Are you searching for a way to stand out this year?

Have a crack at the only awards that matter—the APAC Search Awards 2025.

It’s been a tough year for marketing so far. There have been many cuts, uncertainty, and dubious choices from big players in the search industry. Add to that the shadow of more land grabbing with “AI results” looming over everyone.

Thankfully, Google appears to have f*cked it on the AI front in search so far, so I don’t think there’s an immediate need to panic.

I hear you ask, what does this have to do with entering awards?

Let me tell you.

Search is one of the oldest and most trusted digital marketing channels. Its combination of determined data, relatively high transparency, and, most importantly, the ceaseless work of people in the search industry keeps it that way.

However.

There are always temptations to do things the easy way and listen to the whispering devil on your shoulder.

Last year, I saw many “we did PMax” entries to the APAC Search Awards, which partly inspired this article. Now, PMax has its place if you want to trust Google to do what it says (LOL), but it is not real search marketing because it requires no focus on or understanding of search behaviour or methodology.

You should not rely on advertising and media vendors to tell you how to spend your money without any critical assessment or controlled testing. Google does not have your business’s best interests at heart; they have the monetisation of their data at heart.

To paraphrase one of my old boss’s boss, “Why should we let them mark their own homework?”

The winners of last year’s APAC Search Awards demonstrated a level of thinking beyond “We tried a new Google product, and Google said it worked” with a desire to prove things worked based on their own objectives and methods.

The winners demonstrated their ability to drive forward the growth agenda for their client brands or businesses by creating solutions that gave them control over the optimisation and the outcomes of the campaigns.

Without being overly dramatic (well, perhaps a little), the winners were showing us how to fight the good fight against the big tech agenda and maintain an independent, sustainable growth engine inside a business.

There were some awesome technology stories enabling impressive reactivity and optimisation, some wholesome people being awesome by sharing their passion for search stories, some outstanding results, and some really exciting new products.

So, if you want to join this glorious pantheon of past winners, you know what to do.

You must demonstrate how you and your team are leading the search industry by building campaigns based on actual customer behaviour combined with your own skill and moxie.

You must enter the only awards that really matter—the APAC Search Awards.

Stuart P. Turner

Judge & MD at Flow State

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