Cannes Lions 2024: What to expect from the world’s biggest festival celebrating creativity

New Delhi: Barely a few days away, the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity is sparking conversations in industry circles about what the bigshots of advertising will present this year. 

Confluence of AI and creativity

Hundreds of future-oriented discussions sprawled across multiple avenues will take centre stage, and AI will surely be the buzzword that steers future-gazing sessions. Sharply focusing on the agenda, conversations around AI have been integrated into every facet of the festival.

Talks about AI still being in its infancy stage and experimental solutions around it have transformed into discussions about how to best implement practical, real-world applications to achieve better business outcomes. 

Inclusion and sustainability 

A notable change to bear in mind at the 2024 festival is the introduction of an option for award candidates in which they can choose to share their responses to sustainability and DEI questions with the jury. Aimed to promote transparency and encourage agencies that have made progress in these areas with their creative communication strategies. 

Furthermore, sustainability will be a more prominent theme at the festival. Agencies such as Ad Net Zero will be levelling up their festival presence to focus discussions on reducing the advertising industry's carbon footprint, suggesting a renewed focus on incorporating inclusive and sustainable elements into the creative processes.

Focus on content creation and content-driven marketing

In store for content creators is also Cannes Lions’ two-day creator pass programme, which includes a full day of creator-centric content, recognising the creator economy as a rapidly growing part of the marketing mix. The spotlight will be on content creators with the launch of the first edition of Lions Creators. 
 
To add to that, the festival’s team has announced that it will recognise Mattel’s Chairman and CEO, Ynon Kreiz, as Entertainment Person of the Year in recognition of the role that entertainment plays in the marketing and communications landscape.

To reflect the current landscape, some new categories have been added to the mix while others have been dropped. Below is a summary of the changes made to the awards for 2024:

Introducing the Luxury & Lifestyle Lions: Introduced this year, this Lion recognises and celebrates the most impactful creative work, experiences, and creative business solutions for the luxury sector.

The Mobile Lion is retired. There will still be places for mobile-first creativity across the Lions instead of a standalone Lion. 
Expanded Innovation Lions: Considering the ever-changing landscape of creative solutions to the world’s most pressing challenges and opportunities, the expansion includes spaces for environmental, societal, and financial innovation.

Restructured Audio and Radio Lions: As technology continues to advance, audio content has gained prominence across diverse platforms, breaking free from its traditional radio roots. To reflect this shift in focus, we’ve changed the name from “Radio & Audio Lions” to “Audio & Radio Lions.”.

The social and influencer lions are broadened: The categories have been expanded within the Social & Influencer Lions to better recognise and celebrate the pivotal role that content creators play in shaping and amplifying brand messages.

LIONS Creators: A curated learning and networking experience for the creator economy, highlighting the growing influence of content creators.

The PR Lions are refreshed: The PR Lions have been refreshed to ensure the award accurately reflects the current PR industry and celebrates work that delivers a brand message, changes behaviour or engages customers at scale.

A dedicated place for humour: We’ve introduced the ‘Use of Humour’ category to the Cultural and Context sections that sit across many of the Lions to celebrate the art of humour in branded communications.
The cultural context question is now compulsory: Last year, we introduced a question about cultural context to help jurors better understand the nuances of the work. The jury found it so valuable that this year, we’re making it a compulsory element in every entry.

A new AI disclaimer is introduced: The compulsory question asks entrants to disclose whether AI was used in the work and, if so, how to help the jury judge the work fairly, with the full picture.

A melting pot of ideas and inspiration, driving the future of creative marketing, the above pointers indicate that the Cannes Lions 2024 will be a landmark event, celebrating creativity, inclusivity, and innovation while setting new benchmarks for the industry.