WAN-IFRA's Digital Media Awards are a showcase for the best-practice innovation in digital publishing worldwide. The awards are presented in regions around the world throughout the year.
This year, WAN-IFRA has renewed some categories, in particular, Best Paid Content Strategy, Best Digital Marketing Campaign for News Brands, and Best Digital Project to Engage Young and/or Millennial Audiences.
For this edition, the jury evaluated more than 50 projects from pure players, traditional media outlets, and international media brands from the US and Canada.
The winners of the North American Digital Media Awards 2019 are:
BEST USE OF ONLINE VIDEO (INCLUDING VR)
The Future of Gaming (in collaboration with Retro Report), Quartz
“Effective storytelling in this medium-length form video format, which comprehensively circles the topic of video games. I enjoyed watching this.”
Special mention to Explainer Videos, Le Devoir, Canada
BEST DIGITAL MARKETING CAMPAIGN FOR NEWS BRANDS
The Truth Is Worth It, The New York Times
“This is a wonderful project and extremely well executed. The video pieces are really compelling, and I think that they've identified a key issue in selling the value of journalism. This has been one of my top-rated campaigns.”
Special mention to Democracy Dies in Darkness, The Washington Post, USA
BEST DIGITAL NEWS START-UP
Chorus, Vox Media
“A comprehensive and well-thought out product. It also seems to be a smart offering for a cutting-edge content company to diversify revenue.”
Special mention to STAT News - Digital Startup, STAT, USA
BEST DATA VISUALIZATION
The four days in 1968 that reshaped D.C., The Washington Post
“A very innovative story format with excellent interactivity and information throughout. The format helped to pull the audience deeper into the subject, and the mix of visuals and data viz was very effective.”
Special mention to Self-driving cars: Who to save, who to sacrifice?, Radio-Canada, Canada
BEST PAID CONTENT STRATEGY
From IBM to Health Tech: Our journey to creating a new cross-channel vertical, STAT
“They were laser-focused on the numbers and drew actionable insights into them. It is to applaud how the insights helped inform the content strategy. That is often a difficult sell in an editorial organization. Their strategy evolved as the team identified a retention issue after the initial story was published. This is critical to digital strategies. One can't simply set-and-forget strategies because the variables shift, whether that be platform changes or rapid adoption of new technology or shifts in behaviors by audiences.”
Special mention to The Truth Is Worth It, The New York Times, USA
BEST DIGITAL PROJECT TO ENGAGE YOUNG AND/OR MILLENNIAL AUDIENCES
Playing Games With Politicians, The Washington Post
“Great and well executed idea to use Twitch for news purposes, with some of the content designed specifically for Twitch users. Interesting to see how the newsroom can be extended into such a different platform, well done!”
Special mention to Made in PGH, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette, USA
BEST NEWS WEBSITE OR MOBILE SERVICE
washingtonpost.com, The Washington Post
“The Washington Post is definitely pushing the envelope of digital storytelling, and some of the examples submitted are incredible. It speaks to the investment the Post has made in digital, and the competitive swagger the Post had developed over the past few years.”
Special mention to PGNewsSlide, Block Communications, Inc.
Winners of the North American Digital Media Awards will immediately qualify to compete for WAN-IFRA's 2020 World Digital Media Awards against the best digital projects of Africa, Asia, Europe, Latin America and the Middle East.
