Cannes Comedown: The Drum's review of Cannes Lions 2015
The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity has long since been advertising’s biggest, brashest and most important awards show with thousands of advertisers, agencies and production houses flocking to the French Riviera to celebrate the work and drinks gallons of rose.
Yet for everyone who attends – and remembers – the festival, hundreds more can only watch from afar. Which is where The Drum comes in. In association with Workfront, we brought together some of the industry’s leading creative lights at Cannes Comedown, The Drum’s inaugural review of Cannes, held the week after the festival at Shoreditch’s Hoxton Pony.
David “Shingy” Shing, AOL’s digital prophet, shared his Cannes highlights – how disruption matters more now than ever – and what the work shows about the state and direction of the industry today. Later a panel dissected the things you really need to know about Cannes 2015. Technology, creativity, judging and the glass ceiling were all under the spotlight. Was this the year technology took over the festival?
Disruption equals innovation
Shing, attempting to cram “six hours of content” in to 20 minutes, started by telling attendees in the packed east London bar to remember that disruption is not just about technology – but the business itself.
“Businesses that are prepared to be disruptive are where we will find innovation,” he said, citing Airbnb, Uber, Kickstarter and R/GA – an agency he says reinvents itself every nine months.
He said that the work that mattered this year was from clients and agencies which understood how the world was changing; that the so-called ‘me generation’ was, in fact, a ‘we generation’.
“Peer to peer is becoming more important – they love social for good, not evil,” said Shing, adding that they felt an added surge of insecurity.
Little wonder then he said, that the winning work included Procter & Gamble’s “Like a Girl” viral smash, Under Armour’s “I Will What I Want” starring supermodel Gisele and Snickers Australia’s “Hungry Builders”.
Such work demonstrates that today’s youth are more in step with their grandparents’ values than those of their parents, though the expression may differ.
Another piece of stand-out work is that of Google, whose “Cardboard” brought home the Mobile Grand Prix. He pointed out that for the second time in a row the ultimate mobile winner was that of an experience that wrapped around the medium, rather than an app.
“Creativity starts with inquiry. It used to be big ads, little content. Now it’s little ads and big content.”
He says winning work demonstrated that people do still “give a shit about brands” but they want to be advertised to differently. “It’s not just craft, it’s platforms and performances.”
That human connection was also evident in the Innovation Grand Prix winner What3Words – a universal postcode that maps every inch of the world with its own three words, giving anyone, anywhere an address. “It talks about human connection more than anything I have ever seen.”
Other stand-out “moments to movements” work highlighted by Shing included: Bald Cartoons, giving hope to children with cancer; Apple’s “Shot on iPhone 6” and everyday hacks such as “DHL is Faster”.
One of his favourite winners from the event, however, was Geico’s “Unskippable”, which picked up the Film Grand Prix. The pre-roll ad demonstrated the power of video and showed how technology, content and distribution were the “three primary colours” of marketing.
Shing’s Cannes masterclass was followed by a lively panel debate featuring Ogilvy & Mather CCO Gerry Human; Dan Machen, head of innovation at HeyHuman; Astrid van Essen, MD of digital production house Mediamonks; Ana Balarin, ECD, Mother; and Sarah Wood, managing director of Unruly Group, chaired by The Drum’s Justin Pearse.
Diversity drives the agenda
Diversity – in all its forms - was the number one hot topic, not least because of the introduction of the Glass Lion at this year’s Cannes Lion.
Said Wood: “This is an important year to be talking about diversity. It’s important we focus not just on gender but same sex, ethnicity – it’s a great moment to have this conversation.”
Balarin added that the themes of diversity and equality had led to some of the festival’s best work and was more prevalent than ever before. “It almost feels that brands see this as a must, that everybody should do this,” she added.
For Machen, Cannes 2015 was the year that showed that what advertisers do has grown beyond mere marketing to something that has real cultural impact. An example, he said, was Sport England’s “This Girl Can” campaign, which “knocked it out of the ballpark”.
It showed in the judging, too, said Human, who sat on the Outdoor panel, though there was no predetermination to make it so. “The ideas that break through are original… The brands being recognised are those who are making a difference in the world.”
Is technology taking over Cannes?
Van Essen concurred with Wood that technology was a big talking point of this year’s Cannes that could, unchecked, threaten the celebration of creativity. She hoped, that for all the “dominance” of technology at the festival this year that in 2016 “we see how these two can merge and do really interesting stuff”.
For all the talk of technology Machen believes that successful work has “human” at its heart. “The algorithm of magic is where Cannes will go. Technology will disappear in the background.”
Another shared concern among the panel was Cannes’ ever-increasing list of categories, with some, such as branded content, by their very nature ill-defined – no surprises that in several categories few golds and no Grands Prix were handed out.
For most, though, the real celebration of Cannes lies outside the Palais itself: the opportunity to connect and reconnect with practioners and partners and chew the industry fat. Some welcomed the influx of celebrity influence over the past few years; others bemoan the Kardashiasion of the festival.
No matter. Cannes will remain advertising’s number one melting pot for some time yet. As Balarin said: “I can’t imagine life without Cannes.”