The past year has once again seen some innovative and creative advertising work from the world’s most celebrated brands. So which have captivated our attention?

When it comes to this year’s top marketing initiatives, many of the best have featured video at the core. The medium has continued to explode, and nowhere has this been truer than on Facebook, where auto-play videos ruled NewsFeed. It seems crazy to imagine that only this year for instance, the “Tasty”-style video format was catapulted centre stage, and for its rapid evolution, this has got to be some of the best marketing material of 2016. The phenomenon, ignited by BuzzFeed Video, features short cooking tutorial videos for an array of dishes, and such was the channel’s success that the format was quickly copied by a host of similar brands and digital influencers. Now with over 77 million Facebook page likes, BuzzFeed certainly deserves credit for creating one of this year’s top marketing sensations.

We’ve praised this project on numerous occasions, but Under Armour’s “Rule Yourself” Olympics campaign deserves recognition once again for being one of the best this year. Centred around swimmer Michael Phelps, the brand’s video campaign emphasises the power of practice and persistence when it comes to sporting greatness. We like the fact that Under Armour have not been overly-promotional, only subtly referencing the brand- and in the meantime, cleverly aligning Under Armour with success, prowess, and achievement. Continuing with video, we can’t fail to note Google’s recent video campaign, “Year in Search 2016”, which displays a montage of the most searched-for news stories of the past year. It reminds the viewer of Google’s key position as the starting point for content discovery, and the role it plays in allowing us to understand global affairs. Simultaneously, the video compilation is incredibly poignant and emotive; each news item comes together towards a final climax centred on one of this year’s most relevant themes- the love/hate divide. The video ends with the tagline, “Love is out there”, hopefully providing a positive ray of hope for 2017.

When it comes to multimedia, one of our favourite integrated marketing campaigns this year came from Heineken New Zealand, whose hilarious piece only solidified our reasons to drink more beer! The video and outdoor initiative, “Brewtroleum”, revealed how the brand claim they can aid global sustainability by using beer production to produce high octane biofuel. The result was a multimedia campaign which also scooped the prestigious Cannes Lions Outdoor Grand Prix. Saving the planet by drinking beer- we can’t think of a more compelling marketing message than that!

And one of the best examples of outdoor marketing was also created by Spotify, who created a number of adverts featuring examples of their listener’s habits. For instance, the brand made fun of a user who played the Justin Bieber song “Sorry” 42 times on Valentine’s Day, saying, “What did you do?” Each message featured a similar humorous example, and these were displayed on various billboards across 14 of Spotify’s markets. The result was some great reading for passers-by, and was a clever way for the brand to tap into and deftly present the large amount of user data they hold.

There are of course many other campaigns we loved this year, from the likes of Coca-Cola, to Samsung, to Nike, and more. But we’d love to know which marketing initiatives or campaigns you’ve admired this year? Do you think we’ll see similar storytelling trends carrying over into the New Year? We’d love to hear your thoughts, so please tweet to us @PracticeDigital and share your comments on our Facebook page.