Channel 4’s Diversity in Advertising Award 2024 challenges brands to make TV ads accessible and ‘Inclusive by Design’

25 July 2024

• 2024/25 brief encourages advertisers to shape campaigns around accessibility and inclusion
   
• Winning brand to receive over £1 million of advertising space across Channel 4’s portfolio
   
• Ninth edition of the competition since 2016 builds on previous representation themes including LGBTQIA+, neurodiversity and physical disability

Channel 4 today challenged the advertising industry to build inclusion and accessibility into all campaigns, as it launched its £1 million Diversity in Advertising Award for 2024.

This year’s brief - Inclusive by Design - encourages brands and agencies to remove the barriers faced by many people when engaging with TV advertising, by encouraging them to embed inclusive practices into their creative.

The brief is a call to arms to innovate in the craft of advertising, to make it possible for consumers in all of their diversity to fully experience brands, receive and understand communication, and to engage with brands’ products. Foregrounding inclusivity and accessibility into the production, casting and crewing of ads increases and broadens their impact with audiences.

The beauty of inclusive design lies in its core belief that designing differences doesn’t just make things better for some; it enhances the experience for everyone.

RNID research shows that 18 million people in the UK have different, diverse experiences of hearing loss and deafness, and RNIB research shows that around 340,000 people are registered blind or partially sighted. Meanwhile, Channel 4 Sales’ own research identified that if more ads use inclusive techniques, they can reach an additional 14 million people across the UK.

The Diversity in Advertising Award aligns with Channel 4’s commitment of creating change and ‘Inclusive Design’ is one of six key principles of its new  equity and inclusion strategy, Equity By Design. This initiative follows Channel 4’s announcement that all advertising around its coverage at the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games will carry subtitles.

Veriça Djurdjevic, Chief Revenue Officer at Channel 4 says: “The Diversity in Advertising Award has challenged the industry to up its game every year and played a huge role in encouraging it to be more representative of the UK. This year’s brief is a call to arms: let’s make ads inclusive by design. Already this year, Channel 4 has begun to challenge the industry on equity and inclusion by committing that all ads during our coverage of the Paris 2024 Paralympic Games will carry subtitles. We now want to go further.”

The annual Diversity in Advertising Award has so far seen brands such as FIFA, the RAF, Maltesers, and E45 create campaigns that represent and reflect the LGBTQIA+ community, women, those with visible and non-visible disabilities, and those from diverse ethnic backgrounds.

Competition entries for 2024 must be submitted by 4 pm BST on 20th September. A judging panel, made up of advertising experts from across the industry, will determine the winner and runners-up which will be announced in November, with the campaign airing on Channel 4 in 2025. The winning Diversity in Advertising Award advert must follow AdGreen guidelines provided by the Advertising Association which helps eliminate the negative environmental impacts of production.

Further details and how to enter are available here: www.diversityinadvertising.co.uk

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Notes to editors:

• Details about the award and how to enter are available here:  www.diversityinadvertising.co.uk
• Entries are welcomed from any part of the advertising industry and for ideas covering all brands that are suitable and legal to advertise across Channel 4 platforms.
• Entries can be submitted by creative agencies, media agencies or by brands direct- but all entries must come with direct endorsement of the concept from a senior figure at the brand featured.