Cannes 2024 - Event Recap

Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity is the premier global event for the advertising industry. It’s been exciting to watch over the past three years as Retail Media has taken over, shifting the focus of this event. Held each year in Cannes, France, the international festival focuses on the creative side of our industry. Here are the top themes I picked up on this year.

2024 Themes

Generative AI - This was a buzzword last year, as many of us didn’t know how this would impact our industry. This year, it was on full display, with early adapters seeing massive savings in time and efficiency, allowing them to scale campaigns in ways never imagined. We are still in the early days of understanding the impact, and I expect this theme will stick around for a while. As shared in a fireside chat, the tools we have today are as bad as they will be. They will only get better, solve more problems, and be more helpful.

Creator Economy - Last year, the buzz was around GenZ and micro-influencers; this year, the creator economy was on full display, with influences walking around and sharing their tips and tricks. Amazon Ads had live shopping with John Legend and Chrissy Teigen and influencers such as Alix Earle and Mr Ballen speaking on stage. Three out of five consumers positively engage with brands recommended by creators. The next level is creating connections with your community, which leads to stronger loyalty and growth.

Speed of Culture - Brands are winning by not just tapping into creators and influencers but also tapping into cultural moments. E.L.F. BEAUTY shared how they move at the speed of culture and have developed a framework which allows them to quickly identify culturally relevant moments and create full blown campaigns in a matter of weeks. Gone are the days of briefs and months of planning. If your brand wants to stay relevant, it must say no E.L.F.ing rules and move fast.

Cookies...We Don’t Need No Cookies—As the dates continue to get pushed back, new solutions are being developed, providing various ID solutions to reduce signal loss and measure advertising effectiveness. Some of this may be confusing, but I suspect this will all take shape over the next year or two, and new standards will lead the way. The rapid pace of digital innovation continues to redefine how brands engage with consumers.

Check out a quick video recap of what I did live from Amazon Port.

Announcements

Amazon Ads released Ad Relevance, an innovative approach to determining relevant ad opportunities everywhere we serve ads. With cookies being phased out, the industry can no longer rely on a single piece of information to connect advertisers, customers, and services to deliver relevant ads. Ad Relevance is built on the understanding of what creates excellent shopping experiences and the connection those shopping experiences have with ad interactions, product and category interests, and the cadence of actions along the path to conversion. It uses the latest AI technology to analyze billions of browsing, buying, and streaming signals in conjunction with real-time information about the content being viewed to understand where customers are in their shopping journeys and serve relevant ads across devices, channels, and content types without needing third-party cookies. You can learn more about it by reading the full release or watching this podcast.

Amazon Ads shared updates around GenAI addressing significant challenges that advertisers face today. The product is now available in the asset library, allowing for easier use for any ad type, and a new update allows the AI to auto-scale ads, providing an easy way to take existing ad copy and convert it to all the necessary sizes and styles. This enhancement allows for greater flexibility and consistency in visual presentations, optimizing ad effectiveness across various channels. You can check out this feature in a video posted here.

Pacvue announced Copilot, a new advanced AI commerce tool designed to help you get the most out of Pacvue. Pacvue’s Copilot transforms how you and your team interact with the Pacvue platform, making it faster and more intuitive to access data, simplify operations, perform analytics, and improve efficiency. Through Copilot, users can extract comprehensive data, gain actionable insights, and navigate the platform efficiently, all through simple questions.

Omnicom Media Group unveils a first-of-its-kind partnership with Amazon Ads, enabling Omnicom's planning and investment teams to access Amazon’s proprietary browsing, shopping, and streaming insights to directly tie linear and CTV investment to purchases made on Amazon. Combining Omnicom's audience and viewership data, Flywheel 's product and transactional signals, and Amazon’s shopper insights will ultimately lead to more efficient and effective investment decision-making. You can learn more about the partnership in this article by DigiDay.

Amazon Live and GroupM launched a new shoppable content partnership. This first-of-its-kind partnership co-developed original, shoppable content for the recently launched Amazon Live free ad-supported streaming TV (FAST) Channel on Amazon’s premium streaming services, Prime Video and Amazon Freevee. Shoppable video offers brands meaningful opportunities to engage customers in authentic and unique ways and, in many cases, the chance to experience something new. You can learn more from this article by Adweek.

Amazon Ads Partners Highlighted at Port and Beyond

• Anastasia Leng , Jason (Jay) Richman , Samira Panah Bakhtiar , and Matthew Kemp had a panel discussion on cracking the code of generative AI in the advertising industry. This session covered the latest trends in creative measurement and how brands like Formula 1 are using AI to revolutionize how racing is done. Those in attendance were treated with an opportunity to get photos with the first GenAI-created trophy recently presented at the race in Canada.

• Danielle Waller ( PODEAN ) and Ekta Chopra ( E.L.F. BEAUTY ) joined me on stage as we discussed the “Judge Beauty” campaign that kicked off at the 2024 Super Bowl. E.L.F. used this cultural moment to tap into the female audience watching the game, who are ignored by other advertisers. What made this campaign effective was how they created a 360-degree campaign connecting the dots between the ad and the Amazon shopping experience. You can learn more about this campaign by listening to this podcast.

• Melissa Burdick ( Pacvue ), joined Jason (Jay) Richman and I as we discussed GenAI and the latest product updates from Amazon. This session focused on how these new tools are helping resource-constrained brands create in ways they haven’t been able to before. This allows them to deliver more value to their customers and a better experience for shoppers. Melissa shared how their client was able to take a 4-week process to 1 week, allowing them to quickly refresh creative, creating micro-season campaigns that are more relevant ads.

• Envision Horizons and Vacation Inc. set up a suntan lotion refueling station to highlight the debut of their STV case study. The guide provides a step-by-step plan for how brands should use STV and highlights their success with Vacation. If you are looking to expand into Streaming TV, you can check it out.
• Chad Rogers ( Lemonlight ) spoke at a Converge panel discussion. The topic discussed was video ads and culture, highlighting how Amazon Ads formats and products support advertisers in communicating their messaging authentically. Particular emphasis will be placed on video capabilities, such as Streaming TV and Sponsored TV ads.
• Laura Desmond ( Smartly ) hosted a fireside chat featuring top global creative leaders to discuss unlocking success in the new creative era powered by technology. With AI supercharging how marketers approach their jobs, embracing creative tech to power human creativity at scale is the key to succeeding across the new consumer journey. Gain insights and inspiration directly from the people shaping the future of advertising.
• Tim Sovay ( CreatorIQ ) hosted a conversation with Emily Trenouth , Head of Influencer Relations at Amazon, at the Influencer Beach by Brand Innovators, covering the topic of AI Efficiency vs. Human Connection: How AI Will (and Won't) Influence the Creator Economy.
• Duncan Painter ( Flywheel ), hosted a panel discussion with Paul Kotas ( Amazon Ads ) , and Eric Schwartz ( The Clorox Company ), discussing how every advertiser can now act as an endemic advertiser on Amazon at the Flywheel/Omnicom Cove.

Podcasts

This year at Cannes, we set up a podcast studio that is live at Amazon Port. We recorded over a dozen podcast episodes covering the conference, top news stories, the latest trends, and more. As the podcasts are released, I will share them, but this is what you can look forward to

• BTR Media and E.L.F Beauty - Driving success through a 360 approach. Destaney Wishon interviews Ekta Chopra and Jeff Cohen (Listen Now)
• Commerce Collective Podcast - The Future of Ad Relevance. Emma Irwin interview Brian Tomasette (Listen Now)
• The Digital Shelf Institute - The evolution of Amazon Ads, AI tools, Canva integration, AMC, full-funnel advertising ( Lauren Livak Gilbert Lauren Livak Gilbert interviews Jeffrey Cohen (Listen Now)
• The CPG Guys and CreativeX Inc. - Generative AI and creative effectiveness. Peter V.S. Bond Bond and Ajay Sharma interviewed Anastasia Leng
• CreatorIQ - Trends in Creative Studios - Chris Curtis interview Heather Kehrberg
• The CPG Guys and Amazon Ads - The latest in GenAI. Sri Rajagopalan and Daniel Torres Dwyer interview Jason (Jay) Richman
• Envision Horizons - Thought Leadership and Women Empowerment. Laura Meyer interviews Kim Chappell
• BTR Media and Amazon Ads - Highlights from Cannes. Destaney Wishon interviews Jeffrey Cohen
• The CPG Guys and Amazon Ads - Defining Thought Leadership, Peter V.S. Bond and Sri Rajagopalan interview Jeffrey Cohen
• Envision Horizons - The Creator Economy. Laura Meyer interviews Mae Karwowski
• CreatorIQ - The Creator Economy and Amazon Live. Chris Curtis interviews Julie Haleluk
• Envision Horizon - Vacation Sunscreen’s Full Funnel STV Campaigns. Laura Meyer and Todd M. Piechowski, MPA discuss this case study
• Retail Media Thursday ( Skai )- A discussion with Amazon Ads. Michelle Urwin puts Jeff Cohen in the hot seat.