The Trick & Treat of Tangibility

Day Three: Learn by Example

Tweet of the day:

The Carling Black Label Cup increased their Facebook following by 450%. What a successful campaign. #CannesLions #NewhouseIDSM

— Adelyn Biedenbach (@adelynlee) June 17, 2013

The above campaign shows how an event crowd sourced and united people for a cause. A tangible event made it all realistic and meaningful, and the tangible event in turn increased social. Translating on and offline not only underscores a message but allows to be part of the lives of the brand and the customers.

A NEW DEFINITION OF MEDIA: Anywhere Peoples & Ideas Meet.

Cheil Worldwide’s seminar titled “Every company is a media company” featured examples of organization’s campaigns that crossed lines and created change for their products and community. Often taking the digital and connecting it with the real world, the inspiring campaigns here paved the path for all the award winners that I later got to watch at the first night of the Cannes Lions awards.  I attended five seminars and one workshop today and again saw a lot of repeat themes. Today spread my awareness to a number of global agencies and some outstanding campaigns. Watching ones I’d never seen before as well as enjoying some I’d already studied, today was certainly a case study style of day.

FAME SPOTTING: Jack Black made an appearance at the conference today. Luckily, we were second row to get an up close and personal peak at his new show Ghost Ghirls. (Yeah, also Dave Grohl might play the drums in it. So there’s that) But this show will be exclusively distributed online and part of the conversation today went to all of the positives this allows.  For example, other networks may turn down a show or never have an opportunity to air it. Online allows for a totally different style, not to mention direct feedback and metrics from the audience. A deal also granted Yahoo exclusive online distributive rights to show old SNL episodes and skits, positioning itself as an online comedy location.

The #NewhouseIDSM gang got some attention today too! Featured in the Lions Daily News, our group discussed goals and what we were most looking forward to getting out of the festival.

SU featured in Lions Daily News

Recurring Themes

1.  Narratives, story telling: I heard this first yesterday repeated by Gloria Steinem and others. Many speakers have suggested that the human mind thinks in narrative, and even more today suggested ways to utilize this. BBDO Worldwide suggested three historical figures, who all contribute to what would be ideal story telling and agency makeup. Quoting Ernest Hemingway on the need to listen, Michelangelo and Dickens for his outstanding characters, this seminar showed the need for honest, structured communications no matter what the initiative.

2. Taking the online, offline. What I’ve been noticing in all of the examples is that these two locations benefit each other. Great online content, when taken offline can lead to even greater loyalty. In turn, this offline can drive greater traffic back to the online.

3. Making a change not just in the brand, but the community. A number of the award winners made real change in their communities. Saving lives, effecting legislation, even changing the mind of a nation. Although difficult to execute, payoffs for creation like this can be ongoing and rewarding in so many ways.

Adelyn in Workshopland

My favorite part of today was a workshop with Yonathan Dominitz of Mindscapes. I walked out of this workshop having synthesized what was similar in campaigns and working with a group of other delegates briefly to devise a plan for a sample product. Having just sat through other seminars, the opportunity to converse and participate was refreshing. I spoke with some delegates from Amsterdam, Tokyo and Sao Paulo and our four-country approach created, I feel, a unique and well rounded proposal. Even if it was just a few minutes of brainstorming, we discussed concepts I won’t forget.

The main idea of the workshop was to identify patterns and transform them into thinking tools. We talked about three tools, derived from previous Lion winners and creative campaigns:

• FIGHT FOR A CAUSE: Instead of focusing a campaign on the brand—create a cause. Include a call to action,
• SABOTAGE/REMOVAL: instead of adding something, take existing and add. But this suggests let’s take existing system and sabotage it—remove norms and thus provoke.
• RELOCATION: suggests to take one part of the system and to relocated it somewhere else. Several different worlds: product, media, POS, event, users, etc. challenges us to break the system and to divide. Combining the digital world with the real world: more possibilities.

Culture- Looking forward to China Day at Cannes

A bonus side of awesome that has come with this entire festival is the immersion into other cultures and the ubiquitous array of different languages. When we first got off the plane, Nomi Foster, Sarah Roche and I took a nap on the shores of Cannes. I fell asleep hearing at least four different languages and throughout the week have been exposed to and greeted in many more. Ciao, Bonjour, Guten Tag, etc. I love all of the flavor, background and mindsets of the folks at the festival. All of this being said, I’m excited to attend some events surrounding China Day at Cannes tomorrow.

Specifically I’m looking forward to this event and hearing some different perspectives: How To Reap The Benefits of 1.35 Billion Chinese Consumers

China is one of the most complicated and mysterious markets on the earth. Consumers in China are therefore also complicated and mysterious, not least because their modern consumptive lives are still governed by many traditional or indeed ancient values.

Here’s a cool interactive game I had the opportunity to take a peek (well almost reach a peek) at today:

But #Honestly

Day 2: Honesty in strategy

Tweet of the Day:

With zero budget, world toilet day trended 5th worldwide, just after the release of (4th) HP & deathly hallows #CannesLions #NewhouseIDSM

— Adelyn Biedenbach (@adelynlee) June 16, 2013

Although today got off to a rough start (slept through my alarm!) it did not disappoint in seminars and experience. I was parked in the Grand Audi room at the festival from about 9:30 am to about 3 p.m. hearing from filmmakers, celebrities such as Martha Stewart, Nick Cannon, and Scary Spice and creator of the Obama hope posters: Shepard Fairey.

#NewhouseIDSM made a serious appearance on the festival word cloud today:

#NewhouseIDSM showing up to the game!

After the seminars we took a short train tour of Cannes, seeing the new town developments and swanky city life that is so legendary and heard about in pop culture. After popping into a networking event on the beach, our Syracuse University group went to dinner at a Lebanese Restaurant and polished off the night with some creme’ brule gelatto. Its funny how I’m not usually a fan of such things but when in Rome.. or Cannes. I mean France is across the water from Italy?

But the most interesting part of today came from the celeb insight in social strategy and also the theme of honesty throughout film making, social communications and art.

Check out my storify of the speakers: http://storify.com/adelynlee/honesty-is-the-best-policy

Celebrities & Social Strategy

Like any brand, a celebrity’s name and identity need to be strategically communicated, planned and carefully executed. From the platform used to the type of content shared, any business or branded individual has decisions to make in order to become and remain successful. The second session that I saw at the Cannes Lions conference today edged into this discussion as well as the role digital and social play in fame.

From the beginning digital and social media have the ability to go viral or even to do the opposite and only reach the necessary audience. This can change the way an individual even rises to celebrity status. But once there, digital and social open up a number of opportunities for direct fan interaction and increased exposure. Nick Cannon, one of the panelists, mentioned that his wife Mariah Carey and him noticed sufficiently less paparazzi in their lives as opposed to other celebrities after releasing dembabies.com. In sharing their own photos of their personal life, they have control over what is released. This can create and maintain their image and also decreases the need for spying or shame tactics to get close ups. This way even if there is some negative publicity or a less flattering photo, magazines and fan blogs no longer have the impact or authority when a celebrity can easily tweet, post or share for themselves.

A generational change of approach was also seen through from the three panelists. Martha Stewart is a media giant with a huge following. She mentioned strict rules which she follows on social. She often only allots herself about five minutes a day and follows family rules, never sharing photos of her kids’ faces. She strays away from political speech and tends to keep a lot of her personal life out it. In contrast, Nick Cannon and Mel B (Melanie Brown) both agreed that they are much more open. Their motivations are fun and hoping to engage with the fans by showing genuine moments and thoughts in their everyday lives.

However, there were two things that all three celebrities agreed with–both of which I enthusiastically agree with. The first is that celebrities are better off running their own accounts. Having a team running the social with the celebrity hands off may allow for a more created and consistent atmosphere but it is missing the actual connection. It is almost returning to the days of old when celebrities seemed out of reach. Digital and social have the capability to change that. Also when a team is running account, it does not show the actual personality of the celebrity–still a fictional or forced type of communications. The second is that honesty is the best policy. Nick Cannon advised to never delete a tweet. “Once it is out there, it is out there,” he said and Mel B agreed that honest communication and trying to not go back and delete are better. Martha Stewart also put weight into authenticity and honesty in social communications. Those two conclusions were good for me to hear because while stars are building brands and maintaining images, how long can fake ones really last? Isn’t it that much better to gain fans who agree with an honest representation allowing them to get close and feel even more loyalty?

Honestly, Just mention it.

Three of the other sessions I was fortunate enough to see today both mentioned honesty and the importance of example. Jack Sim, aka Mr. Toilet, is the creator of World Toilet Day: an initiative that aims to bring toilets and clean hygiene habits to parts of the world where contamination is ending mass amounts of lives.  Shedding light on a taboo subject, Mr. Sim said that if you don’t mention it, you can’t change it.

In the afternoon, we heard the inspiring story of the Makers project. With insight from the accomplished Gloria Steinem, Makers shows the story of women globally sharing powerful examples and spreading pride in what it is to take part in female empowerment. Steinem mentioned two things about truth. She said: “if you can’t see it, you can’t be it.” And also mentioned a pin that she owned which reads: “The truth will set you free, but first it will piss you off.”

Thirdly, a session on covering the Paralympics in London 2012 depicted how integrity and honesty to humor and the identities of the disabled athletes allowed for successful storytelling and sold out events. A sobering commercial depicting the super-humans who compete in the games with a risky middle featuring accidents and uneasy images painted a complete picture and grabbed the attention of the British population and the world. This honesty to what the games were and the humor allowed in the broadcast to match the personalities created honest coverage and led to an amazingly successful Olympic year.

So with the surprisingly recurring theme of honesty in media, in strategy, in coverage and even honesty  to one’s own goals in identity, film making and more today’s experience in Cannes taught me a lot about how to approach media.

ALSO: Companies & logos spotted around Cannes

Spotify!

Yahoo!