An ad by Western Australian creative agency Marketforce for internet provider Internode, has won the fourth round of the 2014 Siren Awards. Creatively demonstrating what could happen if someone took over the airwaves, “Bad Things Happen - SFX” featured ‘geeky’ sound effects played simultaneously on all Adelaide commercial radio stations. Its win was the second consecutive Sirens round victory for the agency/client partnership, after round three’s winning campaign, “The Geekiest Promo in the Universe”.

 

Written by Pat Lennox, Ben Green, Guy Howlett and Neil Martin of Marketforce, the ad claimed the single and overall categories, while the complete “Bad Things Happen” campaign also won its category. Another ad from the campaign, “Bad Things Happen – Hawking & Einstein” was highly commended in the single category.

 

The winning writers said: “It’s always good when a client gets recognition for doing something different. So it’s great that Internode have been recognised by the Siren Awards for boldly going where no other ISP has gone before, two rounds in a row.”

 

Round four judge, Rem Bruijn from Brainheart, said: “The Internode campaign really stood out as a great use of the medium. Nobody could have ignored them. The ads were nicely written and produced across the campaign, with the station roadblock execution being the highlight due to the way it integrated an innovative media strategy into the creative idea.”

 

Chief executive officer, Commercial Radio Australia, Joan Warner said: “The winners have explored the versatility of radio as a medium and found a unique way of effectively promoting their client.”

 

“Bad Things Happen - SFX” is now in the running to win the Gold Siren for best radio ad of the year, which will be announced in May 2014. Writers of the best radio ad for 2014 win airfares, accommodation, plus automatic entry and tickets to the Cannes Advertising Lions Festival in June 2014. The client of the Gold Siren winning ad also wins a trip to Cannes and the festival.

 

The craft category was won by the ad, “Dog Tutor”, which was produced for Nimble Loans by sound engineers Ralph Van Dijk (Eardrum) and Abby Sie (Song Zu). Another ad from the campaign, “Life Narrator”, was highly commended in the craft category, while the “Unexpected Happens” campaign, from which the ad was derived, was highly commended in the campaign category.