Like a kid in a candy store, I enjoyed today to the max, walking around in full “sensory overload” mode during my first day ever at Cannes. The people, the great work, the old colleagues from all parts of the world, the lovely, unapologetic Frenchi-ness of Cannes (even when filled with thousands of foreigners), the excitement of the awards show, the lovely weather…I mean, what can I say. Awesome. A great time. And this considering it wasn’t a late night because everyone, including me, was pretty tired from the flight yesterday!
Some of the cool work I saw:
Awards news:
- Tonight, shortlists were awarded for many categories, and the awards ceremony was for Direct/Promo/PR
- This is a personal blog so I don’t talk much about work…but I’m very proud – we submitted one entry for Coca-Cola in the Out of Home category…and we got into the shortlist! This is a big honor, especially since we’re coming in to learn and be inspired…this is just…a cherry on top. Of course, now that we made the shortlist, it would be really nice to bring some “metal” back to Shanghai…please send good vibes:) Awards are tomorrow.
- Big winners tonight that come to mind are some past Ads of the Day – in my mind the one that was unanimously admired was The Return of Ben Ali, by Memac Ogilvy. Just great stuff.
Lessons learned:
- Good work rises to the top, more than ever in this age of internet, blogs, etc. It’s just hard for really good work to not get seen and spread around. This is, more than ever, an argument in favor of creativity as a strategy for gaining awareness!
- If you pay attention to the Ads of the Day…you’re pretty well caught up on a lot of the best work out there. Many (most?) of them will take home prizes!
- Some of the speakers were simply not as good as I would expect for an event of this caliber. More to come on this later but, really, if you’re not ready to deliver on this stage, I don’t know when you will ever be. Some of the highlights from today were Deutsch LA on controlling agency turnover, and Kraft on new ways of getting good work from agencies.
Party happenings:
Empty page. Went out to dinner after the awards with a group of clients and colleagues, and then took a taxi back, I’m writing this at midnight. So pretty civilized, which is good because tomorrow we have an early-ish start.
More to come tomorrow. If yo’re interested, follow the action at #CannesLions, or on my twitter feed on the left. And send some good vibes for CokeHands!
Martin
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