NEW YORK: Nike, Dove and AT&T were among the big winners at the 2012 Jay Chiat Awards for Strategic Excellence, held last night.

The annual competition, run by advertising industry body the 4A's, seek to recognise "brilliant strategic thinking" across ten categories, ranging from social media to research innovation.

Some 12 Golds, 15 Silvers and 20 Bronzes were given out at the event. The judges represented agency networks such as Leo Burnett, BBH and JWT, and clients like Coca-Cola and Allstate. Warc subscribers can view selected winning entries and additional analysis here.

Nike+ FuelBand, a wristband allowing runners to track their physical activity and energy expenditure, and share this information online, led the field with Golds in three categories.

Launched by Nike and its agency, R/GA, this latest iteration of the sportwear giant's Nike+ platform - which boasts a community of more than 6m users worldwide - received top honours for its interactive design, new product/content idea and creative technology.

Dove, Unilever's beauty brand, received Gold for the latest instalment of its Campaign for Real Beauty, on this occasion looking at weight loss products and plastic surgery, and generating 253m free media impressions.

The London office of Ogilvy & Mather was the lead agency behind this initiative, which also carried off Silvers in the creative technology and good strategy contests, and a bronze for brand experience.

AT&T, the telecoms provider, scooped a Gold in the good strategy discipline for its attempts to reduce the amount of young people sending text messages when driving.

A ten-minute documentary, backed by PR and ads, achieved 1m views in three weeks, and saw 93,000 members of the target audience pledge not to engage in this activity. BBDO New York was the main agency involved.

Nature Valley, General Mills' cereal bar line, also claimed a Gold thanks to a tie-up with the Preserve the Parks Foundation, a not-for-profit group, to digitally recreate walks in America's national parks.

McCann New York was the agency that helped develop this idea, which was honoured in the creative technology category.

Also taking Gold was "Small Business Saturday" from American Express, seeking to drive traffic to small US retailers with TV, newspaper, radio and web ads. Some 103m shoppers ultimately took part, and public awareness of the event reached 65%.

Mindshare was the media agency working on this scheme, which attained this prize in the category for media and communications strategy.

Data sourced from Warc