AME’s Grand Jury is the powerhouse behind the prestigious AME Awards, their high standard of excellence ensures that AME’s 26-year legacy is upheld and respected globally both by winners and industry reports measuring creative distinction.

Grand Jury member, Katrine Thamdrup brings years of strategic expertise to the 2020 jury panel. Katrine started her career in strategic planning at Mullen Lowe Group in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. Since then she has gone on to work with brand strategy from both the client and agency side in New York and Copenhagen. Today she is working as a Strategic Planner at & Co. – a part of The North Alliance network – with both Danish and global clients.

AME Awards: Why are effectiveness competitions like the AME Awards important?

I think effectiveness competitions, like the AME Awards, are crucial to our industry, because they are the only kind of award that ultimately validates whether or not your campaign was successful. Award submission or not, I think you owe it to your client and to yourselves to run the numbers and review whether or not your campaign achieved what it was put in this world to achieve.

AME Awards: What makes you share you time and energy to participate on the AME Grand Jury and what do you hope to learn?

Effectiveness is by far always equivalent with increased sales and revenues. Depending on what the brief was; effectiveness can be a great many things – e.g. shifting opinions, evoking emotions, increasing awareness - that is what makes it so interesting to judge effectiveness cases.

AME Awards: What cultural and/or social changes do you think will influence this year’s work?

2019 was the ending to a pretty turbulent decade, especially the last half of it. It’s been a decade of extremities and it has been a decade that has pushed us to face some pretty harsh realities of the world we currently reside - and frankly, scared a lot of us. I think there has been a shift, wherein we are approaching the world with more critical lenses moving forward. But at the same time, these past years have probably also evoked more empathy, more compassion and more human engagement to better ourselves - and our world - than we have ever seen before.

I think a lot of people are craving more honest and real dialogue - and more action. This sets a new bar, not just for brand communication – but for the very foundation that businesses are based upon today. I’m hoping to see great examples of how this has been realized in effective brand communication strategies.

AME Awards: Who is your inspiration and how has this philosophy made you who you are today?

I don’t think you can work in advertising if you are not driven by curiosity and a desire to want to understand other people and their reality. My inspiration is hence, not so much one person in particular, as it is people in general. Understanding the mechanisms that drive movements, that drive people, is ultimately what inspires me.

As for my philosophy, I think it’s pretty simple; you are communicating with people, not consumers. Moreover, when we know that 95% of all of our decisions are unconsciously, irrationally and emotionally driven, based on a gut feeling, the communication we create needs to first and foremost feel right. I believe that the communication which truly resonates with people and generates effectiveness, is the kind of communication that is based on a significant and real human insight. An insight which has been brought to life through a brilliant creative execution that genuinely moves us people. That is by no means easy to do, but nonetheless, it should always be what we strive for.