With only three days left for the Dubai Lynx International Festival of Creativity to kick off, it is about time to take a closer look at the region’s top work that is competing for the Lynx.
With messages that go beyond advertising, and bring out the human element, Memac Ogilvy’s top three contenders are ‘Al Jazeera – Hear the Human Story’, ‘Coca-Cola – Open Up. ‘It’s Ramadan’ and ‘UN Women – The Autocomplete Truth’.
Al Jazeera – Hear the Human Story
As news networks resort to sensationalism and opinionated news anchors, people seek alternative news sources, covering news that matters. Al Jazeera, a news network that prides itself on doing just that, shares its philosophy in the global campaign ‘Hear the Human Story’. The Memac Ogilvy campaign not only positioned the brand but also put some much needed humanity back in the news, by giving a voice to those that other networks often ignore.
Coca-Cola – Open Up. It’s Ramadan
As Arabs, expectations dominate our everyday lives – from career choices, to marriage, down to the formal behavior at home. This creates extreme tension that is kept bottled up, as revealing true feelings is considered taboo. Coca-Cola went to the root of the tension – the hesitation to express how one really feels. Ramadan is a month when things should get better. Memac Ogilvy invited audience to Open Up. Through TV ads encouraging speaking candidly with families and reaching out to influencers, uncovering internal family struggles and resolving them, Coca-Cola turned #OpenUp stories into online films.
UN Women – The Autocomplete Truth
In today’s age, it’s almost unthinkable to consider gender inequality as a persisting issue. UN Women however, sees that despite decades of global advancement, discrimination against women is still rampant worldwide. We needed to reveal this to a global audience and reignite the conversation. Using Google’s autocomplete function, fed by 6 billion searches daily, the campaign, created by Memac Ogilvy, held up a mirror to the world and exposed the truth. The shocking results became the faces of the campaign, initiating people to debate.