IAB Announces Winners of Annual Sales & Service Excellence Awards

Awards Recognize Significant Individual Contributions to the Growth of Interactive Advertising

PALM SPRINGS, Calif. – The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) announced the winners of its 2010 Sales & Service Excellence Awards. Celebrating the importance of outstanding leadership and performance, the IAB Sales Awards are given to individuals and organizations that have excelled in interactive advertising sales. The IAB Service Excellence Awards honor outstanding member contributions to IAB industry-related initiatives. The announcement was made during IAB’s fourth Annual Leadership Meeting, Ecosystem 2.0: The People vs. Data, at La Quinta Resort & Club, where leaders across the digital media landscape have converged to address the most critical issues facing the industry.

Sales Excellence Awards

The IAB Sales Excellence Awards are driven by the IAB Sales Executive Council through a partnership with Advertiser Perceptions, Inc., a highly regarded research firm specializing in researching the agency and marketer communities. The Council worked with Advertiser Perceptions to develop and field a two-part survey to identify the sales organizations and individuals who are viewed by the ad buying community as achieving the highest standards of sales excellence. Approximately 400 agency and marketer decision makers responded across two waves of research. The respondents represented a broad cross-section of verticals, including Automotive, CPG, Financial, Retail and Travel. Each individual respondent spent at least $1 million on online advertising in the last year.

“The Sales Excellence Award has become one of the most telling industry awards because its qualifications are based completely on customer feedback,” said Sherrill Mane, SVP Industry Services for the IAB. “The IAB is proud to have created a mechanism that recognizes excellence in sales and this year’s recipients should be thrilled to know the demand side approves of and appreciates their efforts to provide exceptional knowledge, innovation and customer service.”

2010 Sales Excellence Award Winners include:

Long Term Achievement:
– Large digital sales organizations: Scripps Networks
– Small to mid-size digital sales organizations: Undertone

Most Innovative: Pandora

Best Newcomer: Turn

Salesperson of the Year:
– East Coast: Anna Lem, Google
– Midwest: Todd Hayes, 24/7 Real Media
– West Coast: Nick Leal, ValueClick Media

Service Excellence Awards

Across the IAB’s nearly 500 member companies, 18 IAB councils and committees and dozens of working groups, hundreds of IAB members participate in shaping the interactive advertising business and driving educational outreach to the marketplace.

The IAB Service Excellence Awards honor individual members who have demonstrated strong leadership and provided an exceptional contribution to one or more significant, completed IAB initiatives over the year.

“The winners of this year’s Service Excellence Awards have worked rigorously to help the IAB with a variety of efforts shaped to promote growth and drive the entire industry forward,” said Michael Theodore, VP Member Services for the IAB. “These awards recognize the dedication and leadership it takes to address important issues and create change. The IAB congratulates this year’s winners for their achievements and thanks them for their contributions.”

2010 Service Excellence Award Winners include:

ANNA BANKS, Executive Director, Strategy, Organic and NICHOLE GOODYEAR, CEO & President, Brickfish, for their significant contributions to the Social Media Buyer’s Guide

KEITH BERKELHAMER, VP, CNN Digital Research at Turner Broadcasting and DAN MURPHY, SVP of Research and Ad Traffic at Univision Interactive Media, for their extensive work with Site Intercept Ad Effectiveness Studies

PABLO CHAVEZ, Director of Public Policy, Google and BRYCE HARLOW, VP Government Relations, CBS Interactive, for their dedication and leadership on the IAB’s self-regulatory efforts

GEOFFREY COCO, Group Product Manager, Video & Rich Media Advertising at Microsoft and JOEY TROTZ, Sr. Director, Strategic Advertising & Digital Technologies at Turner Broadcasting, for their participation and guidance on Digital Video Agency Day

PETER HORAN, Chairman, Goodmail Systems, for his noteworthy influence on the development of the IAB’s Code of Conduct

DAVE JACOBS, SVP of Publisher Services, AOL/Advertising.com and JAY SEARS, General Manager, CONTEXTWEB Ad Exchange at CONTEXTWEB, for their substantial contributions to the development of the Networks & Exchanges Quality Assurance Guidelines

JOSHUA KORAN, VP Targeting & Optimization at ValueClick and NICK WEIR, CEO at ChoozOn (formerly VP, Data Strategy, Yahoo!), for their dedication and guidance around the IAB’s Data Primer initiative

JASON RYNING, Attorney for Microsoft, for his contributions to the 4A’s/IAB Standard Terms & Conditions version 3.0

SHANE WILEY, Senior Director, Privacy & Data Governance, Yahoo!, for his considerable contributions to the IAB’s CLEAR initiative

About the IAB

The Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) is comprised of more than 500 leading media and technology companies who are responsible for selling 86% of online advertising in the United States. On behalf of its members, the IAB is dedicated to the growth of the interactive advertising marketplace, of interactive’s share of total marketing spend, and of its members’ share of total marketing spend. The IAB educates marketers, agencies, media companies and the wider business community about the value of interactive advertising. Working with its member companies, the IAB evaluates and recommends standards and practices and fields critical research on interactive advertising. Founded in 1996, the IAB is headquartered in New York City with a Public Policy office in Washington, D.C. For more information, please visit www.iab.net.