The 2nd Yahoo! Searchlight Award was scheduled for 22nd February. The award "recognizes and rewards advertising agencies that develop search marketing applications outside of the tried and true direct response mindset. The award specifically illuminates the quality and outstanding nature of work in the context of an overall multi-media campaign."

This year the winner is Avenue A|Razorfish for their “Your Choice, Your Chase” campaign. Greg Sterling, one of the panelists, said that the award was given to Avenue A|Razorfish for "their discussion of search was the most complete and compelling — with the most granular information about the performance of the campaign in search."

Search Engine Watch quotes the press release on why Avenue A|Razorfish won the award:

The Yahoo! 2nd Annual Searchlight Award winner is Avenue A|Razorfish for their “Your Choice, Your Chase” campaign! Avenue A|Razorfish was a finalist last year at the first-ever Searchlight Awards. This year, Senior Search Account Manager Steve Capone provided solid research to show the benefits of using broad keywords to drive brand awareness for Chase. The campaign also focused on how the Chase microsite delivered the right product with the right rewards to interested customers. Avenue A|Razorfish is an interactive services firm that helps companies use the online channel as a marketing and business tool.

The event both highlights search and integrates it with other traditional modes of advertising. Search as advertising is a highly important symbiotic relationship which hold lots of promise for future. This is exactly where the Avenue A|Razorfish guys excelled. As Greg Sterling summarized:

The Avenue A guys (who also presented last year) did a terrific job in their explanation of the process of how they sold the client, Chase, on spending more on “generic” search terms that were expensive (i.e., “Credit Card”) as part of a branding strategy. (A DR mindset wouldn’t justify the spend because the ROI wasn’t there in terms of customer acquisitions.) And they did a study with Yahoo! to back up their branding position, which was supported by data showing consumer recall and brand lift.

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