Entries Open
umeas 2026
Awards gala
Friday 11th Dec 2026
About UMEAWARDS
The Uganda Marketing Excellence Awards (UMEAWARDS) were first inspired by the extraordinary marketing campaigns that brands and their custodians created, against all odds, during the Covid-19 pandemic.
UMEAWARDS is on a mission to set a new standard of excellence in marketing. We champion effectiveness through smart leadership, inspiring insights, and the largest marketing effectiveness award in the land.
Through these Awards, we explore every year how well brands, marketers, and their agency partners have leveraged different media channels, digital and traditional, to create campaigns that have made a powerful impact on their target groups.
The Uganda Marketing Excellence Awards are back to recognize the phenomenal work of marketing practitioners around the country. These Awards not only bring recognition but shed light on the issues that matter across the industry.
The 2026 Awards will be hosted on Friday, 11 December 2026, at Kampala Serena Hotel as a red-carpet, black-tie event, celebrating marketing excellence for projects and campaigns executed from November 2025 to October 2026.
2025 Judging
Nomination criteria
The Uganda Marketing Excellence Awards exist to prove, not just praise, what works in Ugandan marketing. UMEAS champions the practitioners, brands, and campaigns that convert insight into measurable business and social outcomes building a national body of evidence for what effective, responsible marketing looks like in Uganda’s market and using that evidence to raise the standard of the profession itself, year on year.
Over the past five editions, UMEA has stood for sustainable, responsible marketing positions, a foundation we are not walking away from.
In 2026, we are sharpening the ask. It is no longer enough for a campaign to mean well; it must show that it worked.
“Marketing That Moves the Needle” asks every entrant to demonstrate a before and an after in sales, share, behaviour, or impact and to enter with evidence to back it up.
Every entry is scored out of 100 across three pillars. The weighting is deliberate: strategy and creative execution matter, but results carry the most weight, because a needle that didn’t move is not a winning entry.
Categories are open to both B2C and B2B entrants. The Marketing Council will consider the merits of each entry due regard to the fact that metrics and success factors differ between B2C and B2B marketing programmes. An entry is judged against what constitutes success for its own market, not against a single fixed set of consumer-marketing benchmarks.
Across all entries, judges will weigh the linkage between strategy, execution, and the outcomes achieved, rather than scoring each pillar in isolation.
Criterion | Points |
Strategic Thinking: Clarity of the business challenge, depth of consumer insight, fit with the Ugandan market context | 30 |
Idea & Execution: Originality, quality of execution across channels, integration of the campaign as a single idea | 30 |
Impact & Results: Business results, behavioral or attitudinal shift, social/environmental impact where relevant | 40 |
- Campaign or initiative must have run in Uganda between November 2025 and October 2026 (see Entry Guidelines for the full release window).
- Entries may be submitted by the brand, the agency, or jointly.
- Entrants must be able to substantiate all the results claimed. Unsupported figures will not be scored under Impact & Results.
- All entries are scored by the UMEAS Marketing Council against the framework above, with metrics assessed relative to the entrant’s own B2C or B2B context rather than a single universal benchmark.
- Judges specifically assess how clearly the strategy, execution, and results connect as one coherent narrative — a strong result with no traceable link back to the strategy will not score as well as a smaller result the entrant can clearly account for.
- Finalists may be called for a brief clarifying interview ahead of final scoring.
- Public vote for selected categories shall hold 40% while the council shall hold 60% of the final score.
- Category winners are announced at the UMEAS Gala; the Marketing Campaign of the Year is selected from among category winners.
By entering the Uganda Marketing Excellence Awards 2026, you can:
- Increase credibility and gain industry-wide recognition for your campaigns, teams, and company.
- Showcase your best work, achievements, and innovations to our independent, industry expert judges.
- Receive extensive coverage across Evolve Africa and social media, before and after the event.
- Celebrate your successes across your company and project teams.
- Boost team morale, motivation, and reward outstanding work.
Make sure your hard work doesn’t go unnoticed and your teams get the recognition they deserve!
- A single piece of work, if relevant, can be submitted in multiple categories.
- The work submitted should have been released between November 2025 and October 2026.
- Entries submitted should have been approved by the client before submission.
- The Uganda Marketing Excellence Awards team reserves the right to use submissions for promotional purposes.
- All entries must be in English for the benefit of the jury; video entries must include subtitles.
- Please submit a high-resolution version of the creative.
UGANDA MARKETING EXCELLENCE AWARDS 2026 CATEGORIES
You may submit to more than one category if your entry is genuinely relevant to each. Categories 6, 7, and 10 require the additional submission elements set out below, in place of Section B, and Categories 6 and 7 are each judged against their own weighted criteria rather than the general scorecard. Category 12 is not open for entry.
Recognises campaigns that used striking creativity and strategic planning to reach and engage target audiences, across outdoor, TV, radio, online, or print.
Recognises the effortless strategic alignment of two or more partnering organisations to deliver a compelling customer marketing campaign, showing how the joint approach and shared goals achieved a measurable win-win result.
Recognises the best use of digital; social media, programmatic, immersive, or otherwise innovative to achieve a business objective, deliver marketing excellence, and a strong return on investment.
Recognises excellence in PR and related communications, from brand-building events to the effective management of an issue or crisis, with demonstrated use of creative and innovative strategies to achieve desired business outcomes.
Recognises the innovative development of a new product, service, or process, driven by a customer-centric approach that delivers an outstanding value proposition benefiting both business and customer.
This award recognizes the rising/new agency that has had an unrivalled year. Showcase your successes across strategy, insight and creative, proving how you have delivered marketing excellence for your clients, outshone your competitors and set new standards for the future.
Submissions should include:
· Introduction of agency (200 words)
· Demonstration of excellence (500 – 100 words), including: Their approach to finding and developing great people from within or outside the industry, Insight, and foresight: spotting trends and the skills needed to advance client results, Customer service, Understanding and executing client requirements, Innovative approaches to client problem, Ethical practices, Responsibility around outcomes and how this is shared between the agency and the client
A client reference should accompany the submission.
Judging criteria for this category:
Parameter | Weighting |
Growth & trajectory: Client, team, or revenue growth over the period | 25% |
Talent development: Approach to finding and growing great people | 25% |
Innovation & differentiation: Originality of approach to client problems | 25% |
Client impact & results delivered | 25% |
This award recognizes the agency that has unrivalled years. Showcase your successes across strategy, insight and creative, proving how you have delivered marketing excellence for your clients, outshone your competitors and set new standards for the future
Submissions should include:
• Introduction of agency (200 words)
• Demonstration of excellence (500 – 100 words), including: Their approach to finding and developing great people from within or outside the industry, Insight, and foresight: spotting trends and the skills needed to advance client results, Customer service, Understanding and executing client requirements, Innovative approaches to client problem, Ethical practices, Responsibility around outcomes and how this is shared between the agency and the client
• Reference from client
This recognizes the best individual campaign, product/service launch or event that delivered a unique execution experience with measurable impact to the business
Recognises a brand/campaign that used sustainability as a core lever of its marketing strategy embedding environmental or social responsibility into product, campaign, or brand experience, rather than treating it as a side initiative and can demonstrate measurable business and sustainability outcomes as a result. Distinct from ESG Brand of the Year, which looks at an organisation’s overall ESG commitment; this category looks at how sustainability was expressed through the brand’s marketing.
This award recognizes marketing success in the pursuit of growth when lobbying, fundraising, expanding, informing or positively changing attitudes and behaviors. Show how your approach added value to your customers and benefited your organization.
Recognises an individual who has made a significant and meaningful difference to the marketing profession in Uganda through sound business practice, development of the profession, or wider industry achievements. Selected by the Marketing Council, not entered.
Recognises the best individual campaign that delivered a stunning impact on the target audience and the competition, judged on clear understanding of the marketing issue, consumer insight, execution against ROI and growth KPIs, and commercial value delivered.
Submission requirements in place of Section B: campaign introduction (200 words); demonstration of excellence (500–1000 words) covering the development of the campaign idea, insight and foresight, execution, innovative approaches to situation analysis, and ethical practice
This award is special for a brand recognized as a champion in the industry.
It will be based on the current year market standing and consumer preference. It will honor only the brand which is dominantly led through all levels of the selection criteria.
To emerge a winner, a brand needs to have built a good reputation and trust with stakeholders.
Submissions should include:
• Introduction of the brand (200 words)