Designed to create a PR firestorm, Mango Communications’ campaign, “Correct the Internet” saw the company receive the 2024 Public Relations Institute of New Zealand (PRINZ) Supreme award on Wednesday night.
The PRINZ Awards is an annual event that recognises excellence in the New Zealand’s public relations and communications industry, promoting continuous improvement, and celebrating best practice. The awards ceremony was held in Auckland on Wednesday.
The judges confirmed that Mango’s clever and carefully crafted public relations campaign, Correct the Internet, did exactly what it set out to do.
Their campaign, entered in the best use of media relations category, started back in 2022 when the agency was researching women’s sports before the FIFA Football Women’s World Cup.
Mango was shocked by what it found – women’s sport achievements were ignored or downgraded in favour of men’s sport on most search engines. The more the agency looked, they more they found, and the more it spurred them to action by driving thousands to influence Google and other search engines.
“You’d be hard pushed to find many Kiwis who were not aware of the ambitious objectives this campaign set out to achieve given the significant media coverage it received,” agreed PRINZ Awards Chief Judges, Denise Mackay FPRINZ, APR and Andrew Pirie, FPRINZ.
The judges recognised the significant challenge the campaign took on, hoping to influence ‘big tech’ and loved the “but we’ll give it a crack anyway” attitude taken, regardless. A true David versus Goliath effort.
“This entry is an exquisite example of exceptional public relations and communications professionals and a strong fourth estate working together to create positive change. An almost flawless entry in content and delivery,” says Mackay.
“It was a highly ambitious, innovative and courageous campaign, that achieved positive impact on a global scale,” says Pirie.
The judges noted that although the campaign was a multi-faceted marketing effort, the public relations involvement was significant and the media results impressive.
There was a total of six entries put forward to be judged as the supreme winner, all gold winners in their individual categories.
The award winners are listed below:
Telum Media – Best Use of Media Relations
Bronze Award Winners:
- Anthem for Lifting Aotearoa’s sights to greater sustainable transport opportunities.
- Great Scott for Putting the springs in Hanmer’s new slides.
Silver Award Winners:
- Great Scott for One for wāhine – a stunning victory for NZ Young Farmers
- Blackland PR for Lowering fees for Wellington sports players
- Development West Coast for Return of the Kōtuku: a media campaign takes flight
Gold Award Winner:
Mango Communications for Correct the Internet
Isentia – Best Use of Digital and Social Media
Bronze Award Winner:
- ANZCO Foods for A Technology Leap Forward
Silver Award Winners:
- Stats NZ for Building Trust & Confidence Online for the 2023 Census
- Development West Coast for West Coast Wikipedian at Large
Consumer or Customer Relations
Silver Awards:
- Acumen for Samsung: A taste of 5G
- Acumen for Uber: Helping Kiwis Donate from their Doorsteps
- Cherryred for NOT out with the old, but in with the new
Government Relations and Public Affairs
Silver Award Winners:
- Restaurant Association of New Zealand and Awhi Group for Advocating for Change: Elevating the Hospotlity Industry through government Partnership
- Priority Communications for FundaPen campaign – A triumph for Aotearoa’s anaphylaxis sufferers
- Anthem for Lifting Aotearoa’s sights to greater sustainable opportunities
- Silvereye for Silvereye campaign for the NZ Game Developers Association
- Anthem for The Domino Effect
Most Innovative Campaign
Bronze Award Winners:
- Acumen for Samsung: A taste of 5G
- Mango Communications for Correct the Internet
Gold Award Winner:
- Development West Coast for West Coast Wikipedian at Large
Corporate and Business Public Relations
Bronze Award Winners:
- ANZCO Foods for A research-led solution that worked for users and ANZCO
- Kordia for Kordia’s Business Cyber Security Report
Silver Award Winners:
- Port of Auckland for Port turn-around: Reversing years of declining favourability
- Anthem for Lifting Aotearoa’s sights to greater sustainable transport opportunities
Financial Communications and Investor Relations
Bronze Award Winners:
- One Plus One Communications for Growing up in public: Binance NZ’s journey from crypto disruptor to mature financial services provider
- Fonterra for Flexibility for farmers under new capital structure
Robert Walters – Internal Communications
Bronze Award Winners:
- Switched On Group for Constructing Culture through Values Campaign
- Kiwibank for This is empowering our people. This is Kiwibank Wardrobe.
Silver Award Winners:
- New Zealand Blood Service for 25-years of Te Ratonga Toto O Aotearoa New Zealand Blood Service: Celebrating a lifesaving story
- NZ Superfund for Supercharging our intranet
Community Relations & Engagement
Silver Award Winners:
- Fonterra for Fonterra’s Climate Ambition
- Development West Coast for Reframing perceptions through media and community engagement
- Queenstown Airport for A Master Plan for an airport our community can be proud of
- Beca & Waipa District Council for Ahu Ake – A spatial plan for Waipā, like never seen before
Gold Award Winners:
- Palmerston North City Council for Paving a new path for Palmy’s most dangerous street
- Great Scott & McElrea Consulting for Huihui Mai: bringing Waitaha together to plan our future
Issues, Crisis or Reputation Management
Bronze Award Winners:
- ProCare Health for I ore ate tuatara ka puta ki waho? A problem is solved by continuing to find solutions
- Pan Pac Forests for Rising above: Maintaining business reputation following a natural disaster
Silver Award Winners:
- Watercare Services for Communicating to customers and stakeholders in stormy times
- Unison for Power to the People
Marketing Communications
Bronze Award Winners:
Coastguard Tautiaki Moana for It Takes A Crew To Save A Life
Silver Award Winners:
Mango Communications for Correct the Internet
Celebrity Speakers – Experiential & Activation
Gold Award Winners:
- Acumen for Samsung: A taste of 5G
- Acumen for Uber: Helping Kiwis Donate from their Doorsteps
Isentia prize for Excellence in Research, Measurement & Evaluation
Winner:
Mango Communications for Correct the Internet
PR In-House Team of the Year
Silver Award Winner:
Development West Coast
Gold Award Winner:
Invercargill City Council
PR Consultancy of the Year – Small to Medium
Silver Award Winners:
- Scope Communications
- Campbell & Co
Gold Award Winner:
Little & Loud
PR Consultancy of the Year – Medium to Large
Gold Award Winners:
- One Plus One Communications
- Special PR
Sally Logan-Milne Young Practitioner of the Year
Highly Commended:
Lebron Davis
Winner:
Briar Robb
Supreme Award:
Mango Communications for Correct the Internet
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