Which APAC Search Category Is Right for You?

Whether you are an agency punching above your weight, an in-house team fighting for budget and delivering results, a freelancer working with clients to drive and improve visibility, or a developer building tools that are changing how the search industry works, there is a category for you at the APAC Search Awards. Let’s find it!

The APAC Search Awards exist to celebrate extraordinary work happening across search in Asia and the Pacific.

Every year, brilliant work goes unrecognised because teams aren’t sure which category or categories fit them best. This guide is here to fix that.

Campaign Awards vs Agency Awards

We don’t just award campaigns. The awards are structured in three distinct areas. Campaign Awards, Agency/Team/Individual Awards and Innovation & Software Awards. Understanding where your work fits is crucial to maximise your chances of making the shortlist or taking the win.

Campaign Awards: Celebrating Your Work

Campaign categories are all about the output: the objective, the strategy, the execution, and the results. Judges want to see the thinking behind the campaign, how you navigated the specific challenges of your sector, and what you achieved beyond usual market forces. Did you sail past your KPIs? Did you do something originally creative to reach your audience? Did you get exceptional results on a tight budget? This is your chance to document and celebrate your campaigns in detail.

There are campaign categories covering every major sector and discipline, from retail eCommerce and finance to travel, health, automotive, B2B and B2C, and much more. There are also crosscutting campaign categories for integrated campaigns, innovative campaigns, pan-Asian campaigns, and specialist disciplines like content marketing, data, social media use in search, and AI. In short: if you’ve run a search campaign worth celebrating, there’s almost certainly a category for it.

Agency Awards: Celebrating Who You Are

This is where a lot of agencies undersell themselves by not entering. The Agency/Team/Individual categories aren’t asking you to talk about a single campaign. They’re asking you to talk about who you are. What kind of agency have you built? What does your culture look like? How do you develop and retain talent? How are you contributing to the industry? What results are you consistently achieving for your clients?

“Judges are looking for standout work, yes, but also contribution to industry, brilliant culture, and evidence of a team that is consistently excellent, not just occasionally brilliant.”

Here’s the thing: if you are entering a standout campaign, you should be entering the Agency category too. The campaign evidence you’ve gathered can serve as a supporting case study, in fact, at least one of your case study submissions should be entered into a campaign category. Think of the Agency category as the full picture of your ambition, your values, your people, and your performance. The judges want to see all of it.

Categories span small and large SEO agencies, small and large PPC agencies, small and large integrated agencies, best in-house teams, best start-up agencies (under two years old), and the coveted Emerging Talent Award for those who’ve been in the industry two years or less and are already making waves. There’s also the brand new Best LLM Adoption & Integration By An Agency/In-House Team category for 2027, recognising teams who’ve genuinely embedded AI into how they work.

Working in a Specific Sector? Here’s Where You Should Be Entering

The APAC Search Awards have a wide range of sector-specific campaign categories. Judges for these look at how you navigated the terrain specific to your sector and the particular challenges you faced.

Here’s a quick, but not exclusive, guide to help you match your work to the right categories.

🛒 Retail & eCommerce

Making products easy to find and even easier to buy. If your SEO or PPC strategy drives discovery, increases purchases, and outmanoeuvred the opposition.

💰 Finance

Navigating compliance and regulatory constraints while driving visibility and trust? The Finance categories celebrate that exact complexity. Banking, financial services and insurance are welcome here.

✈️ Travel & Leisure

The travel landscape is competitive and complex. Whether for a destination, accommodation, airline or an experience, you can enter here.

🏥 Health

Health search demands trust, accuracy and credibility. If your work supported health information, connected patients with services or driven engagement for a health brand, this ones for you.

🚗 Automotive

Automotive consumers are obsessed with research. High-intent queries, long consideration cycles and fierce competition. If your activity steered consumers through the journey, enter.

🏡 Real Estate & Property

High value, high emotion, finding the right home starts with search. If you’ve increased viewings and overcome property search logistics, these categories are for you.

🛍️ FMCG & Fashion

Fast-moving consumer goods and fashion brands need to drive awareness, engagement and sales. Choose categories.

🏙️ B2B

Longer cycles, multiple stakeholders and relationship driven outcomes makes B2B search distinctive. Enter with confidence.

📰 News, Media & Publishing

Three brand new categories recognise the unique SEO challenges of news and editorial. Publishers, this is your year.

Enter More, Pay Less – The Multi-Entry Discount

Working across sectors? Running across campaign types? Considering campaign and agency categories? Submit five entries and receive one additiional entry completely free.

Early Entry Rewards the Organised

Entries are open for 2027. Submit early to lock in the best price and give yourself the maximum time to perfect your entry.

Super Early Bird £165 Deadline: 17 September 2026

Early Bird £235 Deadline: 8 October 2026

Final Deadline £285 Deadline: 22 October 2026

All entries are subject to VAT where applicable. Entries must relate to work undertaken between June 2025 and October 2026.

Built Something? The Software & Innovation Categories are Calling

And it’s not just about standalone software. The AI campaign categories on your radar should be. Best Use of AI in Search, Best Use of Search in PPC, Best Use of AI in Content, Best Use of AI for Data and Best AI Search Optimisation Campaign.

“The APAC Search Awards exist to celebrate you. But only you can decide to show up.“

Your Work Deserves Recognition

Creativity, technical depty, relentless optimisation, partnerships built between agencies and clients deserves recognition. The Search Awards are the highest benchmark for the search industry and we want the best work on our stage.

Here’s the challenge. Look at your work across the past 12 months and explore how many categories it could speak to.

The APAC Search Awards are delivered by Don’t Panic – Accredited Outstanding by the independent Awards Trust Mark.