Honouring indigenous advertising excellence with Pendoring 2015

Research shows that an advert in your target market's home language has greater impact. That's one reason why the Pendoring Awards are so focused on advertising messages that respect consumers by speaking to them in their mother tongue...

No less than 84 finalists will be competing for the honour of winning a sought-after Pendoring trophy at the Pendorings' 20th awards ceremony at Vodacom World in Midrand on 30 October. According to Leon Jacobs, the head judge/chairman of the Afrikaans panel of judges, this year's panel looked for work that moves the boundaries. So it shouldn't just be excellent in an Afrikaans context, it also needs the ability to compete internationally.

Kief Koekies
Kief Koekies

Interesting, as 2015 marks Afrikaans' 90th year as an official language in South Africa. But did you know the awards celebrate advertising excellence in all vernacular languages, not just Afrikaans? Franette Klerck, Pendoring Awards General Manager, fills us in...

1. Tell us more about the Pendoring awards' 20 year history. How did they come to be and what is their relevance to the industry?

Klerck: The Pendoring Advertising Awards was established in 1995 by all the leading Afrikaans media role players. This, in itself, made Pendoring unique as it was the only competition where traditional media competitors put aside their differences to work together towards reaching mutual goals, namely acknowledging and rewarding excellent Afrikaans advertising and emphasising the importance of Afrikaans marketing messages to reach a lucrative target market. In time, a substantial number of new sponsors and Pendoring supporters came on board.

Due to a surge in South African ads with a distinct South African flavour, Pendoring subsequently (early in the 2000s) decided to extend its reach and create and patent a Truly South African section, which catered for entries in all indigenous languages. However, as it's Pendoring's 20th birthday this year, the focus is once again on Afrikaans and vernacular advertising, excluding English.

Various research studies, locally and abroad, have shown that an advert in a target market's home language has huge impact. If brands/marketers show a specific target market/audience that they not only understand its needs and wishes, but also show respect to consumers by speaking to them in their mother tongue, those consumers are generally also more willing to open their hearts and wallets to the brand/marketing message.

By staying abreast of industry needs and trends, Pendoring has grown into a prestigious event on the advertising calendar with considerable cash prizes for category winners. This includes a R10,000 cash prize for the overall student winner and a study tour abroad to the value of R100,000 for the Prestige Award winner. The client of the Prestige winner also receives free advertising from our media sponsors, and the gold winner in the radio category will receive free commercial airtime from OFM. The winner of the Umpetha Award, for the best advertising in any of the indigenous languages other than Afrikaans, will get R20,000 cash. In addition, the winners of each category will receive a golden Pendoring trophy and R6,000, and the runners-up will each receive a silver Pendoring and R2,500.

Over the past 20 years, Pendoring has also become much more than just an awards event - it has steadily grown into an ongoing campaign aimed at creating greater awareness of the importance of Afrikaans and vernacular advertising and marketing among marketers, creatives and the broader public, culminating in the prestigious annual Pendoring Advertising Awards.

2. Impressive. Explain how the Pendorings celebrate the diversity of all the indigenous languages.

Klerck: In addition to its loyalty to Afrikaans, Pendoring strives to promote the other indigenous languages of South Africa through the Truly South African category and the Umpetha prize. After all, you have a better chance connecting emotionally with consumers when you speak to them in their mother tongue.

Anyone's game
Anyone's game

3. That makes sense. Delving deeper, how do the Pendorings promote advertising excellence among students?

Klerck: The Pendoring Awards is a fantastic platform to give students who are not Afrikaans-speaking an idea how important it is to create mother tongue advertisements that speak to the heart and culture of a specific target group. That's the view of Wessie van der Westhuizen, lecturer at Stellenbosch Academy for Design and Photography. He says: "All awards are important for students, but we do not necessarily create projects around competitions - the best work is entered for Pendoring."

A representative of Pendoring also visits schools from time to time to do presentations and organise a senior creative to talk to the students. In addition, the top student will receive R10,000 and an internship at Etiket for 2016.

4. Sounds great. What can we expect from the Gala evening on 30 October?

Klerck: As Pendoring is celebrating its 20th anniversary this year, the gala event promises to be the mother of all parties, more spectacular than before. It will be exciting, colourful and up-beat with special effects - a real joy ride.

The evening will be jam-packed with sizzling entertainment, delectable food and a goodie bag filled with gifts from the sponsors. Artists like Riana Nel, Bongi Mthombeni, LeAnne Dlamini and the Mzanzi Youth Choir will set the stage on fire with their music and performances and the two MCs this year are Martin Bester, radio presenter at Jacaranda 94.2, and actress Nadia Beukes, presenter of the reality programme Boer Soek 'n Vrou as well as Groot Ontbyt on kykNET.

Although Pendoring focuses on Afrikaans this year - it is, after all, Afrikaans' 90th year as an official language - it also celebrates the diversity of all the indigenous languages. To this end, Brenda Wilson and her team from the agency First Pencil composed a song titled "Dankie Babel", which will be sung by Melissa Allison. Cute clay characters, each representing one of the indigenous languages, have been created to bring the song to life in an animation format.
The proverbial cherry on top will be the ever-popular after-party in the dome, where everybody can let their hair down and party until they drop as DJ Duanne Rockwell sets the pace and fires up the party, the evening promises to end on a high note.

Certainly sounds like a worthwhile 'jol'. For more on the Pendoring Awards, visit their press office and follow their Twitter account.

About Leigh Andrews

Leigh Andrews AKA the #MilkshakeQueen, is former Editor-in-Chief: Marketing & Media at Bizcommunity.com, with a passion for issues of diversity, inclusion and equality, and of course, gourmet food and drinks! She can be reached on Twitter at @Leigh_Andrews.
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