A (B2B) Tale of Two Cannes

With Cannes gone by and time to reflect, I’m left with a particular perspective: there is an opportunity right now to reconcile B2B’s somewhat split personality.?

Before going there, though, let me start here: From brand to demand and back again, marketing is becoming more important in more ways to B2B and B2C/B2B enterprises than it ever has been.?

Specific sectors from life sciences to logistics, cybersecurity to clean energy, fintech to advanced manufacturing, will only become more important over time. They will become more and more important because they in fact are indispensable.?

These dynamics were on full display at Cannes: an unbreakable replacement for glass; a sustainable vegan replacement for leather; a very cool e-commerce opportunity in support of Black businesses. I’m an entirely biased B2B guy from way back, but I’m telling you flat out: B2B is where it is at. It’s why I believe this post – rather, the topic the post surfaces – is so important.

As everyone by now knows, the Creative B2B Lions launched at this year’s Cannes festival – a genuinely big moment in the development of B2B. What many may not know is that another set of awards was given at Cannes as well – the WARC Awards for Effectiveness.?

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I am in the unique position of having been the only person in the B2B juries for both awards competitions. Now here’s the interesting thing: only one Lions winner – Spotify by FCB New York for “A Song for Every CMO” (Gold for Targeting & Engagement) was also a winner in the WARC Effectiveness Awards (Silver).?

?No other entries in the WARC awards even shortlisted for the B2B Lions. And none in the Lions shortlisted for WARC.?

The simple explanation for this is that the awards criteria are different for each award. Lions ask for results, but not to the same extent as WARC. The situation is reversed for WARC; it places greater emphasis on results – and with greater rigor around the results.

First off: Well done, Spotify! Brilliantly creative work that was highly effective. One of the only reasons Spotify did not win Lions Gold is that some of the most important results could only be inferred; there wasn’t a straight line between the campaign and revenue growth, only a correlation.

But back to my “Tale of Two Cannes.” Creatively focused awards with less emphasis on effectiveness. That’s Cannes. Effectiveness-focused awards with less emphasis on creativity. That’s WARC.?

My question is, does this further expose the brand vs. demand chasm in B2B? The short-term results vs. long-term brand-building chasm? This is all worth industry debate and discussion. But for me, the big takeaway here is that “Creativity” and “Effectiveness” have to become synonymous for B2B marketing and marketers (and agencies and media and tech platforms) to fully realize our potential for growth.

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Can we make the case to CFOs and CEOs and CROs that better creativity in B2B matters by drawing that straight line to meaningful impact and effectiveness? Conversely, does effectiveness fall short of what might be achieved had higher-order creativity been present, driven by commitment and infused with craft? The better we as a profession can understand and answer these questions, the greater progress we will make as growth drivers.

Yet, we clearly need to know more. We need to build on the good work done to date by Binet Fields, Ehrenberg-Bass, WARC, The B2B institute and others to make the best possible business case to our C-peers. We need to build on Cannes and its catalytic effect. We need to stop thinking about creativity and effectiveness as different things. The two need to be one: creative effectiveness. That’s what unlocks growth for B2B, our brands and our profession.?