27. August 2024.

Find out how to win at SoMo Borac 2024!

Are you submitting a campaign in the SoMo Growth or SoMo Global categories? Here’s how to increase your chances of taking the award — Marko Mikeš from Aleph has shared valuable tips on writing submissions that will help you stand out. Read his guidelines below and learn how to impress the jury!

SoMo Borac powered by Aleph is the most prestigious digital regional award and is extremely important for anyone working in digital today. The competition is growing every year, and everyone eager to win regional recognition for their work gives their utmost to ensure the expert jury recognizes their campaign as outstanding. Each of the 17 categories requires a high-quality campaign presented in an original way, and of course, the submission must clearly demonstrate actual results achieved.

Creativity and the way the submission is written, along with the assessment of creativity in general, are quite subjective (anyone who has ever been on a jury will likely agree), but the results must be presented objectively and in a very clear and transparent manner. Considering that in SoMo Global and SoMo Growth, the results account for up to 70% of the total score, it is crucial to pay attention to the submission itself so the jury gets a complete insight into the campaign they are evaluating.

Therefore, I have taken the time to outline guidelines that could be useful when writing your submission and increase the chances of your project making it to the finals. I want to emphasize that projects that don’t make it to the finals are not necessarily poor projects (nor poor submissions), but the competition often dictates the course of the competition itself. However, it is up to each submitter to try and present the value of their project in the best possible way.

Hierarchy of Goals: BUSINESS → BRAND → MEDIA

I will try to illustrate this with examples of cases that I consider to be good examples of submission writing, but first, it should be clarified that the foundation of each submission is a) precisely defined business objective, b) a marketing objective that can be divided into brand and performance/direct response objectives, and c) a media objective. All of these must be clearly and concretely defined so that the jury has a starting point for comparing the results during evaluation.

Case 1 of a good example of goal setting:

• Business objective/result: We increased market share by +3pp over 6 months, +1pp was the goal.
• Brand objective/result: We increased brand awareness by +5pp over 6 months, +2.5pp was the goal.
• Media objective/result: We achieved 55% reach with a frequency of 2.5 on a weekly basis in the target group and achieved 2,000,000 impressions during the 6-month campaign period, while the goal was 54% reach, 2 weeks frequency, and 1,900,000 impressions.

Case 2 of a good example of goal setting:

• Business objective/result: We increased market share by +3pp over 6 months, +1pp was the goal (considering last year’s results and category growth, i.e., providing context).
• Brand objective/result: We increased brand awareness by +5pp over 6 months, +2.5pp was the goal (considering last year’s results and category growth, i.e., providing business context).
• Media objective/result: We achieved 55% reach with a frequency of 2.5 on a weekly basis in the target group and achieved 2,000,000 impressions during the 6-month campaign period, while the goal was 54% reach, 2 weeks frequency, and 1,900,000 impressions (considering that we did not spend more than planned, i.e., providing context for a more complete picture).

KPIs within the framework and how to reach them: BUSINESS → MARKETING → MEDIA

There are many different KPIs that your brand tracks and considers important. It’s crucial to explain in the case what you track, and ideally, you should have 2 to a maximum of 4 strategic objectives (although you can present fewer objectives in the case). Below are just some of the KPIs you might consider when submitting a case.

1. Business KPIs

These include market position, market growth, profitability, profit growth, and similar indicators.

How to reach them: You should rely on internal data from your organization, but an additional plus would be adding any category context that can be obtained through external research agencies or data from your business partners.

2. Marketing KPIs

Marketing KPIs can be divided into brand and performance/direct response KPIs. Examples of brand KPIs include brand awareness, campaign recall, and purchase intent measurement, while examples of performance marketing goals are the number of conversions (leads/sales), ROAS (return on advertising spend), iROAS (incremental return on advertising spend), LTV (lifetime value), CAC (customer acquisition cost), and so on.
An additional plus for those who “want to know more” is the measurement of incrementality.

How to reach them: Internal data that can be obtained either through the platforms themselves or through third-party research. All major platforms offer some form of brand or conversion lift (e.g., Meta, TikTok, Snapchat, Pinterest, etc.) or geo-conversion lift tests, where we can measure the incremental value of advertising, i.e., how much, for example, sales occurred among people who saw the ad compared to those who did not see the ad for your campaign. In terms of brand lift, we can see the difference in positive responses to a question such as “Have you heard of brand xxx?” between the audience that saw and did not see the ad.

3. Media KPIs

Reach, frequency, number of impressions, clicks, social engagement, viewability, etc.

How to reach them: Internal data that can be obtained either through the platforms themselves or through third-party research.

These are the most common mistakes in applications

To conclude, my colleague Mario Frančešević from the agency SeekandHit, who last year won the SoMo Global and Special Mention by Aleph awards with the campaign ‘Valamar Ongoing Campaigns’ (SeekandHit and Valamar), pointed out the most common mistakes that should definitely be avoided. Mario is also a member of this year’s jury, so his advice is certainly worth considering. The first mistake he highlights is that applicants often emphasize metrics in the performance category that are (or have become) irrelevant when it comes to marketing KPIs, such as CTR, impressions, clicks, and the like.

Furthermore, in many campaigns, different time periods are compared. Mario emphasized the importance of comparing the same period, or if it is necessary to compare different periods, it is essential to indicate why this is the case (for example, seasonality).

Mario’s colleague, Antonija Vržina, who, along with the rest of the team, worked on the application for the aforementioned award-winning project, also added her comments. Antonija highlighted the technical elements of the application itself and noted that although 1,000 characters of written application and a video lasting up to 3 minutes may seem like little space to showcase all the unique aspects of your project, it is quite enough to show everyone what sets you apart from other projects. Her advice: Be concise, get straight to the point, clearly emphasize your main advantages, and keep in mind that the video is your main tool— the same story can be told in many ways, and you should find the best one to impress the jury.

Another thing that is always a plus, but worth mentioning, is that you should think outside the box. The only thing better than good results are good results achieved through innovative methods and told in a creative way.

And of course, don’t forget to enjoy the process! The award is the goal for everyone, but don’t forget all the other benefits, from enjoying the creation of the application and video to socializing with industry colleagues and exchanging experiences. And when you successfully submit the project and eagerly await October 25th and SoMo Borac, don’t forget to tell yourself “well done”—no matter who wins, every project is special and successful in its own way, Antonija adds.

Conclusion

Finally, what is most important if you want to win a SoMo in the performance category? If you have achieved excellent business results through good strategic preparation and tactical implementation, you have already done a large part of the job, but you are not yet at the finish line.

Therefore, the purpose of this article is to help you prepare your case and present the results you have achieved through the business → marketing → media framework. If you can holistically present your planned and achieved goals and provide the necessary context for your category, the jury will have a complete insight and be able to evaluate your project, increasing the chances of getting excellent scores. Many brands achieve excellent results in all three categories, but when writing the entire case, they overlook some details that can make a difference in the midst of numerous and strong competition.

To conclude, I am providing a concrete example that follows this flow of KPI presentation. Last year’s case from SeekandHit and Valamar for the ‘Valamar ongoing campaigns.’

Within the case, the business result and growth (KPI – revenue and transaction growth) are clearly indicated with specific context (growth without increasing the budget), as well as the marketing KPI, i.e., performance KPI (return on ad spend – ROAS). Additionally (although the results are not mentioned), other activities were carried out to measure the success of advertising, such as brand and geo-conversion tests.