5 things I took from Cannes Lions Festival
(without even attending)

The marketing world is currently abuzz following the Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.

Delegates from brands, tech companies and ad agencies came together on the French Riviera for five days of panels, pitches, and parties – not to mention multiple award ceremonies – celebrating creative excellence across multiple disciplines and industries.

But for those of us that didn’t attend, there’s still a lot we can take away from following the winning campaigns and wider event coverage.

Here are five things I’ve taken from Cannes, observed from a wide-angle lens, rather than up close and personal.

1. AI breakthroughs are changing the game

Unsurprisingly, AI took centre stage in conversations throughout Cannes, with generative AI starting to be seen in creative outputs across multiple award entries.

Cadbury’s ‘My Ad’ swept the stage with a Grand Prix win in ‘Creative Effectiveness’ as an early adopter of AI. Cadbury used AI and machine learning technology to replicate Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan’s face and voice to create thousands of personalised ads for small, local stores responsible for the bulk of Cadbury Celebrations sales over Diwali.

This is a great example of how AI can be used effectively to help fuel bespoke customer journeys – providing hyper-personalised experiences and locally optimised campaigns. While bigger budget campaign creatives can still be developed centrally, AI advancements can give marketers the ability to roll out more effectively within audience segments and regions – adapting content to provide local relevancy and forge better connections.

2. It’s all about the experience

AI doesn’t necessarily need to be just part of the creative output. One Grand Prix winner that caught my eye used AI as a core part of the campaign input – which I expect we’ll start to see more of as the technology develops.

HungerStation’s ‘The subconscious order’ used AI eye-tracking data over images of takeaway meals to help its users discover which meal their subconscious mind was craving. By removing the decision paralysis that often comes with takeaway orders, the tool not only solved a key customer pain point but added unique value to the app with a gamified experience.

When we consider our campaigns as B2B marketers, I like that this example shows how marketing can be part of the wider customer experience. Marketing is so much more than just advertising and as marketers, we need to apply innovative thinking with new technology to own the full customer lifecycle – considering how we can improve retention, loyalty and advocacy.

3. B2B creativity is getting started

In just its second year at Cannes, the ‘Creative B2B’ category gave us some great inspiration when it comes to progress in B2B marketing innovation.

Workday’s ‘Rockstar’ pushed the boundaries of humour and creativity – mirroring B2C tactics to be engaging and memorable, whilst still communicating its brand message.

Meanwhile, Grand Prix winner B3 (the Brazilian stock exchange) took a more emotional approach with its campaign for social good, ‘Eart4’.

To raise awareness of the dire issues facing Earth, B3 turned the planet into an IPO, and launched it on the stock exchange. B3 helped their audience truly connect by bringing the subject into their world – the campaign cleverly translated social inequality into unequal distribution of dividends and loss of biodiversity into poor asset management.

Cannes panellists praised the campaign for “illustrating the profound progression of B2B creativity” noting that with such a powerful campaign B3, “strengthened its worldwide brand reputation as a progressive force, innovator and market leader”.

4. New audiences, new formats

An interesting one for B2B marketers to watch – B2C brands are getting more creative with formats and tactics when targeting the next generation of audiences. 

Sparked by the insight that Gen Z tend to regard personalised ads as an invasion of privacy, Samsung’s ‘Flipvertising’ campaign took a different tactic – gamifying ad targeting with an online scavenger hunt – aimed to encourage this cohort to figure out how to get themselves targeted by specific ads for a chance to win a Galaxy Z Flip 4.

Elsewhere in Cannes, conversations surrounding messaging channels came to the fore. To reach new audiences it’s expected that marketing via not just WhatsApp, but also Messenger and Instagram Direct, will soon be on the cards. Voice notes in particular, are proving popular with Gen Z audiences, and Breast Cancer Now scooped a silver Lion with ‘The Chat’, the UK’s first drama series played out on a messaging app’s group chat – with episodes using voice notes, messages, videos and pictures to tell the story.

5. Where creativity and digital strategy intersect

Another key theme that steered conversations across the festival was a focus on brand building.

Several discussions highlighted the importance of brand building over more tactical campaigns, and Amplified Intelligence and System1 reported new research that highlights the ever-growing need for better collaboration between creativity and digital strategy.

Their research emphasised that without a format or channel that effectively captures and holds attention, ads cannot have an emotional impact. And without emotion, marketers will struggle to build brands for the long term.

As B2B marketing innovates and develops more emotional and human-led content, now really is the time for digital activation specialists and creatives to be collaborating closer than ever to ensure that emotive creative is given the right environment to truly shine.

Raising a glass to inspiring insights

While it may be impossible to capture the true feeling of Cannes (rosé in a British garden isn’t quite the same as rosé on the French Riviera) and glean all the nuggets of wisdom when not attending in person – taking a step back and watching from afar has its merits.

We can take learnings from the winners and the coverage of major themes without getting too caught up in the weeds. Using these insights to see what’s to come, what to start considering next, and how we can leverage new technology for better B2B marketing.

So pour yourself a vino, and I’ll leave you to enjoy LUMA partners’ Terence Kawaja’s parody video, “I’m Still Branding”, filmed straight from the Palais – you’ll feel like you’re practically there.