SmartNews Awards 2021

SmartNews, Inc., which operates the SmartNews news app in Japan and the United States with the mission of "delivering quality information from around the world to those who need it," established the SmartNews Awards in 2015 to help revitalize the industry as a whole by recognizing the activities of media outlets that are responsible for the quality content on SmartNews. The SmartNews Awards were established in 2015 to help revitalize the industry as a whole by recognizing the activities of media outlets that are responsible for the high-quality content on SmartNews.
We at Equal Studio, in collaboration with Shiftbrain Inc. and Taro Yoshimura, created the communication design, visuals, and website for the SmartNews Awards 2021 campaign, now in its seventh year. The key visual, based on the motif of a road, expresses the sequence of events that occur every day, and the continuous animation expresses the ever-changing modern world. In addition to the visuals, we also reviewed the communication design to ensure that users can effectively understand the information and smoothly participate in the voting process. As a result, the number of votes cast for the Readers' Choice Awards increased 150% from the previous year, while the number of invalid votes decreased.