Member Article

Big Chip Awards celebrate Northern digital talent

Northern England’s digital industry was celebrated last at the annual Big Chip Awards in Manchester.

Among this year’s winners were Greater Manchester Police, Manchester Metropolitan University and Tyneside Cinema.

Best Digital Marketing Campaign and Best On-line Brand Development was won by TDWA\Manchester for their campaign, ‘Join The Revolution’, aimed at increasing engagement with The Co-Operative.

Judges commented on the way traffic was driven to social space, and the level of involvement customer showed once there, which created a positive return on investment across the Co-Op’s family of businesses.

For the North East, Tyneside Cinema scooped the Best Not For Profit Project, for its Time Machine game, used for classroom education.

The cinema also received the prestigious Anthony Wilson Original Modern Award and Best Application of Technology.

Manchester’s Code Computerlove picked up the award for Best Digital Agency, and were also awarded for Best E-business Project for Customer-focussed Digital Innovations, and the Big Chip International Award for Innovation.

Best Use of Social Media when to Greater Manchester Police (GMP) for their coverage of the Manchester and Salford riots in August last year.

Judges praised GMP for the planning and execution involved in its Twitter coverage of the riots, and were impressed by the use of video, PR and link-building, which helped to build traffic on the site.

Music impresario and regional media figure, the late Anthony Wilson provided the inspiration for the Anthony Wilson Original Modern Award, which was judged by David Sproxton of Aardman Animation.

The Tasty Website award was voted for via Twitter hastag, and went to Cahoona for their site James Anderson 613, a website designed to celebrate fast bowler James Anderson’s 10 years in cricket.

Chair of Manchester Digital, Shaun Fensom, said: “It’s been such a fantastic year for the Big Chip Awards, with digital organisations from right across the North of England from Liverpool to Newcastle stepping up to be recognised for their achievements, and providing us with the strongest shortlist to date - as well as a record number of entries.

“The event has continued to grow year on year, with the quality of agencies from across this digital sector being reflected in this year’s winners.

“We have truly established the North as a world showcase for the industry, creating forward-thinking projects and services and it is crucial that we celebrate those achievements.”

The awards are organised by trade association Manchester Digital, with support from regional bodies such as Liverpool Vision and Codeworks in the North East.

This year’s expert judging panel was chaired by Michael Nutley, former editor-in-chief of New Media Age, and included Jon Myers of Yahoo; Steve Smith of Liverpool Vision; Herb Kim from Codeworks and Thinking Digital; Ajaz Ahmed, founder of Freeserve and Dr David Kreps from Salford University.

A record 261 entries from across 152 digital and creative organisations and freelancers were received this year.

This was posted in Bdaily's Members' News section by Tom Keighley .