AI reckoning for world's ad industry at Cannes Lions

As clients demand personalised messaging in a rapidly changing market, AI tools can create ad solutions quickly. Now, the ad industry is consumed about the future of creativity

Walking along the Promenade de la Croisette during Cannes Lions 2024, one could be forgiven for thinking that a global technology conference was underway. The billboards along the Croisette boasted of an impressive presence of technology companies. And the stages among a cluster of white tents on the beach were awash with chatter on technology. 

The debate was: Is technology killing creativity in advertising and marketing or strengthening it?

This question has shaken the industry to the core. Cannes Lions has a 70-year-old history of being the creative industry’s annual celebration of excellence. Gathered at the French Riviera, advertising and marketing agencies along with their client companies obsessed about the impact of technology on creativity. 

Technology has helped bring ideas to life in smart, efficient and vivid ways. Billboards with lifelike, moving 3D images are becoming popular in many markets. Design software has allowed creators to amplify human creativity with efficiency. Software tools have allowed customised campaigns with local models, languages and contexts. However, the rising use of generative artificial intelligence (GenAI ) is driving some agencies to replace creators with AI bots. 

Using GenAI, visuals for print media or videos for social media can be created in seconds and rolled out at scale. Clients are increasingly demanding that advertising agencies use technology for a faster response to quick-changing market impulses. Global consumer brands feel that the best way to match the changing demands of a social media-influenced consumer is to offer highly personalised messaging. AI can deliver such solutions much faster than human creators, they feel. 

Industry leaders at Cannes Lions 2024 fretted about the prospect of designers and creators. GenAI offers rapid options with multiple derivatives almost instantly. GenAI solutions are easily available and now in the form of mobile-friendly apps. Major marketing and advertising groups like WPP, Havas; Dentsu and Publicis announced plans for tighter embrace of technology. Technology giants Adobe, Amazon, Meta, IBM and Microsoft made their presence felt at Cannes Lions 2024. AI in marketing will be an industry worth more than $100 billion by 2028, according to Statista. “AI is deeply embedded into the digital marketing landscape, and based on the latest reports, more than 80 percent of industry experts integrate some form of AI technology into their online marketing activities,” says a report by the data gathering company. “This vast adaptation of artificial intelligence for marketing purposes is no surprise considering that its benefits include task automation, campaign personalization, and data analysis.” 

AI can get insights into the efficacy of advertising spending for each campaign. Based on the feedback, it can help reallocate advertising budgets to products and markets much faster. More interestingly, AI is helping brands track the performance of the campaign of their rivals. AI can help monitor the ads of competing brands and analyse their impact on various consumer groups. 

For marketers trying to get into the mind of the consumer, AI can help create a deeper and richer profile of buyers and their demands using data about their lifestyles. Understanding consumer behaviour using data generated from the digital footprint of buyers is already helping companies create new products. AI is also helping in predicting market behaviour so that products and services providers can anticipate change. 

Most industry leaders conclude that technology will impact the industry in a deeply fundamental manner. However, the Cannes Lions participants – on the Croisette and the beach tents – felt that the industry would remain more creative and smarter than technology. While AI could churn out creatives with speed and scale, innovation and brilliance would still be the preserve of humans. Hopefully human ingenuity will remain a few steps ahead of AI.