TOKYO: At the ADFEST 2010 Lotus Awards judging, the noisiest Jury was definitely the Jury overseen by Ted Lim, Jury President of the Press Lotus and Poster Lotus categories.

For three days, raucous laughter, debates and clapping could be heard coming out of the Press & Poster judging room.

Why all the noise? ADFESTbuzz asked Ted Lim, ECD and Deputy Chairman at Naga DDB Malaysia, to explain…

 What were you looking for as a judge at ADFEST this year?

“First of all, the ad has to stand out so it gets your attention. Typically when you read a newspaper, you’ll be looking for news about the economy, politics, natural disasters, football news – people don’t actually buy newspapers to read ads. So our job is to make those jobs stand out and get attention. I actually did a test at a conference where I asked 200 odd participants if they read the paper that morning. I asked them, ‘Can you recall five ads?’ There was silence in the room. If you can’t even recall five ads, then a lot of money is going down the drain.

“At ADFEST, for an ad to stand out and get the attention of a bunch of people who live and breathe advertising, the idea has to be fresh – it can’t be something you’ve seen year in and year out again and again. It has to be an original idea executed in a cut-through, break-through manner.”

What was the consensus amongst the Press & Poster Jury this year?

“Around 10% of the work (maybe a little less) impressed us.”

ADFEST was postponed a couple of times this year. Why do the results still matter?

“I told the other Press & poster Jurists last week, ‘Look, Cannes is over. People might think this makes ADFEST a non-event because the results are posted after Cannes. But I think differently’.

“The Cannes Jury, as hard as they try, they don’t pick up everything. Sometimes really, really good work doesn’t make it in Cannes. Then there is this second consideration, which is quite critical as well. We have in Asia quite small agencies comprising of 10 to 50 people, agencies that do not have the funds to enter their work in big shows like Cannes and D&AD. ADFEST plays an important role here, because to enter your work in ADFEST is comparatively affordable. These agencies could be producing Cannes material, so this is a good place for the work to be spotted.”

Did you nominate many agencies for the Lotus Root category this year?

“We stopped a dozen times to ask: is this saying something in your country that a Western educated juror may not get? For us, it really doesn’t matter whether the great work revolves around Western thinking or Eastern thinking, however there are some thoughts in the Eastern world that cannot be expressed in Western terms. I think it works both ways.”

Last year, a lot more awards were given out in Press & Poster. Why was this year’s Jury so tough?

“This year we’ve tried to only award the best pieces, so if you win something this year, it’s valuable. Less is more.”

How do you define Gold, Silver and Bronze?

“Gold is really brilliant, outstanding work. Silver is intelligent and engaging, and crafted in such a way that will turn you green with envy. With Bronze, we were a bit more generous. It is definitely very good work, it’s not your everyday kind of ad, it rises above the average, it’s definitely not commonplace. It will get noticed and get your attention.”

For Part Two of this interview with Ted Lim, don’t miss the next issue of ADFESTbuzz.

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