The Cannes Creative Effectiveness Awards reward the direct correlation between creativity and business results. Warc has analysed these best in class cases to reveal trends and insights about some of the most effective campaigns in the world. We compared the shortlist and winners to all entries and uncovered the differences that make a campaign worthy of Creative Effectiveness Lion.
The study includes the 80 campaigns that are available for download by Warc.com subscribers including the Grand Prix, six winners and five shortlisted campaigns. In 2014 some trends of previous years have reversed. The dominance of television among winners has not been seen, with only 58% of the shortlist using TV compared to 83% last year. More digital-led campaigns appear to be meeting the stringent requirements of a Cannes Creative Effectiveness win.
Traditional channels, in particular outdoor, were a key feature of shortlisted campaigns – typically amplified by owned and earned social media. The report investigates the varying strategies used for outdoor media by each campaign.
For the first time Warc considered the creative strategy used by each campaign, and found that use of emotion was important. Humour and emotional engagement were hallmarks of the creative strategy for shortlisted campaigns. And storytelling was also linked to effectiveness, used by 50% of shortlisted campaigns.
Measurement was significant. Overall, the shortlist measured more aspects of their campaigns than all entries, with on average 5 reported metrics versus 4 for all entries. The shortlist also over-indexed for awareness and "brand specific measures".
For Warc's full analysis, download the report: Cannes Creative Effectiveness Lions: An analysis of entries to the 2014 awards.
Warc subscribers can search for more articles on creative effectiveness and media type in the Warc Index.
