📣 Please note, these events are for Agency Hackers’ members only.

If your agency isn’t a member yet, get in touch with Anne or sign up here.

Winning awards isn’t just about great work – it’s also about telling a story that resonates with the judges. 

“A jury room is another channel. It’s the same campaign, but it’s different audiences, different formatting – different everything.”

Shannon Keach, a creative award consultant, has nearly a decade of experience helping agencies get recognition. He believes the key to winning is crafting meaningful, compelling narratives – and presenting your work in a way that connects to judges, not clients.

“They’re expensive, so if you’re going to do them, do them to win, right? Make something out of it. Don’t just throw time and money at submissions and hope for the best.” 

Awards are a factor people should be thinking about from the get-go. A common pitfall is not being ‘authentic’, and only trying to push a narrative at the end of a campaign. 

Shaping the work you do as you go makes it much easier at the end to justify an award submission. “It’s a million times better to make the work more awardable when you’re at the concepting phase,” says Shannon. “Don’t try to bullshit somebody after the fact. Be objective, think about it in the beginning, and do it right.”

In this session, we’ll be discussing with Shannon:

• Why awards matter. “It’s going to help your clients. It’s going to help attract new clients. It’s going to help attract new talent. It’s going to get your reputation out in the marketplace,” he says.
• Knowing your hook. It’s important to identify the standout angle, the one that makes your case study impossible to ignore. “You need to think. ‘What’s our way in, what’s our hook, what’s our angle? What is our story, and how do we tell it in the best way possible?’”
• Picking your categories. “It’s vital to figure out what awards to enter, what categories to go for, and where you’re going to have the best chances of winning.”
• Making the most of your entries. “Smaller agencies don’t necessarily have dedicated award teams, so the entry fees might sting a little bit more.” This means it’s even more important to nail the submission and make sure you’re thinking like a judge.

This session will draw from Shannon’s years of award-winning awards knowledge to teach you how to craft narratives that win. “You need to have a dedicated, proactive approach. This isn’t something that you can just wing and hope for the best – there’s an art and science to it, as well as a lot of craft. ”

From proactive storytelling to capturing the right material during production, Shannon will be sharing the secrets of building submissions that connect, resonate, and, most importantly, win.