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Winners of WAN-IFRA’s Digital Media Awards Americas announced

2023-05-17. Congratulations to the 81 participating companies with more than 150 projects that have made the first combined edition of the Digital Media Awards LATAM & North America the most competitive in the history of WAN-IFRA Americas. Learn a little more about the winning projects below.

by Daniela Bermúdez daniela.bermudez@wan-ifra.org | May 18, 2023

Best News Website

STAT, USA | The Leading Site Covering Health, Medicine, and Science

Through its digital platform, STAT gathers information, data and scientific publications that strengthen the health sector, medicine and scientific research. Using photographs, graphics, essays and opinion articles, STAT has involved the scientific community, universities and companies in concrete actions that seek to combat racism in medicine and structural problems within the pharmaceutical industry.

 

Winner from a small or local company

STAT, USA | The Leading Site Covering Health, Medicine, and Science

Best Use of Video

N+, Mexico | Ambulancias irregulares: lucrar con la emergencia

This multi-format investigation reveals how easy it is to buy and run an ambulance in Mexico City, creating a business based on emergency care. The injured suffer medical neglect and abuse, while private hospitals and ambulance owners profit from excessive fees without facing any penalties. It uncovers the corruption networks of ambulance buyers with the police and hospitals without the necessary infrastructure.

 

Winner from a small or local company

Grupo AM, Mexico | Panzasverdes – la mini serie documental

By using audiovisual content, Panzasverdes seeks to capture the cultural, social, and economic history of León in Guanajuato, Mexico. Through interviews and investigative work, the miniseries manages to recover the city’s most important symbolic and identity aspects. Using different formats, including social networks, Panzasverdes becomes the first video series of Grupo AM that premieres weekly.

Best Data Visualisation

Insider, USA | America’s Lost Chinatowns

“America’s lost Chinatowns” is part of a two-part series that looks into the past and future of some of America’s most significant cultural hubs through the perspective of the owners, locals, and activists working tirelessly to bring new life to these communities. It touches upon themes of immigration, community, respect, and resilience.

 

Winner from a small or local company

The Marshall Project, USA | Who is cycling in and out of Cuyahoga County courts

Thousands of people walk into the Cuyahoga County Justice Center each year to have their felony cases heard by judges. But the Cleveland community has been blindfolded in understanding how systemic unfairness stacks up — including arrests and charging decisions, access to bail, plea bargains, and sentencing. In this investigation, The Marshall Project uncovers the inner workings of justice in the historically opaque Cuyahoga County justice system.

Best Digital Subscription Initiative

Clarín, Argentina | the Spanish-language publication with the largest number of subscribers

After launching a registration system and a digital subscription model a few years ago, Clarín surpassed the 500,000 subscribers milestone in September 2022, becoming the leader among Spanish-language newspapers and ranking 15th among the world’s leading newspapers. It was the first media outlet in Argentina to do so, with the understanding that the business model based solely on advertising was exhausted and that it was necessary to move to a model where revenues from subscribers had more significant weight.

 

Winner from a small or local company

STAT, USA | STAT’s new subscription offering for small, self-serve groups

As STAT’s audience continues to grow, they give their readers as much control and flexibility as possible in choosing a subscription type that best suits their teams and employees. With this in mind, a new subscription offering was created — one that is unique across media and publishing — for small groups and/or teams. STAT’S Self-Serve Group functionality provides access to STAT+ for up to 10 users. Smaller teams are therefore no longer required to have a conversation with a sales rep if they are already convinced/ready to purchase together.

Best Newsletter

The Washington Post, USA | Climate Coach

Ciimate change is a deeply, unavoidably personal story for millions of people. Many wonders: What can I do? To help find answers to this question, The Washington Post launched the Climate Coach newsletter in January 2023. The newsletter is The Post’s first climate advice email product and its primary newsletter for the Climate vertical. Climate Coach, which publishes twice a week and has an accompanying column, tackles issues ranging from how Americans still use their appliances like it’s 1970 to why lentils are the perfect legume to battle climate change to the miraculous qualities of dirt.

 

Winner from a small or local company

The Brazilian Report, Brazil | Brazil Daily, Brazil Weekly, Latin America Weekly

The Brazilian Report is an English-language media outlet uniquely positioned to offer an insider’s view of current affairs in Brazil. The website runs on a subscription-based model, with three newsletters comprising the site’s flagship products. For less than $200 a year, readers gain access to Brazil Weekly and Daily Briefings, delivered to their inbox every business day, and to the Latin America Weekly newsletter.

Best in Audience Engagement

LA NACION, Argentina | Emotions, predictions, forecasts, users interact with La Nacion during the Qatar World Cup

Using different mathematical models, the project seeks to develop an interactive platform that allows the user to express their state of mind during soccer matches and, at the same time, participate in predicting results and allocating rankings for players. The platform analyses data in real-time to map different emotions and interactions simultaneously.

 

Winner from a small or local company

Aos Fatos, Brazil | Aos Fatos’ automation strategy for Telegram

Telegram is a social media platform with more than 40 million estimated users in Brazil. Its increasingly significant use for spreading disinformation regarding the 2022 Brazilian elections encouraged Aos Fatos to outline a strategy to launch an official channel and their benchmark chatbot Fátima on the platform.

Best Podcast

The Outlaw Ocean Project, USA | The Outlaw Ocean Podcast

Few places on the planet are as lawless as the high seas. This seven-part podcast series, The Outlaw Ocean, chronicles the laws, lore and lifestyles of a hidden realm populated by traffickers, mercenaries, wreck thieves and repo men, vigilante conservationists and elusive poachers, oil-dumpers, shackled slaves and cast-adrift stowaways. Through their stories of astonishing courage and brutality, the series uncovers a globe-spanning network of crime and exploitation on the high seas.

Best ePaper-Concept

Grupo RBS, Brazil | ZH archive

Acervo ZH is a product launched in August 2022 that has already organized and made available more than 24 thousand daily editions of Jornal Zero Hora in digital format (e-paper). There are 11,976 covers (1964 to 1998) and 12,316 complete editions (1999 to present). The project focuses on contributing to society and the digital business of Grupo RBS by rescuing almost 60 years of the history of our state and country written in the pages of Zero Hora from 1964 until now.

 

Winner from a small or local company

Atlanta Journal-Constitution, USA | Everyday Heroes

Our communities are filled with ordinary people who accomplish extraordinary feats. As the holidays approached, Atlanta Journal-Constitution celebrated 55 inspiring Georgians in a series called “Everyday Heroes.” Between Thanksgiving and the end of the year, stories appeared on the front page of their printed newspaper, in their ePaper, and through a special digital presentation on AJC.com.

Best Trust Initiative

Agência Lupa, Brazil | Elections 2022 Coverage

The project consisted of journalistic coverage by Lupa of the 2022 general elections. The main goals were to combat misinformation and to produce relevant content that could contribute to the public debate, respect for the democratic process and the voter’s decision-making. The coverage was divided into three stages: campaign, results, and transition.

 

Winner from a small or local company

The Trust Project, USA | The 8 Trust Indicators Help Local News Organizations Build Trust and Brand Loyalty in the Communities They Serve

The Trust Project brings together news organizations across the Americas and beyond under a globally recognized standard that allows them to differentiate their own careful and socially responsible reporting from deception and misdirection. Its mission is to amplify journalism’s commitment to transparency, accuracy, inclusion, and fairness so that the public can make informed news choices. The project’s 8 Trust Indicators, shown on participating sites and promoted as a news literacy tool.

Best Native Advertising / Sponsored Content

O GLOBO, Brazil | Global Citizen

The Global Citizen project was created by Valor Econômico, the leading business newspaper in Brazil, in partnership with Santander bank. The project consists of an international event and a robust branded content platform. In its fifth edition, held in 2022, the event proposed to discuss the ESG concept in practice: how companies and governments can contribute to building a sustainable future.

Best Lifestyle or Sports Site

LA NACION, Argentina | Manija Mundial: first TikTok alike news website from a legacy media outlet

Using an innovative format, LA NACION’s Manija Mundial project seeks to transform the consumption of news about soccer and Argentina’s national team. Designed for the 2022 World Cup, the project mixes the use of TikTok-style data, statistics and stories in order to create a unique space for interaction and experience. Based on the study of the type of audience and its needs, Manija is committed to increasing coverage of the World Cup and attracting new generations to the world of soccer.


About the Awards

For more than a decade, WAN-IFRA has recognized the efforts of Publishers who have developed unique and original initiatives in the field of digital media, with the help of new tools and formats, using the most advanced technology or driving innovation, from new approaches to digital subscriptions to the most impressive digital storytelling or native advertising initiatives. Digital Media Awards are a reference for the industry at a regional and global level.

Who can apply for the 2023 Digital Media Americas Awards?

The WAN-IFRA Digital Media Americas Awards are open to companies and entities of the press and the media that operate in the industry around the American continent (United States, Canada, Mexico, Central and South America). Nominations must be prepared and entered by the media organization, a representative of the organization, an advertising agency or public relations firm on behalf of the company. International media with active operations in the Americas can participate as long as the project has been published in a media outlet in the region.

Contact and Inquiries

Daniela Bermúdez
Digital Manager Americas, Mexico City
daniela.bermudez@wan-ifra.org

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