Our Monthly Round-up of the key pieces in Marketing for June – we’ve chosen six key articles that shape the future of marketing. If you missed any of them – have some time, they are all well worth a catchup. http://haiconsulting.com/category/views/

Our Monthly Round-up includes Ten Takeaways from the Cannes Lions Festival, which took place last month.

Here are our June highlights:-

1. Our top pick this month, it’s Rishad Tobaccowala and his flagship piece on Leadership. It’s an excellent and thought provoking read and is part of his series:- The future does not fit in the containers of the past.

Here is the link: https://rishad.substack.com/p/on-leadership

2. Secondly, we’ve picked a report issued by Deloitte’s this month on employee wellness in the corporate workplace. The Great Resignation is seeping into the corner office, the stats:- 70% of C-level executives telling Deloitte pollsters that they seriously might resign for a job that better supports their well-being. 57% of employees in the Deloitte survey said they were fed up enough to quit too.

Here is the link: https://www2.deloitte.com/us/en/insights/topics/leadership/employee-wellness-in-the-corporate-workplace.html

3. Thirdly, we’ve gone for a piece in the Mckinsey Quarterly we liked on climate change – Playing offense to create value in the net-zero transition. Now is the moment for companies to spot green growth opportunities and move boldly to take advantage.

Here is the link: https://www.mckinsey.com/business-functions/sustainability/our-insights/playing-offense-to-create-value-in-the-net-zero-transition

4. Fourthly, we’ve picked a piece from the HBR on how Marketeers can earn and keep customer trust. Christine Alemany talks through three ways:- do not overspin, avoid half truths, read the room & adjust.

Here is the link: https://hbr.org/2022/06/3-ways-marketers-can-earn-and-keep-customer-trust

5. Fifthly, we like the Digital Native substack Rex Woodbury writes, it’s an excellent blog that he adds to each week. This week he looked at the 10 characteristics that define Gen Z. Part II. And 10 startups building on them. If you’re into the Metaverse and Web 3 then he’s definitely one for you to follow.

Here is the link: https://digitalnative.substack.com/p/10-characteristics-that-define-gen-1ab?l

6. Sixthly, we’ve picked an article from the Creative Salon to have their view of Cannes. Sonoo Singh writes ‘Cannes showed that great clients want agencies to take more risks. Work that provokes visceral reactions to what is and isn’t creatively excellent can only be a good thing.’

Here is the link: https://creative.salon/articles/the-conversation/conversation-300622-cannes2

Our Cannes Lions Festival Special:

Having attended Adforum for the last 8 years, and visited Cannes on a fairly regular basis – we thought we’d give you our snapshot or Ten takeaways from the Cannes Lions Festival. We knew beforehand this wouldn’t be be a big year for Cannes creatively as clients and agencies recover from the pandemic, but it was a long overdue catchup. Whilst creativity is front and centre there was an increasing nervousness from clients preparing for another media recession. For some reason this view of recession is more centred in the UK, than on the continent, where wider based European based clients are less concerned.

Here are our Ten Takeaways from the Cannes Lions:-

1. From Creativity to Commerciality, with a big dollop of entertainment

Lots of chat of being back face to face and in person, this year Cannes was a celebration of Commerciality and being there – versus Creativity. Of course the rosẻ flowed – clients and agencies made up for the last three years of not being out and about.

2. Economic Turbulence

Whilst the old adage – if you spend more going into a recession – then you’re are likely to come out stronger was a well trodden story, preparations for turbulence are well underway. Some clients are getting twitchy, some are already protecting creative agency fees, but clipping on their media expenditure.

3. The Fringe

Meetings across the Croisette, the fringe was just as important. As many if not more of the conversations that matter are happening outside Le Palais. With the Carlton closed for a refurb, there were pockets of meetings, rather than the usual Carlton Terrace circus.

4. Ad net Zero

It was great to see the UK leading the way with the AdNetZero global launch. If we’re going to tackle climate change as an industry we’ll have to do it together.

5. Time to Dial Up Purpose

‘Purpose is the new digital’ but when it comes to Cannes and Awards – more awards were given to brands who are ‘doing good in the world’.

6. Broader Backgrounds

From Bristol to Brazil, it was good to see attendees with broader backgrounds, the industry is doing well with diversity and inclusion, we met agency leaders, but we also met startups, Indies, programmers, digital strategists, freelancers, investors, consultants – Cannes really is appealing to all walks of life.

7. Greenpeace

Well they had there moment in the sun, on three separate occasions, when they stormed a beach, scaled the Palais – but it was pretty low key. Whilst the planet is important this type of behaviour is just disruptive.

8. Ads with CX

An ongoing trend we noticed the abundant increase in brand experience entries, versus pure advertising campaigns.

9. Sustainability

The biggest topic of discussion this year was the communicating of sustainability, the progress of clients and their brands, making work sustainably, and buying media that is more sustainable.

10. WPP wins creative crown

WPP has dominated Cannes Lions 2022 after amassing a hoard of 176 Lions including 1 Titanium, 4 Grand Prix, 36 Gold, 47 Silver and 88 Bronze awards. Ogilvy was the network winner – are the network burners about to re-ignite after a few years on the WPP backbenches.

Back to Henley: It’s been Henley Royal Regatta week this last week, and what a great aerial shot of Henley this was taken last week. It’s living proof that the regatta course is a straight course – some 6930 feet, or 1 mile and 550 yards. Congratulations to all those crews/entries taking part, who came from all over the world – this year was the first regatta over six days. We now have a slight pause before the Henley Festival which starts on Wednesday for five further evenings.

In June, Hamilton Associates turned 10 years since our start in the consulting world – at 100 Pall Mall in 2012, so a big thank you to all our clients, agencies, and friends that have helped us along the journey.

We’re here to help you with your agency resourcing structures, agency reviews, evaluations, and benchmarking to improve your marketing performance, do get in touch – for anything we may assist you with.

Kind regards,

Will