Pleon sweeps the board: Five international online awards for projects with World Youth Day and METRO Group

Pleon Online Relations has won five new international awards for its work on World Youth Day 2005 and METRO Group. In April, the team was awarded three Astrid Awards for outstanding achievement in design communications. The team also took home a Silver Globe from the World Media Festival, an international competition that is among the most coveted prizes for modern, audiovisual communications solutions. In addition, the team has received an honorary “Webby” at the 10th Annual Webby Awards, an international event honoring excellence in web design, creativity, usability and functionality.

“The number of international organisations that have acknowledged these projects speak to the superior work and global impact the team has made on behalf of these two clients,” commented Pleon Chairman, Alex Schoep.

The team’s World Youth Day 2005 website received both a Gold Astrid Award and an Inter-media Silver Globe. Supported in five languages, the website was the central communications vehicle for this international super event attended by 400,000 Christian youths, 23,000 volunteers, and 8,000 journalists.

Silver Astrid Awards were given to Pleon for two METRO Group projects:

• METRO Group Info-Terminal Beauty promotion -- an interactive and educational in-store kiosk that helps consumers pick the most appropriate beauty products; and
• METRO Group Networking (Intranet) – a truly global intranet accessible to over 50,000 employees in 26 countries.

The team’s work on behalf of METRO Group’s Future Store Initiative (FSI) received an honorary Webby Award. Of the more than 5,500 entries from over 40 countries submitted to the 10th Annual Webby Awards, fewer than 20% were distinguished as an Official Honoree.

Additional nominations

Pleon’s World Youth Day project has also been short-listed for a 2005 SABRE Award. The Awards - designed to honour superior achievement in innovation, integrity and effectiveness – are administered by The Holmes Report, a widely respected trade journal of the public relations industry.

The online team’s METRO Group Networking and an additional project, METRO Group CD-ROM “World of Commerce”, have also been nominated for the prestigious PR Report Awards.

Winners of the SABRE Awards will be announced in May.

For more information about Pleon’s award winning projects, please go to:

• PleonAwards
• World Youth Day 2005
• METRO Group Future Store Initiative

For more information about the Awards visit:

• Astrid Awards
• WorldMedia Festival
• The 10th Annual Webby Awards
• The SABRE Awards

Pleon Designs One of the World’s Ten Best Intranets for METRO Group

The global employee intranet designed for METRO Group by Pleon has been ranked one of this year’s 10 best in the world.

After reviewing hundreds of intranets around the world in its annual design contest, consulting company Nielson Norman Group named METRO Group’s intranet to its top 10 list. The contest picks winners based on a site’s functionality, user-friendliness and world class design.

METRO Group’s site, called Networking, received the award because of the creative approach and design risks the Pleon team took when creating an in-house information platform that would support all of the 20 METRO Group companies in 30 countries.

Pleon partner and head of Online Relations Britta Neisen said the site was chosen not only because it improves every-day tasks and information sharing in a seamless experience for all employees around the world, it also uses fun and creative tools such as interactive games as training devices.

“Our long-standing relationship with METRO Group and our ability to really understand their business afforded us the opportunity to take risks that make the site an engaging and invaluable workplace of the future,” said Neisen.

Neisen went on to describe how the design challenge for Networking was further complicated by the fact that many of the METRO Group companies have different branding structures and multiple back-end platforms. As a global organization, she says Pleon was able to leverage resources and feedback to test ideas in an approach that ensured efficient use of resources while maintaining corporate identity and consistent design.

“The globalization of good intranet design was really made clear in this year’s contest. For the first time, the majority of our winners came from outside the United States, but more importantly, most of the companies are highly multi-national, with employees working in multiple countries. The intranet success stories of these winners surely will provide valuable ideas for other large and small companies with a geographically dispersed workforce,” said Kara Pernice Coyne, director of research, Nielsen Norman Group.

Pleon’s Online Relations Team Scoops Four Awards

Düsseldorf / Berlin, June 2005.  Pleon’s Online Relations team has won four awards in four weeks, and has been nominated for a further honour. The team first took three awards at this year’s WorldMediaFestival, an international competition that is among the most coveted prizes for modern, audiovisual communications solutions. Pleon’s Online Relations Team then tasted success again at the ASTRID awards, a prestigious international award that honours outstanding achievement in design communications. The team has also been shortlisted for a Comprix award. The Comprix award is regarded as the premier award for innovative pharmaceuticals communication in Germany and increasingly throughout Europe as a whole. Pleon’s Online relations Practice develops and implements solutions which support and optimise communications between enterprises and their customers, and between employees and their business partners through strategic internet-based communications.

“I want to offer my congratulations to our Online Relations Team for its recent award successes - four awards in four weeks is a remarkable feat,” said Rainer Zimmerman, CEO, Pleon. “These awards provide yet more proof of our great people, outstanding performance, hard work and dedication. They also affirm our leadership in Europe and our commitment to deliver real world results for our clients.”

Pleon won in the following categories at the WorldMediaFestival awards:

	Gold for the CD-ROM "The World of Commerce," developed on behalf of the METRO Group
	Silver for the website of the Future Store Initiative, also created for the METRO Group
	Silver for and the Aspirin e-learning platform developed for Bayer.

The final awards are associated with work that Pleon has carried out on behalf of the Federation of German Pharmacy Associations (ABDA). At the ASTRID Awards, Pleon won in the ‘Design’ category for the new corporate web site it had created for ABDA and in the Comprix awards, Pleon was nominated for the online payment calculator it developed for the Federation.

For more information on the Pleon’s award winning projects, please go to:

WorldMediaFestival:
 http://www.future-store.org/ 
 http://www.aspirin-training-kit.com/ 
 http://www.worldmediafestival.de

ASTRID

 http://www.abda.de/ 
 http://www.mercommawards.com/astrid.htm

Comprix:

 http://82.165.42.224/zzr/zzr.html (ABDA payment calculator) 
 http://www.comprix.com/

Family: the Factor for Success. Entrepreneurial commitment pays off

A jury of 10 including Family Minister Renate Schmidt and Economics Minister Wolfgang Clement is to select the winners of the companies’ competition “Factor for Success: Family“ by May 2005. Pleon Düsseldorf created the Website for the campaign as well as the database application for the companies taking part in the competition.
In an 11-page online application form under www.erfolgsfaktor-familie.de the companies can present their in-house measures to promote families. The assessment and judging of the applications is the second step. The address management system based on a database proved to be a great support to the campaign office.
The competition was initiated by the Federal Ministry of Economics and Labour (BMWA) and the Federal Ministry for Women, Senior Citizens, Families and Young People (BMFSFJ). Federal Chancellor Gerhard Schröder has undertaken the sponsorship. The aim is to reward corporate commitment to the compatibility of work and family and to achieve the greatest possible imitation effect.
Further information on the campaign under http://www.erfolgsfaktor-familie.de online.

hinsehen.handeln.helfen!

The website http://www.hinsehen-handeln-helfen.de is contact point for citizens looking for information regarding sexual violence against young people or children or who need help in a concrete form. The website supports the entire prevention campaign of the BMFSFJ (Federal Ministry for Women, Senior Citizens, Families and Young People), provides information on the dates of the back-up road tour as well as campaign and informational material.

Health Minister for a day – what would …

The Reform-O-Mat puts the player in the role of the Health Minister: the German health insurance system needs reforming, most experts agree on this. However the “how” leads to some disagreement. The proposals range from citizen’s insurance to increasing the tax on tobacco products to finance health service benefits. The impact of the individual options is often difficult to estimate for the people who would be affected by the proposed changes. The Reform-O-Mat developed by Pleon for SCHWARZ PHARMA now offers support.

Pleon wins the COMPRIX 2004 for Schwarz Pharma

The specialist jury of the 12th COMPRIX prize for innovative pharmaceutical communication conferred 22 Gold Awards, one of which went to Schwarz Pharma and Pleon for the Reform-O-Mat. This innovative online tool puts the player in the role of the Health Minister and illustrates in a game the effects of various reform options on the health system.

World Youth Day: now in the Internet, 2005 in Cologne

Days left: 500, 499, 498 .. The Website countdown to the event: the Catholic World Youth Day in Cologne. Young people from all over the world will be meeting from 11th to 21st August 2005 to talk together, pray and celebrate. Some 800,000 visitors, 60 bishops, 4,000 journalists and of course the Pope are expected.

Certificate of Creative Achievement Award won

Pleon (formerly ECC Online Relations) was honoured with the Certificate of Creative Achievement Award as part of the International Web Page Award (USA). The award is presented to agencies, companies or freelance designers who offer “excellent examples of superior website design”.