What gets a roomful of Australia’s top creatives to stop and pick a rival’s work? The November 2026 Campaign Brief Creative Circle has six answers, and they double as a cheat sheet for performance marketers who want attention that converts.
The league table has a clear leader
Campaign Brief’s monthly Creative Circle invites creatives from BMF, Sunday Gravy, Thinkerbell, Akcelo, Rick Barry and Droga5 ANZ to flag work made outside their own agency. This month, Special holds the top spot on 11 points, with Sunday Gravy second on 8. Bear Meets Eagle On Fire is on 6 and Droga5 ANZ on 5. Clemenger BBDO and Leo join a six-way tie on 3.
On the production side, EXIT keeps first place on 8 points, Good Oil joins Revolver on 7, and Finch climbs to 5. Collider and Publicis Production enter the table for the first time.
The standout work, and why it spread
Tom Hoskins of BMF chose RACV’s as it should be work from Special: a service promise built around common sense, captured in a simple locked-off shot. Lenna Boland of Sunday Gravy went for TAC’s The Shredmill from Clemenger BBDO and Finch: a giant road-surface treadmill that grinds motorcycle leathers to show why protective gear matters.
Garret Fitzgerald from Thinkerbell picked Leo Australia’s Bluey-branded Auslan lesson for the ABC, because a children’s anthem now teaches inclusion. Megan Egan from Akcelo admired an Uber Eats out-of-home idea from Special that hijacks partner brand imagery without words. Andrew Torrisi from Rick Barry chose Movember’s moustache-led social norming from Special and CREATIVITY&COMMERCE. Lennie Galloway of Droga5 ANZ flagged Petbarn’s Petey & Barnadette campaign from Howatson+Company as genuinely social-first.
The pattern behind the praise
These aren’t only craft picks. They share four mechanics that performance marketers can reuse:
- Product demos beat lectures. The Shredmill shows the risk physically instead of warning you about it.
- Wordless OOH stops the scroll. Uber Eats’ “ooooh” moment works because the visual does the job before the brain reads.
- Recurring characters earn organic reach. Petbarn’s Petey and Barnadette behave like influencers, with pet mannerisms and dialogue that invite people to watch all the videos.
- Borrowed culture gets a job. Bluey isn’t the message; teaching Auslan is. The beloved asset removes friction and adds meaning.
What to do about it
If you’re running Google Ads, Meta creative or a D2C launch, the Creative Circle picks point to a practical framework: demonstrate, don’t declare; make the visual carry the claim; build characters your audience can follow; and use culture as a utility, not a logo. Track creative recognition the way Campaign Brief does: points reward consistent, repeatable standout work, not a one-off viral hit.
The table also matters because creative momentum signals where fresh thinking is compounding. Special’s lead, Sunday Gravy’s climb and the first-time entries on the production side show that agencies with a repeatable creative pattern are the ones other creatives watch.
Source: Campaign Brief
