Today we are excited to announce the finalists for the second annual Ad to Action Awards. We received 91 entries, an over 50% increase compared to 2014, and the 20 finalists demonstrated the greatest potential for driving local consumer engagement and best addressed current market needs.
This week the judging panel – made up of 18 companies including Twitter, Foursquare, Yahoo, MapQuest, xAd and more – completed their evaluation of these products and solutions. Each judge reviewed a subset of entries and no judge reviewed any entries where there was a potential conflict of interest.
Entries were evaluated on ability to facilitate consumer actions (calls, clicks, store visits, etc.), innovation, ROI potential, ease of implementation and more. Scores were calculated on a 10-point scale and what follows are some scoring highlights from the competition:
- The aggregate score for the entire competition, or the average score per entry, was 6.5;
- Automation had the best overall category score at 7.5;
- The best individual score was a 9.
“I was very impressed by the breadth and quality of entries LSA received,” said Anne Mercogliano, head of SMB marketing at Twitter. “Being named a finalist in this competition means being part of a high caliber and innovative group.”
Around three-quarters of entering companies were new to the competition bringing forth 15 first time finalists. Winners will be announced at the 2015 LSA Conference in Los Angeles, April 20-22.
So without further ado, here are the finalists:
Presence Management
- Yext is the world’s leading digital presence management company, with a mission to help marketers perfect their location information in every hand, on every device.
- DevHub is a private labeled presence platform that includes responsive sites, landing pages, multi-location and business listing management.
Verticals & Marketplaces
- Urgent.ly provides consumers with on-demand, real-time roadside assistance.
- Rio SEO facilitates the discovery of global retailer and service providers’ local listings and optimized content by local searchers across multiple platforms.
Attribution & Analytics
- CallRail provides call tracking, a way for businesses to see what makes the phone ring.
- ReachLocal is an online marketing and advertising solution provider for small, medium, and large businesses advertising to consumers in local markets.
Platforms & Services
- MomentFeed connects national brands with local consumers in the communities they serve.
- Rise Interactive is a digital marketing agency which specializes in digital media and advanced analytics. Rise is a strategic partner helping marketing leaders make smarter investment decisions.
Automation
- MerchantAtlas provides products and services which allow companies to sell cheaper, scale faster and acquire more customers at a far lower customer acquisition cost.
- PaperG is an ad technology SaaS platform that provides creative scale by eliminating the high costs, slow turnaround time, and siloed production usually required to build ads for a multi-screen campaign.
Mobile
- Aisle411 provides indoor mapping and indoor location tracking solutions for retailers, developers and shoppers on iOS and Android.
- YILLIO™® is a social GPS helping everyone discover, save and share favorite places and deals along their routes.
Social
- SocialCentiv is a patented Twitter marketing application tool to help businesses find new customers.
- Closely helps small businesses sort through endless digital marketing options and discover best-of-breed solutions tailored for them.
Video
- Media Distribution Solutions delivers the only turnkey video platform that provides media companies and agencies the technology they need to meet the demands of small- to mid-sized business (SMB) owners.
- Sightly‘s local video advertising platform reaches target audiences on multiple screens through YouTube and other networks.
- hibu is a multinational directories and internet services company headquartered in Reading, Berkshire, UK.
- SMG Local Spectrum specializes in helping clients understand how people connect with local directional marketing channels.
Best Local Ad Campaign
- Location3 Media is a digital marketing agency based in Denver, Colorado with expertise across paid, earned and owned channels.
- Search Influence is a national, full-service search engine marketing company based in New Orleans.