Microsoft will be this year’s Cannes Lions’ official innovation technology partner, which will see its technology intertwined throughout the festival.
Ahead of the festival beginning next week, Frank Holland, corporate vice president of advertising and online business at Microsoft exclusively spoke to The Drum about the evolution of the technology industry and what Microsoft has planned for the future.
In his only interview with a UK publication ahead of Cannes Lions, Holland said explained his belief that the holy grail of advertising is reaching people in the right way, at the right time, at home, work, and play.
“Technology is changing our industry – from delivering consumer insights that inform brilliant creative advertising, to supporting seamless multimedia campaigns at scale.” It is because of this belief that Microsoft has become technology partner of the festival.
“Cannes Lions is one of the most important events on the creative industry’s calendar, and gives us a chance to show a global audience what we’re all about. We also want to showcase how Microsoft’s devices and services help people make the most of every moment,” he states.
“For those fortunate and successful individuals that win a Cannes Lions award, it can change their entire career, opening up opportunities that would never have existed otherwise. For an agency, the event can catapult them into the spotlight and attract lucrative new business opportunities.”
There is no doubt that technology – and Microsoft with it – has changed over the past years. Having spent over 15 years at Microsoft, Holland comments on the changes he has seen over the past decade and a half.“Look at it this way – when I joined the company many moons ago our core product offering was Windows 95, and the first Xbox was still two years away. Skype didn’t exist, Hotmail was in its infancy and Microsoft was very much still a software company. Suffice to say, a lot has changed since then.”This change comes through innovation, which Holland believes is “of the utmost importance”, adding: “Our industry doesn’t respect tradition – it only respects innovation. It’s only through ground-breaking innovation and by building opportunities for our clients and agencies that we will thrive. “Driven by changing social habits and technological advances, audiences have become increasingly fragmented and advertisers have had to quickly adapt to fit the way modern consumers live their lives in order to stay relevant and keep people engaged.”The World Cup is a perfect example of this, he claims. Previously, there were only three options if you wanted to be part of the event: you could travel to the country where it was being played at, watch it on TV or listen to it on the radio.
“Today we can still do all of those things, but we can also stream it on our PC or tablet, get live updates and clips on our smartphone or watch the whole game at a more convenient time using a host of video-on-demand services. As advertisers, we must be able to tell a compelling story across all of these screens; understanding people’s behaviours and intent to reach them in that ‘moment’ that really matters to them. I think that’s where the most important innovations are happening right now.”Holland’s remarks come as research from IAB finds that 58 per cent of UK football fans are likely to use their smartphone to follow coverage of the football tournament. But people will not just be using their smartphones, Holland believes, as he discusses the growth of second screening.“The ‘second screen’ is definitely changing the way brands approach digital advertising. Our global ‘Meet the Screens’ study showed people are using different screens at different times during the day; one for work, one for surfing, one for communicating. This represents a huge opportunity for brands to multiply their engagement with a target audience and feed different messages for different products across different devices at different moments in the day, achieving new heights of relevance.”He references the Transport for London ‘Kill Your Speed, Not Your Mates’ campaign which recently turned to Xbox 360 as part of its promotion.
This is something that Microsoft will continue to embrace in the coming months: “We want to continue challenging brands to augment experiences, integrating offline with online to create interactive, immersive stories. We work closely with brands and agencies from the earliest possible stage in the creative process, helping to build bespoke solutions from the ground up. “As I’ve mentioned, our multi-screen solution will be a big focus for us and is something we’re really excited to see more brands taking advantage of. We’ll also continue to develop the best possible experiences across the breadth of services we offer with Windows 8, Xbox, Skype, MSN and more.”As part of its innovation technology partnership with Cannes, the shortlist display area will be transformed into a fully interactive digital experience powered by Microsoft’s technology for eight different award categories.
