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In a sense, it was yet another Cannes Lions that I am glad I did not miss. The Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival has operated like Madonna, reinventing itself every year for the last 57 years. And it had a surprise for everyone in store too, when for the 58th year, the organisers are changing the name of the festival. Every year, there is someone new to talk to and new things to learn – I wonder, when does the learning stop and boredom begins. Hasn’t happened in my case yet, though I was warned five years back that it would happen.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 28, 2010 8:41 AM
Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival 2010 saw P&G’s CEO and President, Bob McDonald, talk on the new growth drivers at P&G, where the shift is to touch and improve a billion more lives in the year ahead. McDonald also informed that technology was at the centre of everything for the company – whether it was moving away from bench laboratory prototyping to staff promotions.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 28, 2010 8:38 AM
With zero shortlists in Titanium & Integrated and Film Craft Lions, India’s last fighting category was Film Lions, and Ogilvy & Mather India has won a Silver Lion Campaign for Breakthrough. With this, the final metal tally for India is 17 Lions. Last year, Indian agencies had won a total of 25 Lions.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 27, 2010 8:39 AM
Cannes Lions is making a statement on where the festival is headed. Festival Chairman Terry Savage pointed out an announcement from the Festival calling the 2011 festival - Cannes Lions 58th Festival of Creativity. This is not just a change in name but a reflection of the changes in the festival that has included domains beyond advertising - PR, Media, Design to name a few. Savage also informed that the Festival would be including Effectiveness Awards, for now called, Cannes Effectiveness Awards.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 26, 2010 8:39 PM
Film Craft Lions was introduced this year in order to honour craft of the filmmaking process – the direction, copywriting or editing, or the skilful use of music or sound design. India had sent 29 pieces of work in the debut year of the category, however, none has made it to the shortlist.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 26, 2010 8:47 AM
The Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival has announced the shortlists for the Titanium & Integrated Lions. In what would prove to be an extremely disappointing development for India, no Indian entry has made it to the shortlist. Indian agencies had sent four pieces of work this year in comparison to the 11 sent last year. The only other category where India did not manage even a shortlist so far was Cyber Lions.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 26, 2010 8:46 AM
Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival 2010 may have had its share of weak sessions this year, but the Cannes Debate has been one of the best so far, and clearly one of the best sessions of the festival. The conversations between Sir Martin Sorrell, CEO, WPP, and Keith Weed, CMO, Unilever, discussed many concerns of the industry. The best part was the tough questions, coupled with candid answers.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 26, 2010 8:41 AM
After over a year of conversations, Mediabrands has finally announced its digital plans in India. Making the announcement, Michael Roth, Chairman and CEO, Interpublic Group said, “This is exciting for us since India is one of our key markets from an IPG perspective. This adds to our presence in the market, and more importantly marks our digital plans in India. This reinforces our commitment in India.”
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 25, 2010 9:05 AM
Of the 58 entries sent from India in Films Lions, only five have made it to the shortlist. Ogilvy & Mather has two for Breakthrough Trust, titled ‘Software Engineer’ and ‘Bus Driver’ making one broad entry. Ogilvy has one more standalone entry for Fevicol, titled ‘Moustache’. Creativeland Asia has two pieces of work ‘Tummy’ and ‘Waterhose’, making one broad entry, for Parle Agro.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 25, 2010 9:04 AM
The Integrated shortlist is not out yet, but the conversations all around have been on Aman ki Asha. The work done by TapRoot for The Times of India was received extremely well at a session, but has so far not picked anything in any of the categories. Integrated Lions is where Camp India’s hopes are pinned now.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 25, 2010 9:03 AM
Of the various trends seen at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival 2010, one of the prominent conversations was how well India’s youngest creative independents have done at the festival. From being Jury Member to speaking on the Cannes stage, which has been rare for India, to winning metals, agencies like TapRoot and Creativeland Asia have made a mark on the festival.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 25, 2010 9:00 AM
Mediabrands is finally in India, and the route that it has taken is its digital asset Reprise. Reprise is the formalisation of an existing relation between Lodestar UM and Interactive Avenues. The two entities have been working together for the last 18 months. Some details changed, which includes a change in the 51:49 percentage shareholding pattern, Reprise is finally operative in India. But more importantly, Mediabrands is operative in India now.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 25, 2010 8:58 AM
The fifth day of the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival 2010 saw Marc Pritchard, Global Marketing and Brand Building Officer, P&G, address the audience on the challenge of shifting from marketing to serving consumers. exchange4media caught up with Pritchard and Sumeet Vohra, Marketing Director, P&G India, on various issues relating to agency relations, marketing and what it meant for clients to be at Cannes Lions.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 25, 2010 8:54 AM
The agency business model has been seeing changes for many years now, but the core of the model has not been impacted much. According to the R/GA team, it was time to rethink the agency model, and give another boost to the creative industry.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 24, 2010 9:02 AM
Microsoft is one of the key players in its space, but it knows there are areas where it has to catch up with the competition. There are times when it plays the underdog, when it plays the overdog, and when it just plays the game marketers play. Mich Mathews, Senior VP, Central Marketing Group, Microsoft, spoke on some of the advantages of being the underdog and also acting the overdog.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 24, 2010 9:01 AM
Design Lions is soon becoming a good category for India. India has won two Design Lions – Publicis has won a Gold Lion Campaign for the work done for Publicis Communications, while Ogilvy has won a Bronze Lion for the work done for Department of Posts. Jury Member Elsie Nanji, Managing Partner, Red Lion, stated that the work from India was good, and going forward, the effort should be to pay attention to all aspects of an entry.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 24, 2010 8:56 AM
The Press Lions jury called it the ‘return of writing’. The Press Lions results indicated that it was a good year for the category. India got two Golds – the first from the Festival so far, and four more metals, including two Silvers and two Bronzes. The Golds were awarded to RMG (from the JWT family) and TapRoot India. There were 12 Golds in all awarded in the category.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 24, 2010 8:55 AM
The Times of India party at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival 2010 saw the Indian team celebrating 16 Lions. This was coupled with some discussions on what the Films and Integrated Lions categories would bring for India. Last year, the metal tally was double this by this time, but given the way the festival began, the 16 number too is looking good.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 24, 2010 8:54 AM
This year was a tough one for Media Lions. There were lesser number of awards handed out, and India managed to get only one Bronze Lion – a considerable fall from the eight Lions last year. India media agencies did not get even a single award. Ravi Kiran, CEO, Starcom MediaVest Group, South Asia, who was also a member of the Media Lions 2010 jury, explained what Indian entries expected when they put overloud ‘Kaminey’ track, or Sardarji jokes in the media entry presentation.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 4:45 PM
The shortlists for Cyber Lions and Design Lions were announced on June 22, 2010, the third day of the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival 2010. There are no Indian entries in the Cyber Lions shortlist. Seven pieces of work have made it to the Design Lions shortlist.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 9:27 AM
So far, India has won one Silver PR Lion, two Silver Outdoor Lions, two Bronze Outdoor Lions, one Bronze Promo Lion, one Bronze Radio Lion, one Bronze Media Lion. By this time last year, India had over 20 metals in its pocket. The results of Media Lions have been most disappointing for Camp India. However, as they say, the meetings, party-ings and Gutter bar-ings continue.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 9:21 AM
After four years of holding the wildfire ideas together with Leo Burnett at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, this year, Contagious partnered with the Publicis Groupe for a session on ‘Contagious Conversations’. With Publicis Worldwide’s COO Richard Pinder and Contagious Communication’s Paul Kemp-Robertson leading the conversation, the four-point mantra that emerged was that brands should Ignite, Own, Confront and Subvert conversations.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 9:19 AM
In a session at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival, Malcolm Hunter, Chief Strategy Officer, Aegis Media, pointed out that consumers were more interested in brands today than ever before. They were engaging with brands at different levels. But this was not to say that they were interested in the brand’s advertising, and one way of looking at the new age conversations with consumers was by starting in a different place.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 9:18 AM
Leaving the comfort of a big agency, and taking the big leap towards creative entrepreneurship is a challenge across markets. In a session that heard from these creative entrepreneurs of various markets, India was represented by TapRoot India’s Agnello Dias, who shared the examples of TransAsia Paper and Aman ki Asha. After Piyush Pandey, Agnello Dias is the only other speaker from India who spoke at the Cannes Lions stage.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 9:14 AM
The second day of Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival began with one Silver Lion in the Radio category. The winning agency is Leo Burnett India for the work done for Bajaj Electricals. Jury member Manohar Nayak, Managing Director, Lingo India, said that India should not be happy with the performance and asked, “Why are we seeing only English entries? The only deviation that comes is Hindi ads – what about Tamil, Bengali, Marathi – where is the local work?"
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 9:13 AM
It was yet another year when creative agencies won the awards battle against media agencies in the Media Lions category. Unlike last year, when media agencies had managed to make a mark in the Media Lions category, this year, the majority of awards were dominated by creative agencies. The case was no different in India. Leo Burnett won the single award given to India in the category – a Bronze Lion for its work done for Tide. At the overall level, Ravi Kiran, CEO, Starcom Mediavest Group, SMG, says that the work has to improve.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 23, 2010 9:11 AM
In an age when precise targeting is the conversation that is expected to become the order of the day, marketers experiment with various mediums to gauge what works best for their brief. Renault had a similar situation at hand when it wanted to launch its electric cars. The product itself, the expected queries, and the elusive young target audience led Renault and its partner agencies like OMD to work together with Electronic Arts to develop games for the marketing of the electric cars. According to market observers, this is just one of the reasons why gaming is set to be a key medium of the future.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 22, 2010 11:40 AM
It is not often that you see creative professionals from India speaking on the stage of the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival. Ogilvy India’s Piyush Pandey has done it in the past, but 2010 is also special because Pandey made his presence felt on the stage once again, and the Indian camp is all geared to attend TapRoot India’s Agnello Dias’ session on June 22, 2010. Pandey explained that voicing views from the Indian creative industry on an international stage was important.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 22, 2010 11:38 AM
A few more faces from the Indian contingent at the Cannes Lions International Advertising Festival were seen on Day Two. No show at Direct Lions has disappointed many, but there are high hopes from Media and Design categories before attention moves to the bigger categories like Press and Outdoor. However, a Silver and a Bronze kept Camp India smiling. However, some bit of angst was seen from advertisers on the number of ‘scam ads’.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 22, 2010 9:26 AM
India has six entries shortlisted in Media Lions. The agencies are Leo Burnett, Grey Worldwide, McCann Worldgroup, Creativeland Asia and two entries from MediaCom. There are six pieces of work shortlisted in Radio, across five broad entries. Publicis and Leo Burnett each have two pieces of works shortlisted. JWT India and Bates 141 have an entry each shortlisted in Radio.
Noor Fathima Warsia Jun 22, 2010 9:21 AM
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