provider of business, marketing, and clinical-research information to the pharmaceutical industry.