Irish technology marketing firm TecBrand has won its second consecutive Gold Icon award at the Adweek US Technology Marketing Awards. Last year the Dublin-based firm become the first company outside the US to win such as prize and this year its efforts beat entries from Microsoft and HP at what is regarded as the Oscars of the technology marketing world.
TecBrand won its award for an innovative campaign targeting Irish chief information officers (CIOs) and chief technology officers for Siemens Business Service as part of its “It’s For You” sales lead generation campaign. The campaign, whereby participants received an unmarked package with a Siemens phone inside that automatically dialled a marketing message, generated a 100pc response rate measured in sales meetings created with senior executives. The result compares with an industry average response of 2pc to 4pc.
Each year the Icon Awards receive thousands of entries from agencies throughout the world. This is the second year in a row for TecBrand to win an ICON Award, having become the first non-US company to do so in 2002 for the Best Direct Mail Category. The company also took four awards at the Irish Direct Marketing Awards for 2003.
TecBrand’s CEO Stephen Stynes cited the growing awareness amongst Irish technology firms to get their marketing in order if they were to generate sales. “Without doubt the biggest challenge facing technology companies today is the ability to use their marketing budgets wisely in support of driving sales. They need to become more aggressive and competitive.”
Stynes pointed to a speech made by Dr Michael Lynch of Autonomy to the recent Irish Software Association Annual Conference, calling on firms to increase their sales and marketing activities. He said that while companies had to control costs, it was impossible to succeed without investment in marketing. “Many of us come from the old school of engineers who believed that if you built a better bridge, the world would beat a path to your door. This is not the case. There’s no point in having the best software in the world unless you market it.”
By John Kennedy
