This year’s winners – American Express, Kroger, PepsiCo, and a joint submission from Forbes and Capital One – were selected for their best-in-class work in improving business outcomes through advanced marketing analytics

Neustar Inc., a global information services and technology company and leader in identity resolution, announced the winners of the 2021 ANA Genius Awards competition on October 7 during the annual ANA Masters of Marketing Conference in Orlando, FL.

Now in its ninth year, the Genius Awards program – produced by Neustar in partnership with the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) – recognizes the achievements of the marketing analytics and data science teams behind many of the world’s leading brands. Each of the Genius Award winners share in a $100,000 prize pool to be donated to charity.

The winners of the 2021 ANA Genius Awards are:

• PepsiCo – in the category of Growth, which recognizes achievement in the use of a data-driven approach to drive significant business results
• American Express – in the category of Innovation, where progressive, analytics-based approaches are used to solve a business challenge or seize an opportunity
• Kroger – in the category of Adoption, which recognizes the organizational adoption of data and analytics to boost business outcomes
• Forbes in partnership with Capital One – in the category of Storytelling, where the use of data tells an enlightening, visual story that encourages organizations to make insights actionable

This year’s winners were selected by a panel of nine judges, each of whom are seasoned marketing and analytics executives representing top publishers, brands, platform providers, research organizations, and academia.

“Celebrating the often-unsung heroes of the marketing analytics and data science community is incredibly important to all of us at Neustar Marketing Solutions,” said Brett House, Neustar Vice President of Marketing, who announced the winners at the ANA Masters of Marketing Conference. “These are teams behind some of the most important advances in data and marketing strategy, and their efforts have a huge impact on business outcomes. From predictive analytics to multi-touch attribution, marketing mix modeling to machine learning, the data science discipline is critical to brands now more than ever. We’re proud to celebrate the people behind the magic.”

“We’re pleased to recognize American Express, Kroger, PepsiCo, and Forbes and Capital One as the winners of this year’s ANA Genius Awards,” said Bob Liodice, ANA CEO. “Their outstanding efforts and results show a true commitment to marketing analytics, and they serve as powerful examples of what’s possible in achieving milestone successes that help propel business forward.”

“It’s clear from the entries received in this year’s competition that increasingly organizations are not just using marketing data and analytics to fuel campaigns and demand-generation activities,” said Michael Schoen, Neustar SVP and GM of Marketing Solutions, who also served as a judge in this year’s competition. “They’re creating foundational marketing analytics disciplines at their organizations that work in lock-step with their senior leadership to make game-changing business decisions that drive growth, scale, agility, and differentiation. The 2021 winners all stood out in this way.”

All of the 2021 ANA Genius Awards winners' case studies will be featured at a virtual half-day event on December 2, 2021, from 11:00 a.m. to 2:00 p.m. Eastern Time. The event is open to ANA members only. For event inquiries, contact Tina Jordan at tjordan@ana.net.

To learn more about the 2021 ANA Genius Awards winners, visit us here.

This year’s Genius Awards follow the launch of Neustar Optimizer, a new closed-loop marketing optimization and consumer insights platform that enables marketers to improve marketing and brand performance by measuring all consumer activity. Marketers can use Neustar Optimizer to make critical, real-time optimizations to marketing mix, media budget allocation, campaign and creative tactics, and audience segments.

ABOUT NEUSTAR

Neustar is an information services and technology company and a leader in identity resolution providing the data and technology that enable trusted connections between companies and people at the moments that matter most. Neustar offers industry-leading solutions in marketing, risk, communications, and security that responsibly connect data on people, devices and locations, continuously corroborated through billions of transactions. Neustar serves more than 8,000 clients worldwide, including 60 of the Fortune 100. Learn how your company can benefit from the power of trusted connections here: home.neustar.

ABOUT NEUSTAR OPTIMIZER

Neustar Optimizer™ is a closed-loop marketing optimization and consumer insights platform, backed by broad measurement integrations and professional services expertise, that enables marketers to measure all consumer activity to make critical, on-the-fly optimizations to their marketing mix, campaign tactics, and audience targets to improve marketing’s impact on sales.

Learn more here.

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