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Alpha goes to Embilipitiya

Alpha Industries [Pvt] Ltd manufacturers and suppliers of security safes and light metal and wood based office furniture, established its latest sales centre in Embilipitiya town. The new outlet was opened by Alpha's Managing Director Priyanjith Weerasooria amidst a gathering of the town's influential business community, dignitaries and other well-wishers.

Alpha COO Deshantha Silva, Factory Director Shane Dirckze and GM-Marketing Jeremy David were also present.

Alpha's expansion plans have been boosted by the resurgent economic trends and their strategy to embark on regional sales centres of this nature have been carefully planned in terms of capitalizing on newly emerging economic destinations within the country. Embilipitiya has been identified as a key strategic area with immense potential. In a joint statement issued Alpha MD Priyanjith Weerasooria and Alpha COO Deshantha Silva said. "Our brand is a significant symbol known across the country for its reputation for high security safes and steel furniture.

We have diversified considerably in portfolio management to suit our manufacturing capability and embarked upon wooden furniture for the standard and up market offices that have now become more visible in the country's business segments.

Additionally our forays in to the health and leisure sectors wherein we embarked upon manufacturing and marketing branded furniture for these segments have further expanded our basket of products to more decisive business sectors within the country." Alpha's entry into Embilipitiya is a further endorsement of the region's stability and growth judging by the city's ability to attract the best in the business over a period of time.

Alpha GM-Marketing Jeremy David said that the tremendous business potential noticed in Embilipitiya coupled with the development work carried out by the Government in the Southern Sabaragamuwa region certainly gave rise to the establishment of an Alpha sales centre within the vicinity.

"The purpose of setting up this centre was to regionalize our distribution channels to greater effectiveness, in other words cutting down on logistical time and getting a product at speed to our already existing customer base in the territory," he said.

Maliban wins MACO Award 2010

Maliban Milk Products (Pvt) Ltd. Sales and Marketing Head, Nalinda Jayamanne and Sales and Marketing Maliban CEO Ravi Jayawardena were recognized with an honorary award in the Sales and Marketing segment at the MACO Special Award Ceremony 2010 organized recently by the Mass Communicators Association of Sri Lanka, at the Grand Oriental Hotel, Colombo.

Nalinda Jayamanne was appreciated with the award for the yeoman service rendered with a keen commitment to the company and the country alike in a short span of two years. Maliban diversified from the traditional pioneering arena of the production of world class biscuits into full cream milk, where milk production became the company's other highly successful business venture. Maliban Milk is the only company to be exclusively recognized from the milk industry for this award.

Maliban Milk during the last one year has grown tremendously due to the outstanding objective that has become the policy of Maliban - "World class quality at an affordable price to our consumers". Based on the resounding success of Maliban full cream milk powder, the company was able to diversify and extend its brand portfolio to offer Maliban Non Fat, Maliban High Cal, Puredale and Vitagen," the nutritional supplement and meal replacer.

Maliban Milk was recognized by the award for its current corporate social responsibility project - "Abhayadana", amnesty from slaughter to a herd of cattle every month on the full moon Poya Day.

Maliban has so far salvaged the lives of 250 cattle from slaughter houses and given to poor farmers to uplift their livelihood.

This achievement by Maliban in spite of the recession experienced by the majority in business was commendable, Sales and Marketing CEO Ravi Jayawardena and Maliban Milk Products (Pvt.) Ltd Sales and Marketing Head Nalinda Jayamanne, lead this project.

It was the vision, commitment to the industry and the solidarity exhibited to the community that were recognized as key features to award this prestigious MACO Special Award 2010 to Maliban Milk Products (Pvt.) Ltd.

World Finance Awards 2010:

ICICI Bank wins in three categories

ICICI Bank Ltd, India's largest private sector bank has been awarded the Excellence in NRI services - Worldwide, Excellence in Remittance Business - Worldwide and Excellence in Private Banking Business - Asia Pacific Region awards, at the prestigious World Finance Awards, UK, 2010. ICICI Bank has won the Private Banking and NRI services awards consecutively for three years and the Remittance Business award for the second year in a row.

An ICICI Bank spokesperson said, "We are privileged to receive the World Finance Awards which recognize the best teams across countries. The bank has always been at the forefront of customer-centric innovations and services. The Excellence Awards in NRI Services and Remittance on a worldwide basis and Private Banking in the APAC region bear testament to our commitment to provide relevant solutions to our customers."

The World Finance Awards are a part of the World Finance Magazine, a leading financial publication from the UK. World Finance Awards are presented post detailed evaluation that the magazine conducts among various banks across the globe.

The criteria for the selection of winners include business numbers, customer service, back office capabilities, delivery systems etc. These awards also recognize the institution for introducing innovative services and solutions during the year.

Effies 2010 - the search is on

Marketing and communication effectiveness:

Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing (SLIM) launched the Effie Awards Sri Lanka 2010. Effies is being held for the third consecutive year, after its extremely successful introduction to Sri Lanka in 2008. It is the only international advertising awards scheme being conducted in Sri Lanka presently, with the support of 4A's of Sri Lanka. The recently held official briefing of the marketing and advertising fraternity was attended by the heads of Sri Lanka's leading advertising agencies and some of Sri Lanka's leading marketing professionals.

The Effie Awards identifies the most significant achievements in marketing communications: ideas that work. Therefore the differentiation of the Effies from the other advertising and communications awards programs is that the Effies focus on the results or the effectiveness of a campaign to meet the originally stated objectives of the campaign. However the criteria to win an Effie is not merely limited to results but rather focuses on the analysis of the environment, the stating of aligned objectives, development of a strategy as well as the idea or creative and finally the implementation which all lead to results in the market place. Therefore the Effies is an awards program which focuses not only on creativity of a campaign or the execution of a campaign but rather looks at the entire communication process which ultimately leads to delivering superior results in the market place.

Known by marketeers and agencies globally as the pre-eminent award in the industry, the Effies recognizes all forms of marketing communication that contribute to a brand's success. Therefore it was a significant achievement when the Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing managed to secure the rights to hold the Effies in Sri Lanka for the first time in 2008. The enduring strength of the Effies is its ability to enlighten marketeers worldwide with strategies that have proven to be effective in their respective markets.

The Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing President Rohan Somawansa said "Sri Lanka Institute of Marketing has brought the big league of advertising awards to Sri Lanka in association with the 4A's. Effie Awards one of the biggest and most challenging advertising awards is focused on rewarding Ideas that work - the great ideas that achieve real results and the strategy that goes into creating them. We are certain that these awards would no doubt assist in the cause to improve the standards of marketing communication in Sri Lanka."

Effies 2010 will recognize any form of marketing communication or consumer engagement, as long as the results are proven, including Print, TV, Radio, Internet, Guerrilla, Digital, Package Design, Events, Street Teams, mainstream or alternative, paid or unpaid and more. The keys to winning an Effie includes the ability to understand the business context, development of aligned objectives, an insightful strategy, outstanding creativity and the market results to prove it.

The Judging panel Chairman, Unilever Sri Lanka Director Brands Ramani Samarasundera said "the most important criteria for judging great advertising in the eye of the marketeer is effectiveness. Increasingly the challenge for the industry as the competitive landscape increases is to get a best bang for the buck. The Effie awards are all about Ideas that work. For ideas to work they must resonate with the end purchaser and the user, hence the criticality for both the agency and client teams to live and breathe with the people out there, whom we more often than not club under the banner of the consumer."

"Samarasundara also made the following statement with regard to the judging process, "The judging process consists of 5 key aspects. Primarily, the strategic communications challenge is looked at which takes into consideration the market scenario, the competitive framework and the key challenges which should be met by the campaign. The relevant stipulated objectives to overcome the challenge, including quantifiable, behavioral and attitudinal/perceptual shifts and the amount of resources utilized."

"Secondly, an exploration of the 'big idea' behind the campaign, and how it was derived, be it market insights, consumer insights or otherwise."

"The third aspect is - what was the 'strategy' behind the campaign. And how was this rolled out through operational, creative and media strategies."

"Fourth, how were these strategies put into operation or implemented and brought to life. This includes all the integrated aspects of the campaign and multiple touch points covered."

"Finally and most importantly the results of the campaign - How the campaign meet the stipulated objectives, as examples: increase in sales, improvement of image, improvement of profitability, reinforcement of core values of the brand, improvement of perception and change in attitudinal dimensions (alter behavioral aspects, motivate staff etc)."

"To recognize effectiveness in an era where creativity is being lauded everywhere, is commendable and in fact essential. A successful brand is often the result of a diligent agency and a solid client/agency relationship" said the 4 A's President Keith Wijesuriya.

This year the gala awards ceremony is scheduled to be held on November 12 at the Water's Edge.

This event is expected to be an exciting night with much expectation from both the marketing clients as well as the advertising fraternity, as another uniqueness of the awards is that it recognizes both parties.

This year too there would be 24 categories open for awarding. Campaigns which ran between, July 01, 2009 to June 30, 2010 are eligible to apply. The judging process established for the awards show has been of global standards due to learning's from Effie's worldwide. The Judging panel is comprised of an elite group of individuals representing the Marketing, Advertising, Research, Media and Academic spheres.

Judging Panel consists of the following: Unilever Sri Lanka Director Brands - Ramani Samarasundara, Judging panel Chairman - Diventars Training (Pvt) Ltd Chairman/Managing Director Lasantha Abeywickrama - Judging Panel Advisor.

Tigo (Pvt) Ltd Glaxo SmithKline Beecham (Pvt) Ltd Managing Director Sachi Thomas

Fonterra Brands Lanka Director Marketing Vidya Sivarasaraja, Sampath Bank AGM Marketing, Tharaka Ranwella, Words Managing Director Rohan Rajaratnam

Grants Group Vice President Laila Gunasekera Martenstyn

LoweLDB COO Chalaka Gajabahu, BBDO SWARA CEO Keith Wijesuriya, Quantum Research Snr. VP Roshani Fernando, Vanguard Management Services CEO Lakshman Bandaranayake, Kelaniya University Prof. Sunanda Degamboda

There will be participants brief held on September 23 at Water's Edge on providing insights into filling winning Effie applications. The closing date for entry submission will be October 20, 2010 at 3 pm, and needs to be handed over at the Effies Office.