Leo Burnett is one of six agencies to win a Gold Lion in the first ever Creative Data award – there was no Grand Prix awarded making Leos’ the top gong.
The Lion was awarded for the Run That Town campaign developed for the Australian Bureau of Statistics – it created a game based on real census data to show people census data in a new light.
GPY&R’s Melanoma Likes Me campaign for Melanoma Patients Australia campaign was shortlisted, but didn’t make the finalists.
David Sable, President of the jury, said Leos’ approach in Run That Town was worthy of a Gold Lion because it turned boring data into something compelling.
“We looked for the things that made boring data compelling, personal day into living data. We believe there is no story these days without data,” he added.
“I mean, the Bureau of Statistics is the most shit boring stuff you can ever imagine in your life and turned it into something so compellingly interesting. The way they used it and the engagement model we so clear, and it was scalable, any Bureau or census or government that has boring, miserable data could adopt.”On not awarding a Grand Prix, he said that it being the first year made it challenging for the jury and so it opted not to award a Grand Prix prize.
“The honour is in getting on the shortlist, when you think about the sheer amount of work that goes through here, it’s huge. We didn't give a Grand Prix this year, not because the work wasn’t good enough, but because we thought we were inadequate in the first year to pick out that one thing that represented the category.
“It was challenging for the first year, and we were very cognisant that we were making a statement and setting a benchmark. Hopefully creating a bar that you hope will be raised next year and again the year after. The key was that what we were looking for was; was the linkage to data clear, could you see it,” he said.
There were 600 entries, 55 shortlisted and 28 Lions handed out. Creative data category came about from discussions with the research industry about how to bring in research to the Lions, but create a Lion that still reflected creative side of the industry.
Cannes Lions Festival CEO Phil Thomas said that it reflects the changing market. “Every move that we make has to be linked back to creativity. The concept of data lions goes back to conversations with the research industry, but we found it difficult at that time to create a Lion that was still about creativity but linked to research. It’s an indication of how far things have moved that we can create a lion about what data can do,” he said.
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