This year Promo has two agency executives sharing their thoughts each day from the Cannes International Advertising Festival.

This is the second year that the festival will give Cannes Lions awards for promotions.

We share an insider’s view with daily postings from Tom Hansen, executive creative director at Wunderman and the only U.S. judge on the Promo Lions jury this year.

We’ll also hear from Tina Manikas, Draftfcb’s chief global retail and promotions marketing officer, as she works the conference and talks with promotion experts from around the world to shape her perspective on global promotional trends.

Cannes has been ramping up all week exposing a wide mix of creative talent and showmanship, some juicy bits of global insight with a peppering of company self promotion here and there. The festival culminates with the Film Lions and Titanium (innovation and integration) Lions on Saturday, the last day of the Festival.

Cyber Lion award winning work was really more interesting last year. Grand Prix winners range from (as predicted) Nike Plus to Unilever's Dove "Evolution." With agency creatives dominating the audience, nice to see clients from both Nike, Unilever and Frito-Lay take the stage to share insight on how taking measured risk to involve consumers like never before is paying off.

I spoke with judges from the Promo Lions last night and they revealed their struggle to come up with a core global definition from which to judge the work. As this category builds and more agencies get involved in future, won't this debate continue? For me, the idea is the heart of promotion but the ability to motivate a change in behavior now or at a specific time across channels drives its soul.

Also, note to the festival: Please move merchandising and P-O-P category under Promo. Please? Great P-O-P should not be judged with same criteria as a billboard. Au revoir.

-- Tina Manikas, Draftfcb

Well surprise, the buzz at Cannes bodes well for forward-thinking believers in holistic promotion and the power of the idea. Advertising's finest today are talking about higher consumer involvement and experiences. The rise of the mobile screen from "third screen to first screen," cyber or Web 2.0 (as it's being hailed), and wildfire brands that highly involve the consumer, were the debate today at the festival. From a different angle, shopper marketing and controlling meaning inside the store became a sold-out workshop.

The discussion has taken a turn to a less fluffy place. Think twice if you think consumer-generated content for your brand on YouTube makes you cutting-edge. Take a look at Doritos' media win for "Crash the Superbowl." The reality is that having a true understanding and putting to use the many ways consumers now consume information is key to future success.

One of the key facts from Nokia today is that it took the industry 20 years to sell the first billion mobile devices globally and just 2 years to sell the next billion. And a revealing new study from Jeffrey Cole at USC confirms that 12- to 24-year-olds never read a newspaper, may never wear a watch because they are using their mobile, are less interested in TV, and e-mail is what their parents use.

The creative industry has been selective in judging itself this year. Awards in traditional areas last night like radio, outdoor and print went to work that is not just creative but more innovative and involving. Campaigns that are cause-related and that tackle bigger social issues have helped brands break through and develop stronger consumer bonds. Take the billboard from NetBank in South Africa that gave "power" to the people. It was the first to be solar-powered. It fueled a school and wove its way right into consumers' hearts. Or the Earth Hour 60 program that motivated 2.2 million Sydney residents and 60 corporations to turn off their lights for one hour in response to global warming.

Strategic alliances were also a spotlight in delivering this higher brand engagement. Take Nike Plus, an alliance between Nike and Apple that allows you, via your shoes and iPod, to log the number of miles that you walk or run and compete online. This higher defined engagement is true at retail as well. Retailers focused on controlling the experience and building more meaning inside their store are gaining in brand loyalty and in many cases surpassing loyalty to individual brands on the shelf. Shout out to Jim Lucas on a great presentation.

-- Tina Manikas, Draftfcb

We have completed our task as a jury: 21 Lions awarded to 19 campaigns. Our aggressive work on Day Four paid off, as we aired all of our arguments during the shortlist section, creating some consensus as we moved to the Lions today. (The Direct jury, for instance, was at it until after midnight Sunday arguing the merits of the shortlisted work. The Promo jury was on the beach by 5.)

The awarded work covers a variety of executions, proving once again that it’s the IDEA that is essential. There are complex viral campaigns and simple promotional stunts.

The Grand Prix winner, “Bonded by Blood,” is essentially a free poster with purchase. But the core idea, mixing the actual blood from each of the All-Black rugby players into the ink on the posters, comes right from the DNA of the sport, and makes the idea a perfect combination of sponsorship and execution for adidas.

“First Impression” is an elegantly simple idea: have street teams suction-cup the Mercedes logo onto competing luxury cars with a tag inviting them to drive a Mercedes.

And “Soul Bar,” a viral email and video posting claiming that a wealthy guy lost a bet, and has left his platinum credit card at the bar enabling single girls to get a free glass of French champagne just by asking for it, predictably spread through the web and media, creating a sexily simple sampling campaign.

All of the winning work shares another characteristic: the agencies convinced their clients to do them. How many of us have pitched original, aggressive ideas that got watered down and “committeed” into a nice, gray, safe compromise we barely recognize? The winning ideas somehow kept their individuality AND found a client to embrace and pay for them. No easy task.

My favorite shortlisted idea didn’t even win an award, but was a brilliant thought boldly executed: show the sugar-like taste of an artificial sweetener by squirting it into the shape of an ice cream bar on a poster, then encasing it with hundreds of live ants under glass. The ants followed the ouline of the bar when they consumed the artificial sweetener, creating a weird live product demonstration you couldn’t take your eyes off of. The jury couldn’t agree, however, whether it was a legitimate promotion or a great outdoor poster. It took 2/3rds of the jury to award something, and after repeated attempts, the poster never got more than a handful of “yes” votes. (I think many jurors suspected a scam. The writeup was scant, with no results, and all the posters were photographed hanging on the same tree. Which underscores my contention that presentation of your entry means everything. Especially with a multicultural jury.)

Other entries lost because they didn’t promote the brand enough. Many were considered to be repeats of ideas people had seen before. The Cannes Lions committee spent a lot of time calling agencies and searching online to confirm the jury’s suspicions of repurposed work.

All but one of the winning campaigns had a compelling support video as part of the entry. The only one that didn’t was a simple Nike shoe box with a sound chip and stadium imprint inside of it. They sent the actual box, and no discussion was necessary.

The rest of the campaigns had great visual support shot by the agencies to dramatize the impact of their work. Not just media clips, but custom-shot video to document and explain every aspect of the entry. That’s important to note as you develop your work this year. Shoot everything. They all had good music, too. That’s especially important to the jury when you’re hearing the stupid thing for the fifth time.

Now the bad news, at least for U.S. agencies. Only 6 U.S. entries made the shortlist, compared to 23 for Germany alone! The Netherlands had 5 on the list. The Netherlands! Have you seen the size of the Netherlands? And the list of winners is dominated by general agencies: TBWA, Publicis, BBDO, Leo Burnett, JWT, Ogilvy, Dentsu, Y&R.; You have to dig deep to find a traditional “promotion agency” on the list. God bless integration. There is no “above” or “below” the line. There is no line. Now it’s big ideas placed wherever they make the most sense.

If you’re a promotion agency, and don’t have strong digital, media and PR capabilities, it’s been nice knowing you. Entries in every category this year focus on original content, placed in non-traditional media. The general agencies are finally willing to roll up their sleeves and push a branding idea until it touches the consumer. That’s really refreshing.

The press conference this morning was typical: journalists from each country asking why their country didn’t win more awards. It’s very parochial, and important to note that the competition here isn’t necessarily between agencies. It’s between countries who’ve entered the work.

There is much cocktail discussion about the success Australia and New Zealand are having across categories. The conversation isn’t about the specific agencies; it’s about the country, the culture and national pride.

In the U.S. the opposite is true: I’m not proud for my country when my competitor wins an award. I’m pissed. I don’t care where they’re from. As a jury member, you have to keep that in mind, so you understand the motives of a judge who is promoting or denigrating specific campaigns.

Make sure you check out the Cannes Web site to look at the winners. You’ll notice a lot of work entered and winning in multiple categories. That’s another example of the cross-pollination of ideas. We all have license to be brilliant in every medium, despite whatever it says on your business card.

-- Tom Hansen, Wunderman

How refreshing to stop and celebrate creativity. In promotion and shopper marketing, we continually focus on results and driving action, and sometimes we forget to see that we need lightning to create that thunder.

The power of promotional marketing ideas was in the spotlight last night in Cannes as the Promo Lions and Direct Lions were awarded in front of a packed house. An international Promo jury headed by the dynamic Geraldo Rocha Azevedo of Neogama BBH in Brazil did a great job ensuring the best work was honored.

The audience was inspired by gutsy, break-through promotional work from the most unexpected areas of the world. Take the Promo Lion Grand Prix winner from New Zealand. In a promotion called “Bonded by Blood” for Adidas and the New Zealand Rugby Union, TBWA\WHYBIN leveraged the All Blacks rugby team in promoting Adidas shirts. The team players took part in a blood donor event in which their team blood/DNA was combined in vials and embedded into the promotional merchandising posters. The celebrity blood donation and cause was captured and made available online. The program helped achieve an emotional level and a parallel bonding with consumers, providing a higher reason for action than ever before. The coveted, innovative posters are being traded on eBay now, and sales of shirts went up 24%.

Agencies outside the U.S., even those that would be considered “mainline” in the U.S., are ahead of the curve in operating through the line or creating actionable experiences. It’s not about just persuading people anymore but it is about going out and persuading consumers in the environments where they are most receptive – and not always in traditional ways. Applause also goes to Spain, South Africa and the U.S. for a great showing in direct marketing.

Congrats to all the winners, especially my own Draftfcb colleagues in Israel, Zurich and South Africa.

-- Tina Manikas, Draftfcb

Imagine spring break but with agency people from around the world.

Another summer has just kicked off the 54th annual International Advertising Festival in the south of France. The streets of Cannes are teeming with a record-breaking 11,000 creative talents of all shapes and sizes.

There is much to take in at this coveted festival completely devoted to celebrating creativity. Award entries on display from around the world total 25,000+ with greatest numbers from the U.S., Germany and Brazil.

Touring the entries on display, one gets a sense of both “wow” and “hmmm.” What does not change is that the best-of-the-best has been gathered from all parts of the world. Recognizing that creativity is about the idea, the Festival has broadened focus to more disciplines and channels. How gratifying it was last year to be part of the team influencing the inclusion of Promotion as a major category. Those with a passion for promo and retail would empathize with the struggle to get this key part of the marketing mix on an equal playing field.

One can already see the result of this expanded arena for creativity. Major, fully attended seminars and "who’s who" events are being hosted more and more by diverse agencies including digital, direct, promotional and media. Whether they come to covet great work, pray for awards, grab some cosmopolitan sun, or rub shoulders with talented creative leaders, attending delegates exude a pent-up desire for nuggets of creative wisdom, new approaches and trends that will inspire their creative juices.

Though broad and thin so far, Day 1 and 2 seminars included the expected focus on convergence, digital innovation, marketing to averse targets and a creative look at media. One example is Sprite’s inventive "Sprite The Yard” program—an interactive platform on your mobile device that delivers social networking functionality. Stay tuned for more tomorrow.

-- Tina Manikas, Draftfcb

The shortlist. Oh, the shortlist.  The judging process here is well organized and precise.  Each jury member has an iPac—a handheld device that presents each entry in order, processing rating screens for strategy, creative, execution and results.  We rate each category from 1-9.  1-3 means no shortlist for you.  4-6, maybe.  7-9, a definite shortlist entry.  It’s a click and go process, basically, for hundreds and hundreds of entries.  By the end of the 3-day preliminary process, each entry has a cumulative numeric score. 

The problem is, not all work is clear-cut.  An entry that is superior strategically but average creatively may get just enough 4’s or 5’s from the jury to sneak onto the shortlist.  There’s a natural tendency for jury members to keep questionable work in play until later, to see how it compares to other work, or to have detailed discussion about it.  The weak work gets broomed immediately.  And the superior work gets 8’s or 9’s from everyone and finds a home on top of the shortlist.  The work that is almost great, or work written in a dense foreign language that seems good but is hard to penetrate, winds up in significant numbers on the bottom of the shortlist.  That’s what we faced on Saturday.

Our assignment was to rank each of the 190 shortlisted entries in one of three areas:  “not a winner,”  “possibly a winner,” or “definitely a winner,” again using a 1-9 numeric range.  It was immediately apparent, however, that the jury disagreed with at least a third of the shortlisted entries.  Even more significant, many countries participate in a global ranking system that assigns points for making shortlists and winning trophies.  So the weaker of the shortlisted work stood a chance of earning its agencies both notoriety and currency, a fact that outraged several of the European judges.  We couldn’t rank the shortlisted entries if we didn’t even agree on the list itself.

So we changed the rules.  We spent 9 hours discussing and ranking the shortlisted entries, creating a sublist of questionable work.  Our president then petitioned the Lions committee to rewrite the software at the end of the day, allowing us to review all the questionable work and assign it one of two rankings:  “stays on the shortlist,” or “not a shortlist entry.”  And so it went into the evening, as we argued, campaigned and influenced each other in an attempt to recognize only the very best of the promotion category. 

Predictably, the software crashed, since we were revising it on the fly.  We resorted to folded up bits of paper with the words “yes” or “no” on them at one point.  Then we ran out of paper.  Mind you, we weren’t discussing which entries would be awarded on Sunday.  This was just to identify what made the shortlist.  After nearly 13 hours (and long after my dinner reservation with USA Today expired) we had 107 entries on the shortlist, and more importantly, a connection among the jurors, having analyzed and debated every aspect of the work. 

The process works.  It’s objective and interactive, with 19 jury members of mixed gender, race, culture and attitude challenging each other to honor work that makes us proud.

The committee warned me when I accepted the Jury position that the process would be exhausting.  It has been.  The process of focusing on and measuring so much work, with so much at stake, every day, is tiring.  And, because we’re in the south of France, every evening requires examination and measurement of the multiple wines and gourmet specialties of the region.  Until, say, 2 a.m.  Which only adds to the depletion of energy.

(I finally caught up to my dinner mates at about 10:30.  They had slowly consumed 5 bottles of wine waiting for me.  I had a lot of catching up to do . . . .)

-- Tom Hansen, Wunderman

It rained here this morning.  Perfect for lying in bed, watching old, black and white French movies with a strong espresso and even stronger Gitanes.  Unless, of course, you’re judging the third day of the Promo competition, the final chance to determine what makes the shortlist.  (I couldn’t find any movies on TV anyway.  Just overwrought soap operas, the monotonous drone of CNN, and soccer.  Lots and lots of soccer.)  We were challenged again today with a wide range of work, exhibiting a broad level of creativity. The work that stood out today was a result of the agency taking a chance, challenging convention or, at least, pushing back on their client.  Five-second TV spots.  Real-time production.  SMS-controlled content.  And, continuing the trend, user-generated content that is either hilarious or obtuse, rarely in between. 

A hilarious price promotion spot we saw today used street people as ambassadors for the products.  These “spokespeople” included a homeless guy and an epileptic.  And a lunatic voiceover.  We also saw hamsters, rabbits and squirrels fronting products, with varied success.  It’s refreshing to see so much television being used to support promotion ideas.  I guess it means that the agencies that control the media are now getting more involved in the activation.  That’s good for the brands.  And probably bad for the agencies who don’t buy TV, or know somebody who does. 

We also saw long-format content developed by the agencies and placed as TV programming, feature films and, in one case, an entire radio station’s content for 72 hours.  With the fall-off in effectiveness of typical spot buys, smart brands and their agencies are working with networks, local stations and websites to create the editorial themselves, baking the brand right into the mix.  While this is being heralded as breakthrough, it’s actually a giant step back to 1930, when the advertising agencies created the radio shows, cast the talent, wrote the scripts and sold millions of cigarettes and cans of coffee without producing a single “commercial.”  Funny to see the trend take over 70 years later.

There has been much discussion about “spoof” entries.  Judges are suspicious of work entered from their markets that they haven’t seen, or that appears too out of the ordinary for a client to have paid for it.  Not that the judges blame them—we’ve all had great work left on the floor by nervous clients.  It’s just that nobody wants to award work that hasn’t actually gone through the process of development, sell-in, production and placement.  So there’s constant peer-to-peer vigilance to embrace the great stuff that somehow saw the light of day.

We also saw the most aggressive video support of the festival—an on-camera offer by the art director to sleep with a judge in exchange for a Lion.  Yesterday I said you had to keep the videos concise and direct, right?  It doesn’t get much more direct than that!  (It remains to be seen if she gets her Lion.)

Once again, entries without video support suffered, regardless of the category.  Digital work, for instance, relying on URLs to persuade the jury, saw broken links and bad aspect ratios harm their chances.  The best entries had a voiceover take us through the experience, a trend that will continue next year.  Only a third of the promotion entries had video support last year, compared to almost two-thirds this year.  In many cases, the presentation board is given only a cursory glance, since the write-ups are given to each judge to review along with the video.  It’s that important.

The most entertaining work we’re seeing is coming from places like Australia, Japan, Brazil and Korea.  Generally, their brands aren’t afraid to have fun and generate buzz, even if some of it is negative.  The U.S. work, on the other hand, has been well-executed and smart, but not particularly surprising or funny.  That doesn’t mean entertaining will win, but it IS a creative festival.  And we’re trying to show the world how amazing great promotion can be.  There is a lot of it on tomorrow’s shortlist.  Now we get to identify which ones really raised the bar.  We can award as many or as few of the Lions as we deem worthy, regardless of categories or number of entries.

No more monkeys today.  Unless you consider the aging rock stars we saw today (The Ramones, The Stones, Spinal Tap) to be primates.  More tomorrow.

From the Jury Room

Here’s what happened in Jury Room C at the Palais on La Croisette in Cannes: Finally the great work we were hoping for.  In fact, I’d have to say the bar was raised today.  Some of the work stood out significantly, shaming the mediocre work by comparison.  There’s a definite energy in the room when great work is well presented.  And there was a common thread, too.  All the good work possessed a clear idea.  One simple thought.  A premise, carried out through all the customer touchpoints simply and aggressively.  I’ve said for years that there are no new ideas, just different ways of expressing what we already know works.  And some of the obvious work we reviewed today—gifts with purchase, poster giveaways, sweepstakes awarding cars and cash—were rendered with a fresh voice, captivating design and one simple message integrated through all the media.

We saw new tactics that will definitely be here for a while.  So-called viral video surreptitiously posted on You Tube was presented as a “unique” tactic in more than two-thirds of the 100 campaigns we reviewed today.  “Pop-up” stores and events.  User-generated content.  And fictional characters created by the agency to be comical ambassadors for the brand popped up at least a dozen times.  There were also dolls, manga, soccer (a lot of soccer), texting, Myspace postings, more puppies, sexy girls and clowns appearing in more than one promotion.

After two 8-hour days reviewing more than 200 campaigns (and a full day tomorrow, too) I can tell you this:  Your “optional” video support is the single most important part of your entry.  And although the rules allow for 5 minutes (we suffered through one that was 12 minutes this morning), the best presentations are around 3 minutes long.  They include voiceover.  They present the problem quickly, in the beginning, and choose the best creative elements to tell the story.  The jury was actually deflated when confronted with only a presentation board.  Those entries were at a disadvantage immediately.  Know this about your boards: Less is More. Don’t reverse type on black.  And find three lines of copy that explain why the entry should be considered the best work in the world.  We spent most of the day trying to figure that out on your behalf.  And that didn’t make us happy!

By the way, your work is being reviewed by some of the most talented and diverse creative directors in the world.  The promotion jury includes men and women from Argentina, Australia, Austria, Brazil, Canada, China, France, Germany, India, Japan, Russia, Singapore, South Africa, Spain, Sweden, the Netherlands, the U.K. and the U.S.  That’s significant because the DNA of this process includes discussion.  It’s not a solitary process.  We view work in small groups (6 today) and together are trying to identify the most distinctive work regardless of origin.  I used to have a bias that some of the work was pre-judged, or at least that certain agencies were better positioned than others.  That’s not true.  The only identification on the entries is client and country.  There’s no built-in bias. It’s the ideas that distinguish the work.

By the way, the 3rd entry we saw today, at 8:45 in the morning, featured monkeys.  Stuffed monkeys.  At least until next year, the streak continues.  Tomorrow’s the final day of ranking.  Then we spend the weekend arguing over the shortlist.

From the Jury Room

Bonsoir.  I am writing this from inside Promo Jury Room C, at the Palais in Cannes, having just reviewed some 60 promotion entries from what seems like 60 different countries.  And so concludes Day One.  So far the trip has been distinguished by a 2-hour delay in NY, a 2-day trip to Atlanta by my luggage, and a 2-hour lunch waiting for a hotel room to open up.  (OK, that part wasn’t bad.) 

I was hoping to find a common theme or insight shared by the work —at least the good work—but there is none.  The objectives are varied, as are the measurements.  The creative content includes the usual TV spots reformatted for alternative media (not really promotion), and the expected print ads repurposed as posters (again, not really promotion).  That sparked a lot of discussion, as we tried to find common denominators to define truly great promotional ideas and campaigns.  Many of the objectives focused on “awareness” or “creating excitement,” which, not surprisingly, carried favorable results describing “satisfied clients” and “expectations met.”  We were not impressed.

The unique thing about the Cannes process is all of this is up for discussion.  The large juries are split into small groups for 3 days.  Each day features a portion of the overall entries, with each entry reviewed and considered by the group before the jurors assign numerical rankings.  That means no work is overlooked, and every included element is examined and considered.  It also means the best written, best-designed entries stand the best chance of distinguishing themselves.  Let’s be honest—after the first 3 hours, and countless mediocre submissions, the jurors are anxious to see great work.  Not to mention glazed over.  There are a record number of entries across the categories this year.  The entries with video summaries absolutely stand out.  And among them, the most concise, best-shot and directed videos (including the right music) promote the submissions far better than any written submission could ever do.  This doesn’t mean you need TV.  It means you need to flex your creative muscles to persuade the jury.

And watch your spelling.  The misspelled words we saw today didn’t eliminate the entries, but it was distracting.  We’re trying to honor the best creative work in the world, and it makes us nervous when the headlines have mistakes. 

Come to think of it, I guess there WAS a common theme in the work we saw today:  monkeys.  There were none.  We saw horses, pink elephants, circus acts, puppies, alligators, bunnies, and the world’s ugliest and smallest people.  But this may be the first year ever without monkeys.  Stay tuned . . .