It’s mere days until the ad industry decamps to the south of France. Cannes Lions is a time to celebrate world-class creativity – but it’s also when the industry’s titans come together to compare notes on the topics keeping them awake at night. For CMOs and marketing leaders, Cannes not just about picking up trophies, it’s also a chance to find answers to some of those burning questions.
Here’s what I think will be the hot topics, from the Palais to the sun-drenched rooftop terraces:
How to gracefully navigate disruption and uncertainty
Lots of marketers will be heading to Cannes looking for inspiration for how to communicate during times of disruption. Ongoing tariff tussles and stock market volatility are creating an uncertain environment – one where marketing budgets are under ever more scrutiny. And a potential global recession may cause consumers to rethink their usual purchase decisions. How are brands responding to the permacrisis – and will any of the Lions winners show how to connect with consumers who are stressed and distracted by rising prices and political upheaval?
Key session: InBev Changing the game: building brands in the age of experiences
How can I make sure my brand stays connected with cultural moments?
Creator content is growing rapidly – accounting for more and more share of marketing budgets. Group M estimates that digital marketing spend will grow 10% over the course of 2025. How can I embed my brand in the conversations people are already having, through music, sports, or borrowing attention by jumping on viral hype moments and contemporary culture?
Key session: DuoLingo Playbook for building a beloved social-first brand
How do we pick up the pieces of a fragmented media?
Fragmented audiences and channels mean that ideas need to stick like velcro – connecting with across a media landscape fuelled by creators and micro formats. How do brands maximise creative connectivity, where each asset performs strongly individually, and together with other assets in the campaign?
Key session: Heineken Connected ideas: New brand-building rules in the creator economy
Putting brand back at the top of the agenda
At this point the evidence is clear that brand building is essential to long-term growth. But how do CMOs keep a focus on it when budgets are under threat, and the industry is hooked on the immediacy of performance marketing? How do we address the challenges of securing budget and executing brand building campaigns in a world where marketers are working at an ever-faster pace to deliver growth?
Key session: WARC, Zespri and DDB Hong Kong How do we move fast and build brands?
How is AI enabling creativity? (again!)
The topic of AI and its role in creativity isn’t going away. It has been a mainstay of Cannes conversations for a couple of years, but is evolving quickly. How will it play out in 2025, when ChatGPT is one of the world’s best-known brands, and nearly 70% of the Fortune 500 now use Microsoft Copilot? This year, expect CMOs to be going beyond Gen AI ads, and having conversations about how it’s shaping organisational design and the end-to-end creative process.
Key session: Apple Human after all
And of course, there will be the LIONS-winning campaigns announced throughout the week, giving us a drumbeat of news and fuelling conversation. At Kantar, we recently released our list of the most effective ads of the year, so we will be watching with interest to see how these top performing ads resonate with an expert jury.
Vera Sidlova is global creative thought leadership director, Kantar
