Judges reasons for the winners

Category 1: Best Female Leader in Marketing

Client Side: Winner – Katie Vanneck Smith, News UK

This category recognises a woman who has demonstrated exemplary leadership over the past year. As CMO at News UK, Katie leads from the front, providing a great example of how to achieve success in business.

After controversially removing promotional cover mounts five years ago, prompting other newspapers to follow suit, Katie has made history by launching the first newspaper loyalty programme – Times+. She also led the digital transformation and successfully introduced paid-for content on The Times and The Sunday Times – two of the biggest newspapers in the UK.

Her mantra, ‘work hard, have fun and make history’ is evident throughout her career, and News UK’s print-only business model has been transformed into a multi-channel, customer-centric, global business, under Katie’s vision.

An industry game-changer with true grit, Katie has broken down traditional hierarchies, and through her determination to ‘make friends with finance and marry the technologists,’ News UK has flourished during a tough economic year.

Agency Side: Winner – Claire Stokes, Circle Agency

Originally from Canada, Claire Stokes is the Founder and MD of Circle Agency – a multi award winning specialist experiential agency based in Reading, Berkshire. Claire started Circle nine years ago, after spotting a gap in the UK market, and since inception in 2004 the agency now boasts an impressive client roster including EA™, BlackBerry, O2, Symantec, GlaxoSmithKline, and PlayStation.

Having worked on some of the original breakthrough experiential campaigns of our time, the Pepsi Taste Challenge for example, Claire has brought unrivalled experience and enthusiasm that she still trades on today. Her presence in the peer nominated EVENT 100 – most influential people in the UK events industry, having made the list for the last four years running, is testament to her enviable reputation for creativity and faultless execution.

With almost 18 years’ experience, Claire is a pioneer of a very young industry, and her reputation as an industry leader is well deserved.

Category 2: Best Female Marketer – Consumer

Winner – Marie Edwards, Pembrokeshire Coast National Park Authority

An experienced strategic marketer leading a team of five, Marie’s task was to mark the 60th anniversary of the Pembrokeshire Coast National Park’s Association (PCNPA) designation with a fitting tribute, which promoted the Park to UK residents and international visitors.
With a campaign budget of £60k, Marie commissioned six pieces of artwork that set out to capture the heritage, charm and feel of the area, and displayed them at UK mainline railway stations and the London Underground, as well as cities that geographically provided good links via rail and road, into Pembrokeshire. The art also featured QR Codes to encourage people on the move to access the PCNPA website via their phones and tablets.

And the results speak for themselves: visitors to the park increased by 25% (against the same time in 2011), mountains of PR exposure including features in the Independent and Guardian; Wales’ leading daily, The Western Mail; all six Pembrokeshire newspapers; BBC Wales Today; and lifestyle magazines Coast, Britain, and the front cover image (and editorial) for the August 2013 edition of Welsh Coastal Life. And to top it off, merchandise sales rose by 50%, to a total of £30k, reducing campaign cost by almost half!

Category 3: Best Female Marketer – Independent Consultant

Winner – Tina Fegent, Tina Fegent Ltd

In some marketing circles procurement is viewed with suspicion and fear. Our winner has worked in marketing procurement for 22 years and has built an enviable reputation as positive, constructive, and dare we say it, even creative partner. Indeed she has worked tirelessly to promote the professionalism of both procurement and marketing.

She set up the marketing procurement team at Cellnet (now O2), then went to SmithKline Beecham, Orange – again setting up teams from scratch. 11 years ago she then crossed over to the dark side – joining Grey and then Lowe to professionalise their tendering and commercial operations. So has seen both sides of the fence and built trust on both sides of that fence. 8 years ago she set up her own – Tina Fegent Consultancy – which has gone from strength to strength working with blue chips including John Lewis, Adidas, William Hill and Age UK to name a few. She has also worked on behalf of the industry, chairing the purchasing trade body group on Marketing for 8 years (Chartered Institute of Purchasing and Supply).

Highly Commended – Sharon Jaffe, JaffeBlend

Sharon is a passionate marketer who has devoted the last 20 years of her life to the world of digital marketing. She branched out on her own 6 years ago when she started the JaffeBlend digital marketing and sales business focussing on consulting, training and speaking, and has racked up an impressive client list including the likes of the BBC, Visa, CondéNast, Skype and Hyundai.
Sharon dedicates herself to charity work helping individuals and small businesses with social media strategy and speaks at regular and charity events. She’s also a prolific blogger, who’s reported from Google Zeitgeist for the last 4 consecutive years, and her tweets have even been retweeted by none other than Nikesh Arora (SVP and Chief Business Officer at Google).
Sharon hails from South Africa but now lives in London balancing her business with being a wife as well as a mum to her two girls – we think she’s a shining example that women can have it all.

Category 4: Female Fast Track Marketer of the Year

Winner – Grace Letley, PHD

This award is in recognition of someone who has relatively short experience in marketing, six years or less, but has made a significant impact in their business – demonstrating best marketing practice with tangible results.

Grace Letley is the Media Group Manager for PHD. Having started her career on the SMG graduate scheme, Grace was widely regarded as a ‘rising star’ who proved herself to be a self-starter, considered, intelligent and, above all, displaying a natural instinct for insight and strategy. Now working on PHD’s flagship Mondelez account, Grace has been at the forefront of having to tackle some of the biggest issues on her client’s business particularly in the space of media migration and return on investment. Not only has Grace contributed to the growth of PHD as a business but she has been an invaluable individual to her client’s business. Her confidence and ability has ensured that her ascendance continues and she is on track to meet her ambition of moving to the next level.

In the words of Chris Tebben, then Chief Marketing Officer of Pizza Hut UK (later Vice President, Marketing – Yum Restaurants International, US): “She is a tremendous asset to our business and consider this a threat if you have any ideas about pulling her off the account.”

Category 5: Best Female Marketer – Not for Profit

Winner – Belinda Parmar, Little Miss Geek

After being confronted with startling statistics that only 17% of the technology workforce is female, and number of women entering the technology workforce is at an all-time low, Belinda knew something was needed to change the negative perception of technology and revolutionise the way it was taught in schools. Social enterprise Little Miss Geek was founded.

Consisting of after-school clubs in inner city London schools, enrichment days in secondary schools, teacher programmes, parent-daughter workshops, rising stars mentoring programme, as well as the support of politicians and the press – the campaign, which only began in Jan 2013, has been a huge success.

Not only has Belinda secured international coverage, notably in the New York Times, Herald Tribune and WIRED, but she’s garnered the support of major politicians including Boris Johnson and the equalities Minister, Maria Miller, and most importantly, after the completion of phase 1 in their trial schools, one school in particular has seen a 52% increase in girls taking Computing GCSE. Who knows the next Mark Zuckerberg may well be female.

Category 6: Special Award for Outstanding Contribution to Marketing

Agency Side: Winner – Karen Blackett, MediaCom UK

This award recognises someone who inspires greatness, who challenges the norms of marketing, is passionate about the development of women within the industry, and whose energy and commitment has delivered outstanding results.

Karen Blackett is the CEO of MediaCom, the UK’s biggest media planning and buying agency. Since Karen took the helm in January 2011 she has led the agency to build on its already successful history by bringing a plethora of new clients to its offices, winning £110m of new business including Coca Cola and Sony in 2013 alone. But it’s what she undertakes outside of her day job that really shines a light on Karen’s outstanding contributions to our industry.

Karen is an ambassador for the National Apprenticeship Service, and has launched Mediacom’s very own apprenticeship scheme in 2012. She has also taken on roles as Facebook UK’s Advisory board member and a Trustee for Adopt a Better Way, and is also a regular national and trade columnist and industry speaker, having notably spoken at the House of Commons Black Women Mean Business Event, Management Today’s Inspiring Women conference and Voice of Women event. Moreover Karen has appeared twice in Todays ’35 most powerful under 35,’ and featured three times in Powerlist of Britain’s top 100 influential black people.
Karen is not only an extraordinary woman in marketing; she’s a leader who’s showed unfailing commitment to the next generation of female leaders.

Category 7: Special Award for Outstanding Contribution to Marketing

Client Side: Winner – Roisin O’Donnelly, P&G

Roisin is a true inspiration for women in marketing in the UK. She simultaneously champions P&G, the marketing industry and its responsibilities and her role as the mother of three children.

She works for a demanding organisation, one that is famous for its marketing thinking an innovation for over a century. She launched Hugo Boss Fragrances, integrated the Gillette business following its acquisition and more recently led P&Gs sponsorship of the Olympics and turned the occasion into a celebration of mums. This initiative was fresh, innovative and disarmingly humble. Humility, not being a character trait of most Olympic sponsorships, but absolutely a characteristic of Roisin.

In addition, she actively champions women in the industry, being a recent chair of WACL, a role that demands time and effort. She speaks at industry events regularly and is brave to stand up for what she believes in to ensure responsible marketing and the protection of self regulation.

As a mum she delivers her kids to school and leaves work at 5.45. She is a great believer in using technology to integrate her work and life and to minimise the conflicting demands of both. Her approach to life is to prioritise, be disciplined and to ensure that she creates an environment around her of joy and laughter. She takes what she does seriously but not herself.

Women in Marketing Company Award

Winner – Diageo

The judges were immensely impressed by the way that Diageo manages and invests in its talent globally. Development programmes, mentoring and coaching programmes and global internal networks celebrating and promoting diversity, all work to ensure that female talent is engaged and motivated to progress to the highest levels of seniority.

Diageo’s approach to gender diversity is driven by a core belief that winners in global business will be those with diverse leadership teams. A great deal of research indicates that companies with more women do better – achieving sales performance that is on average 56% higher. A third of Diageo’s executive committee is female (5 out of 15). All of these women have had long careers in Diageo, rising through the business to join the executive team.

The signal that this sends to young female marketers is a very positive one – that your career will be supported in a well thought through, structured and rewarding manner…and that you can reach for the stars!