American Advertising Awards
It is AWARD SEASON!
Welcome to the 2024-25 American Advertising Federation Awards (AAF Awards) season! We know you created some amazing content this year, and we want to celebrate YOU! You did the hard part already, you might as well get some new bling to showcase for it!
The AAF Awards are a series of competitions that starts in our local market, the Space Coast. Take home an award here and your work will compete in the district wide competition (in our case that is all of Florida and the Caribbean), win again at the district level and your work will head on to the National Competition! There are nearly 35,000 professional and student level entries at the national level each year!
The mission of the awards is to recognize and reward the spirit of creative excellence in advertising. (We already know you’ve got that, so let’s win some awards!)
Who submits to this competition? Ad agencies, graphic designers, in-house design teams, media outlets, film and production companies, photographers, student designers, corporate teams and others. When it comes to creative work, the American Advertising Federation has categories for individuals working on projects in video, web, print, graphic design, sound and events, just to name a few. With over 100 categories, you will find a connection to a project that emulates the award-winning creative excellence we all know and love to see.
Our local awards are open for entries now, we can’t wait to see your amazing work!
And don’t forget, we will have an amazing Gala in February 2025 to celebrate all of the amazing creative work being done right here on the Space Coast. We can’t wait to see you there!
How to enter
Step-By-Step
Don’t doubt yourself. It is easy to submit and you can follow the step-by-step guide below. You will need to do a little research to get yourself familiar with the categories and the rules, make a plan to submit your work while gathering the entry pieces, and then submit it all through the portal.
- Step 1| Research
- Step 2 | Categories
- Make a list of the categories you are interested in and use this time to collect your entry pieces.
- Step 3 | Discounts and Timing
- Enter early to get a discount on your submissions and review the Award Oops below.
- Step 4 | Become a Member
- If you are already a member, thank you—and we appreciate your already being a part of our club. If you are not, please consider this a perfect opportunity to join the club. We enjoy meeting new people and learning from you. You help to keep our industry strong and our creatives prosperous.
AWARD SUBMISSION OOPS
You are considering several entries but may have questions. We have an experienced award chair and several members who can help. Please do not hesitate to contact them at this email address:
The most important first step is to view and login to the American Advertising Awards Portal and read through the rules.
You can bookmark this webpage for future review as we will continue to list a few tips, tricks and common mistakes when submitting for the competition.
Common mistakes during submission
- Not attaching a label to the work in the proper way. Yes, this is number one.
- Submitting work in the wrong market. Refer to the rules link above.
- Video and audio entries submitted only as a YouTube or Vimeo URL link rather than uploading the actual file.
- Submitting just a beauty shot of the cover of a multi-page entry (brochure, multi-page spread, invitation, annual report, etc.) rather than a PDF that shows all of the work. This is a real problem if virtual judging is necessary.
- An agency, industry supplier and/or media company that submits the advertising for their own services in the general market category instead of the Industry Self-Promotion category.
- Including too many pieces in your submission. Refer to the rules link above; each category has a different number of pieces allowed. Remember, digital and print pieces count separately, as do separate executions within a medium or campaign.
If you have any questions during submission, please do not hesitate to email our award chair for an answer. It is better to ask (especially this year) and have the correct files, physical entries, and payment submitted once.
DATES:
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Friday, Dec. 13, 2024, 5 p.m. – EARLY BIRD Entry Deadline
Save $10 per entry if you submit your online entry by 5 p.m., Friday, Dec. 13, 2024. -
Wednesday, Jan. 8, 2025, 11:59 p.m. – Entry Deadline
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Friday, Jan. 10, 2025, 11:59 p.m. – LATE Entry Deadline
We will be taking late entries this year with a late fee of $50.00 per entry received after Jan. 10, 2025. -
Absolutely no entries will be accepted past Jan. 10, 2025.
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Friday, Feb. 22, 2025 – Awards Gala
Details to be announced.