AI talk returns to Cannes — but marketers want practicality over pontification

AI buzzwords and jargon, like digital twinning and anomaly detection, have saturated Cannes Lions and other industry conferences for the last two or three years. But agency execs say this year, they’re expecting more practicality and less hot air. Now, the focus is on how AI can improve marketing business ROI, whether that be creative automation, audience targeting or scale. Execs say they’re looking for data integrations to understand how AI can be paired with agency and brand client data, and efficiency outputs that’ll allow marketers to do more with less, from tech partners and AI platforms. 

“Getting clear on what adding a tech partner will do in terms of efficiency is key so we can also make the right business decisions as we continue to grow,” said Freddy Dabaghi, chief transformation officer at full-service agency Crispin, in an email to Digiday. 

At this year’s Cannes festival, Evan Horowitz, ceo and founder of agency Movers+Shakers, expects to discuss the industry’s hot button issues, including DEI and its place in messaging, how brands are communicating their values and — of course — use cases for AI.

Horowitz said his clients are operating on both ends of the AI spectrum these days, from those who are being most conservative and asking his team to not use AI given its risks, to those who want to run as efficiently as possible and actively ask for AI to be part of the workflow.

But, it’s important to keep in mind what consumers might want — especially as AI-generated content fills more and more feeds, he said.

“Pretty soon AI will be so ubiquitous that it will flip consumer sentiment,” Horowitz said. “We need to keep our eye on the pulse of that so that we’re moving in the right way to keep with consumer sentiment.”

Meanwhile, platform announcements from the likes of Meta and Google seem to have upped the ante in the AI arms race. Last month, Google rolled out Google AI mode, a new feature within Google Search that effectively replaces the traditional search engine results page with one more liken to an AI chatbot. Earlier this week, Meta flicked at plans to fully automate ad creation using AI, per The Wall Street Journal. 

If last year’s Cannes was about navigating a flurry of AI-powered offerings for everything from automation to content creation, this year’s Cannes is expected to answer questions around scale and incrementality. 

“This year, I’m hoping the practical AI use case in your business year [is the topic] vs. the pontificating of we’re all going to live on Mars and AI is just going to take everybody’s job,” VaynerMedia’s Miaritis said. 

All said, expect Cannes Lions 2025 to be AI-saturated for better or worse. 

—Sara Jerde contributed to this report.