Feeling Good About our Top 3 Cannes Lions Champions
There is a special time of year that all advertisers look forward to. The annual Cannes Lions award ceremonies feature the best campaigns and marketing efforts. That includes 2020-2021, which was filled with unique strategies that came out of the pandemic. In-person events were rarely an option for advertisers, so they strengthened their digital presence. The pandemic also encouraged a theme of togetherness while the entire world faced one common problem. The advertisers that made waves this year were those that focused on digital communities and making positive change. We have been marking the days until Cannes Lions, so let’s not delay any longer and count down our top 3 favorite winners.
Number Three: Warner Music & Rothco’s “Saylists”
Warner Music won the Creative Data Grand Prix for their creation of “Saylists”. These Saylists are music playlists selected specifically to assist children with speech impediments. For example, if a child struggles with the sound that the letter “t” makes, there is a Saylist for them that features songs that include the letter t in quick succession. Now practicing speech is a fun activity, instead of a tedious process! It is heartwarming to see a Grand Prix winner that goes to great lengths to help people. We tip our caps to Warner Music for putting something positive out into the world.
Number Two: Burger King & the “Stevenage Challenge”
Professional sporting sponsorships are a big deal, and oh boy, they’re also extremely expensive. Companies will pay millions to sponsor big name teams in England’s Football League. These sponsors get their logo on the team uniforms (kits for those in the know) and those uniforms also appear in each year’s edition of FIFA. Burger King took a different approach and sponsored Stevenage, the lowest ranking team in the league. They followed up this act by reaching out to content creators who focus on the FIFA franchise and offering all players a test. The Stevenage Challenge: Each goal scored with the lowest ranking team in the game would win you free food at Burger King. Suddenly the world went wild; endless content poured onto the web courtesy of streamers and users alike. Suddenly the lowest ranked team in the game became the most played and one of the most recognizable. Burger King engaged an entire gaming fanbase with their brand by encouraging them to play their favorite game and get rewarded for it. It is well deserving of winning an award in both the Social & Influence category as well as the Direct category. And let’s be honest, who doesn’t love to play as the underdogs?
Number One: Reddit’s 5-second Super Bowl Ad
Our favorite Cannes Lions winner this year would have to be the online discussion platform, Reddit. Everyone laughed along with all of the clever and funny ads at the 2021 Super Bowl this year, but only one ad made them pause the game. Lasting only 5 seconds, Reddit took the internet by storm with a single ad that cost their entire marketing budget. It looked like your television short circuited as the logo came into view through a flash of static. Then audiences nationwide had hardly 3 seconds to pause their television and read the post before it flashed away. The post’s title read “Wow, this actually worked”. Social media lit up with screenshots of the post as everyone stopped to see what it said. An incredible gamble on the part of Reddit, but it paid off. If anyone talked about a Super Bowl ad the next day, it was this one. Not only that, but it was extremely effective and increased website traffic by a staggering amount, skyrocketing brand awareness. The Cannes Lions was filled with stiff competition, but this ad ran away with the touchdown with its ability to grab viewers’ attention.
What do you think of this year’s winners? Give your human opinion!
AUTHOR: Zach Dunphy
ORIGIN: Speaking Human Contributor
Follow Zach on Speaking Human / Human Content from Zach
