Review of Cannes: The three biggest Out-of-Home trends!
The advertising industry moves quickly. Just a day after the Cannes Lions concluded, the sentiment was: The festival is history. 46 Lions for German agencies – that’s quite an achievement, but now it’s back to business as usual. Nevertheless, it is worthwhile to let the campaigns, lectures, discussions, and impressions settle and, with a little distance, address the question: Which trends are truly relevant for day-to-day business, especially for Out-of-Home (OOH)? Three main developments are emerging.
Creative Effectiveness: Tempo, Zeitgeist And Humor
Numerous speakers at Cannes pointed out that the internet is being flooded with advertising, adversely affecting the overall perception. It is becoming increasingly complicated to break through with a campaign and achieve the required level of attention. The general consensus is that this is one of the future challenges of the advertising industry.
The solution could be Creative Effectiveness, responding quickly to current issues with highly creative content, text, graphics, and videos. Campaigns don’t need to be meticulously planned and perfected in every detail. It is more important to hit the zeitgeist with humor and implement the campaign with speed. This way, it is possible to maintain relevance and create surprising moments that result in significantly higher engagement.
Examples of how this can work wonderfully in OOH were demonstrated by Burger King and Pepsi. In „Whopper Heist“ (a reference to the Netflix series “Money Heist”), consumers could steal Whoppers from DOOH screens using their smartphones. They just had to hold their phones to the Burger King DOOH motif, causing the Whopper to disappear from the screen. This triggered a virtual hunt for the digital Whoppers and generated corresponding social media buzz. Pepsi, on the other hand, addressed the fact that all three major fast-food chains served Coca-Cola and engaged origami artists who sewed or folded the logos of Burger King, McDonald’s, and Wendy’s together in such a way that the typical colors of Pepsi became visible. They used these posters for an OOH campaign.
Metaverse: WiLL THIS BE THE Betterverse?
Numerous brands presented cases in the Metaverse at Cannes, and speakers pointed out the many new marketing possibilities. If a player can already buy an NFT yacht for $650,000, and new products are constantly being introduced, it is high time for agencies and companies to engage with the Metaverse, according to the unanimous thesis. Brands find new opportunities for communicative interaction there, leading some to speak of the “Betterverse.” Real estate, ships, even entire places can be acquired and marketed. Therefore, it is crucial to experiment in virtual parallel worlds now to have a certain level of experience when not only early adopters are present but also the traditional internet users.
In-Game Advertising has already shown that outdoor advertising spaces are primarily marketed in virtual games. In this regard, the Metaverse could be a great opportunity for (D)OOH. Physical campaigns could be extended into the Metaverse and enriched interactively. An example is the Miller Lite Super Bowl campaign. Miller Lite promoted its campaign in the Metaverse with a digital bar. The ability to bring the real world and the digital world closer together is also demonstrated by H&M’s campaign „The Billion Dollar Collcetion“ showing the creation of a virtual fashion collection. This approach marks the beginning of a change that could turn an entire industry towards sustainability.
SEEING AND FEELING THE Purpose
In previous years, Cannes focused primarily on the theme of Purpose, but in a rather abstract sense. This year, many campaigns that focus on fighting for a better world but also show where life in our society is improving, have won. In demand were life-affirming actions that contrast with the currently challenging times.
This is evident, for example, in the Liquid Billboards, that Adidas set up on the beach in Dubai – The World’s First Swimmable Media Space – inviting women to swim in inclusive swimwear. Or the Chillboards,
a project by the American brewery Coors Lite. They created “ads” on the roofs of houses that particularly suffer from the heat. They were painted entirely white, which had an immediate effect on the residents and significantly cooled down the houses. How did Coors Lite put it? The first outdoor advertising campaign that no one sees but everyone feels!
This once again shows that advertising and sustainability do not have to be contradictory. There are now a series of environmentally friendly advertising mediums that can be booked. At Weischer, we calculate the CO₂ emissions for each campaign and offset them through investments in climate projects. Therefore, it is possible to book carbon-neutral billboard campaigns. If Cannes has sparked some contemplation in this regard, much has already been achieved. buchen. Wenn Cannes hier zum Nachdenken angeregt hat, ist schon viel erreicht.