Categories
Please see the following descriptions for information on each category.
For further clarification on the judging criteria, click here, or visit the here for more information on guidelines and entry fees.
SECTOR/CAMPAIGN AWARDS
STANDOUT PAID MEDIA PERFORMANCE
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Recognising exceptional campaigns that set a new benchmark for paid media execution and results. Entries should demonstrate clear strategic rationale, precise audience targeting, and compelling creative that together drove measurable outcomes, whether reach, engagement, conversions, revenue, or brand uplift.
Eligible work may span paid search, paid social, programmatic, video, audio, OOH, or integrated paid strategies.
STANDOUT PAID SOCIAL PERFORMANCE
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Recognising exceptional campaigns delivered through paid social channels that drove measurable impact against clear objectives.
Entries should demonstrate strategic audience targeting, platform-native creative thinking, and strong results across any paid social environment including Meta, TikTok, LinkedIn, Pinterest, Snapchat, or emerging platforms.
STANDOUT PAID SEARCH PERFORMANCE
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Recognising paid search campaigns that delivered exceptional commercial results through precise intent targeting, smart bidding strategy, and compelling ad copy.
Entries should demonstrate a clear connection between search activity and measurable outcomes including revenue, lead generation, or customer acquisition and may span Google, Bing, or other search environments.
STANDOUT SHOPPING ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising paid media campaigns that utilised shopping ad formats to drive outstanding retail and e-commerce results. Entries should demonstrate smart feed management, product-level strategy, and strong attribution of sales or revenue impact.
Campaigns may span Google Shopping, Performance Max, Meta Advantage+ Shopping, or equivalent formats across any retail category.
STANDOUT DISPLAY ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising display advertising campaigns that cut through the noise to deliver meaningful brand or commercial impact.
Entries should demonstrate creative effectiveness, smart audience targeting or contextual placement, and clear evidence of results, whether awareness, consideration, retargeting, or conversion. Programmatic, direct-bought, and rich media campaigns are all eligible.
B2B CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating the most effective paid media campaign targeting a business audience.
Entries should demonstrate clear understanding of complex buyer journeys, precise professional audience targeting, and compelling creative, including lead generation, pipeline contribution, brand authority, or account-based results. Work spanning any paid channel or combination of channels is eligible.
D2C CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns that powered direct-to-consumer growth, cutting out the intermediary to build a direct relationship between brand and buyer.
Entries should demonstrate how paid activity drove traffic, acquisition, and revenue through owned channels, with evidence of strong ROAS, customer lifetime value, or new customer growth.
TRAVEL/LEISURE CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating outstanding paid media work delivered within the travel, tourism, or leisure sectors.
Entries should demonstrate how paid activity inspired audiences, drove bookings or enquiries, and delivered commercial impact in a highly competitive market. Work may span destination marketing, airline, hotel, cruise, experience, or leisure brand campaigns across any paid channel.
RETAIL /FMCG CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns that successfully drove awareness, footfall, online sales, or brand affinity within retail or fast-moving consumer goods.
Entries should demonstrate creativity, audience understanding, and measurable commercial impact including product launches, seasonal activations, or always-on strategies across any paid channel.
FINANCE CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating exceptional paid media work delivered within financial services including banking, insurance, investment, fintech, or lending.
Entries should demonstrate how campaigns navigated a heavily regulated environment to engage audiences effectively, build trust, and drive measurable outcomes including applications, sign-ups, or brand consideration.
PROPERTY AND CONSTRUCTION CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns that delivered standout results within property, real estate, or construction.
Entries should demonstrate how paid activity engaged buyers, tenants, investors, or trade audiences at key moments in complex, high-consideration purchase journeys, driving enquiries, leads, or sales across residential, commercial, or new-build markets.
FASHION & BEAUTY CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Recognising standout paid media campaigns within the fashion, beauty, cosmetics, skincare, and personal care industries, this category celebrates work that combines creativity, cultural relevance, and audience engagement to deliver measurable results.
Entries should demonstrate paid and performance originality, brand storytelling, visual excellence, and strategic execution across channels
and could include launches, brand campaigns, community-building initiatives, or campaigns that successfully drove awareness, engagement, loyalty, or sales.
ECOMMERCE CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns that delivered exceptional online retail performance.
Entries should demonstrate how paid activity drove traffic, conversion, and revenue growth through digital storefronts, with clear evidence of ROAS, basket value, new customer acquisition, or retention impact across any paid channel or platform.
ENTERTAINMENT / SPORT CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns delivered within entertainment, sport, gaming, or media.
Entries should demonstrate how paid activity built anticipation, drove audiences, and delivered commercial or cultural impact whether promoting a film, live event, streaming platform, sports franchise, game release, or broadcast property across any paid channel.
HEALTH & WELLNESS CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns that effectively engaged audiences within health, wellness, fitness, or wellbeing.
Entries should demonstrate sensitivity to audience mindset alongside strong strategic and creative thinking, with clear evidence of outcomes including awareness, behaviour change, product uptake, or service enquiries across any paid channel.
AUTOMOTIVE CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns that drove standout results within the automotive sector.
Entries should demonstrate how paid activity engaged audiences at key moments including driving showroom visits, test drive bookings, configurator engagement, or vehicle sales across any paid channel or combination of channels.
DIGITAL OOH CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating campaigns that harnessed digital out-of-home to deliver reach, relevance, and impact.
Entries should demonstrate creative use of the format, smart use of location, context, or data-driven targeting, and clear evidence of brand or commercial results. Work that pushed the boundaries of what DOOH can achieve, including dynamic creative, programmatic DOOH, or cross-channel integration is strongly encouraged.
LOCAL CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns that delivered outstanding results within a defined geographic area.
Entries should demonstrate how local targeting, audience understanding, and channel selection drove meaningful impact for a regional business, national brand with a local focus, or location-specific activation.
THIRD SECTOR CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating paid media campaigns delivered by or on behalf of charities, non-profits, or public sector organisations.
Entries should demonstrate how thoughtful strategy, compelling creative, and smart use of paid media drove donations, volunteer recruitment, awareness, or behavioural change often against tight budgets and with significant audience sensitivities to navigate.
SOCIAL COMMERCE CAMPAIGN OF THE YEAR
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This award recognises an outstanding social commerce campaign that successfully turned social media engagement into measurable business results.
Entries should demonstrate how social platforms were used to drive product discovery, influence purchasing decisions, and generate sales through creative content, community engagement, creator partnerships, live shopping, or platform-native shopping features. Submissions should showcase clear objectives, strong execution, and measurable commercial impact.
STANDOUT INTEGRATED PAID MEDIA CAMPAIGN
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Recognising campaigns that delivered exceptional results through the intelligent combination of paid media channels.
Entries should demonstrate how a coherent strategy, consistent creative, and smart channel orchestration worked together to achieve outcomes greater than any single channel could deliver alone. Work may span any combination of paid search, paid social, programmatic, video, audio, OOH, or emerging channels.
STANDOUT AMAZON ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising exceptional campaigns delivered through Amazon advertising.
Entries should demonstrate strategic use of Amazon's suite of ad products, including Sponsored Products, Sponsored Brands, DSP, or video, with clear evidence of sales impact, visibility growth, or market share gains within a competitive retail environment.
STANDOUT LINKEDIN ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising exceptional paid campaigns delivered through LinkedIn.
Entries should demonstrate audience targeting, platform appropriate creative and and strong outcomes, including lead generation, pipeline contribution, brand authority, or talent acquisition.
STANDOUT META ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising campaigns delivered across Meta's advertising platforms, including Facebook, Instagram, and Messenger.
Entries should demonstrate strategic audience targeting, creativity across formats, and strong measurable outcomes including reach, engagement, conversions, or revenue across any objective or sector.
STANDOUT SNAPCHAT ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising campaigns delivered through Snapchat that engaged hard-to-reach younger audiences with creativity and impact.
Entries should demonstrate platform-native thinking, innovative use of Snapchat's ad formats including AR lenses, Story ads, or Commercials, and clear evidence of commercial results.
STANDOUT TIKTOK ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising campaigns that harnessed TikTok's unique creative culture to drive outstanding paid performance.
Entries should demonstrate platform-native content thinking, effective use of TikTok's ad formats, including In-Feed, TopView, Branded Hashtag, or Spark Ads, and clear evidence of reach, engagement, or commercial results.
STANDOUT YOUTUBE ADS PERFORMANCE
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Recognising exceptional campaigns delivered through YouTube that captured attention and drove measurable impact.
Entries should demonstrate creative storytelling suited to the platform, smart use of targeting and ad formats, including skippable and non-skippable pre-roll, bumpers, or YouTube Shorts, and clear evidence of brand or commercial outcomes.
BEST USE OF DATA
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Recognising campaigns or strategies that placed data at the heart of paid media decision-making to deliver exceptional results.
Entries should demonstrate how data was collected, interpreted, and activated to sharpen targeting, inform creative, optimise spend, or improve outcomes, with clear evidence of the commercial or brand impact that data-driven approach delivered.
BEST USE OF ATTRIBUTION
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Recognising work that demonstrates excellence in understanding and proving the true impact of paid media investment.
Entries should demonstrate how attribution modelling, measurement frameworks, and/or multi-touch analysis provided clearer insight into campaign performance, enabling smarter budget decisions and stronger evidence of commercial return.
BEST USE OF AUTOMATION
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Recognising campaigns or strategies that leveraged automation to improve paid media performance at scale.
Entries should demonstrate how automated bidding, dynamic creative, audience automation, or workflow tools were applied with strategic intent to deliver measurable efficiency gains, performance improvements, or cost savings that would not have been achievable manually.
BEST USE OF PROGRAMMATIC
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Recognising campaigns that utilised programmatic technology to deliver precision, scale, and results across paid media.
Entries should demonstrate strategic use of programmatic buying, including audience targeting, contextual placement, private marketplace deals, or real-time optimisation, with clear evidence of the brand or commercial impact delivered.
BEST USE OF AI IN PAID MEDIA
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Recognising campaigns or strategies that applied artificial intelligence to meaningfully improve paid media outcomes.
Entries should demonstrate how AI tools, whether for creative generation, predictive targeting, budget optimisation, or performance analysis, were deployed with clear strategic purpose and delivered measurable results beyond what conventional approaches could achieve.
INNOVATION/TECHNOLOGY AWARDS
AD TECHNOLOGY OF THE YEAR
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Recognising a technology platform, tool, or solution that made a demonstrable difference to paid media performance in the past year.
Entries should demonstrate the problem the technology solved, how it was applied in a real-world paid media context, and the measurable impact it delivered for clients or campaigns.
INNOVATION AWARD
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Recognising a bold idea, approach, or use of technology that pushed the boundaries of what paid media can do.
Entries should demonstrate originality, whether in creative format, channel use, data application, or campaign strategy, and provide clear evidence that the innovative approach delivered meaningful results. Work that challenged convention and set a new standard for the industry is strongly encouraged.
AGENCY/TEAM AWARDS
EMERGING TALENT AWARD
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Celebrating an individual who has made a remarkable early impression in paid media.
Open to practitioners with no more than two years of industry experience, entries should demonstrate exceptional skill, initiative, and impact, whether through campaign results, creative thinking, strategic contribution, or wider influence on their team or clients.
PAID & PERFORMANCE MEDIA FREELANCER OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating an independent practitioner who has delivered outstanding paid and performance media results over the past year.
Entries should demonstrate client impact, strategic thinking, and measurable campaign performance, showing how a freelance operator has brought expertise, agility, and commercial results. This category is free to enter.
START-UP AGENCY OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating a paid media agency founded within the last two years that has already made a significant mark on the industry.
Entrants must be actively offering paid media services as a core part of their proposition. Entries should demonstrate early commercial success, strong client results, and the ambition and foundations to become a major industry player.
BRAND PAID MEDIA TEAM OF THE YEAR
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Celebrating an in-house paid media team that has delivered outstanding results over the past year.
Entries should demonstrate strategic capability, creative thinking, and measurable commercial impact, showing how an internal team has driven paid media performance with the focus, agility, and expertise to rival any agency.
SMALL AGENCY OF THE YEAR (25 AND UNDER EMPLOYEES)
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Celebrating a paid media agency of up to 25 people that has delivered outstanding work and business performance over the past year.
Entrants must be actively offering paid media services as a core part of their proposition. Entries should demonstrate client results, creative and strategic excellence, team culture, and the outsized impact that a smaller agency can achieve.
LARGE AGENCY OF THE YEAR (26+ EMPLOYEES)
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Celebrating a paid media agency of 26 or more people that has demonstrated excellence across client work, commercial performance, and agency culture over the past year.
Entrants must be actively offering paid media services as a core part of their proposition. Entries should demonstrate the breadth and depth of paid media capability, standout campaign results, and the leadership and culture that drives continued growth and innovation.
Our Event Sponsors & Partners
Testimonials
Being nominated for this award was already an incredible achievement for us, but taking home the award is something we’re immensely proud of. It truly validates our hard work, energy, and enthusiasm for what we do. We’ve had some really tough setbacks in the last couple of years, but instead of holding us back, we’ve pivoted and moved forward on our strongest foot.
Julia Symonds, Co-Founder outbloom
Winning the Best Use of Amazon Ads at the UK Paid Media Awards is a tremendous honour for us at Fluid Marketplaces. It underscores our commitment to excellence and innovation in the digital marketplace, and celebrates our success in driving significant growth for our clients like Le Col. This accolade not only validates our strategic approach but also inspires us to continue pioneering in the ecommerce space.
Adam Hindle, Managing Director Fluid Marketplaces
Being recognised at the UK Paid Media Awards is the ultimate validation of Happy Yolk’s collaborative work with Pooky Lighting. Our laser-focused targeting, creativity, and comprehensive strategy generated top-notch leads and ROI, propelling our campaign into the spotlight as a worthy contender. We’re thrilled to be in the running and to be among so many great agencies.
Happy Yolk
Being shortlisted is brilliant recognition for our work itself, but also for the partnership behind it. We are proud of what we have built and proud to see that approach recognised by the industry. The entry process has also been a positive experience. The UK Paid Media Awards have created a platform that genuinely celebrates smart, effective work, and the Don’t Panic team have been supportive and easy to work with throughout.
Focus Agency Group
Being shortlisted for the Start Up Launch (Paid Search at Scale) category highlights the role Paid Search can play in accelerating growth for emerging brands. For Loop Digital, the recognition reflects the agency’s approach to performance marketing - combining strategic thinking, careful optimisation, and a strong focus on customer intent.
Loop Digital
We’re delighted to have been shortlisted for the UK Paid Media Awards due to its prestigious nature and standing in the digital marketing world. We feel that being shortlisted for awards like this is a testament and culmination of the hard work that has been put in by both our team and our clients.
Seb Dean, Managing Director Imaginaire
After taking home gold last year for Best Integrated Paid Media Campaign, we decided to throw our hat in the ring again this year. We also saw success at the UK Search Awards, whereby we took home Best Low Budget PPC Campaign and Best Integrated Campaign. Following a very busy year with huge client wins and impressive performance results produced quality material to work with for our entries. As a boutique agency, we pride ourselves on our dedication and diligence to each client relationship and the clients from our nominated campaigns – The Online Lighting Store and Supersoil were ecstatic to hear of the recognition of the joint efforts.
GrowWeb
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