What Cannes Lions signaled about what's next

Cannes Lions 2026 signaled a shift from AI experimentation to full organizational redesign. The focus moved from what AI can do to how it reshapes teams, operating models, and the structure of marketing itself. Across sessions and award-winning work, a clear idea emerged: marketing is becoming a connected system rather than a series of campaigns.

At the center of this shift is AI embedded across the value chain, from insight and content creation through to media, discovery, and optimization. This is driving a move toward always-on systems where learning compounds and performance improves continuously over time.

Three topics stood out. First, the importance of AI-readiness as an organizational design challenge, where success depends on restructuring teams, roles, and decision-making. It requires a C-suite level mandate to transform how the business operates, with talent models, culture, and ways of working aligned around more integrated, tech-enabled systems rather than traditional functional silos. Second, the dual audience reality, where brands must now be understood by both people and machines, with discovery increasingly shaped by recommendation engines and large language models.

We revealed new, cutting-edge research that investigates creativity's role in persuading machines. In partnership with INSEAD and Brandtech, Tom Roach, VP Brand Strategy, Natasha Wallace, Chief Solutions Officer and David Duboi, Associate Professor of Marketing at INSEAD uncovered whether LLMs possess a form of ‘creative receptivity’; can they feel the creative spark of an ads as humans do? Analysis of hundreds of ads across multiple categories and geographies will feed into a creative blueprint for a world of dual audiences and AI-mediated consumer journeys.

Across 480 Cannes Lions ads, there was zero correlation between how humans and AI models ranked creative, with humans responding more to emotion and storytelling while AI prioritised clarity, product visibility, and explicit signals. Despite these differences, the answer is not separate strategies, but stronger unified brand systems that can be interpreted by both audiences. As AI draws on a broader ecosystem of signals beyond brand-owned channels, from creators to reviews and third-party content, effectiveness increasingly depends on how consistently a brand is represented across the wider digital environment. Read more about the findings here

The third topic that stood out was, culture at machine speed. We can’t ignore the presence of the creator economy at Cannes Lions. Creators, communities, and platforms accelerate participation, and brands need to blend AI-driven production with strong creative direction to stay both present and distinctive.

Across multiple sessions, there was also a clear move from campaign thinking to connected systems. Commerce, content, and media are increasingly converging, with brand building and performance optimization working together in a continuous loop. In this model, effectiveness depends less on isolated messaging and more on consistent signals across creators, platforms, retail environments, and AI-readable structures.

In terms of the award-winning work, the most effective campaigns reflected this shift. Winning ideas were participatory, culturally embedded, and designed as systems rather than one-off executions, often blending creativity with utility and commerce in more direct ways.

Community-led models such as Vaseline Originals and Dove Real Reviews showed the power of turning audiences into co-creators. Culture-hacking ideas like Kit Kat Heist and Coca-Cola’s meme-driven activations demonstrated how brands are increasingly operating inside real-time cultural moments rather than planned media cycles. Commerce-integrated ideas like BCP’s POS banking solution and Mercado Libre’s stadium activation showed how creativity is merging directly with utility and transaction.

Looking ahead to 2027, Cannes pointed to a maturing phase where AI becomes invisible infrastructure rather than the headline. As that happens, attention shifts back toward craft, storytelling, and creative quality. The key challenge for brands is no longer access to technology, but the ability to align people, systems, and culture into one coherent operating model that can continuously adapt.