Three favourite things at Cannes this year

1. Seminars
As always in Cannes there is a packed schedule of seminars at the Palais’ Debussy theatre, with the great and the good of the advertising sharing their views on the past, present and future of the industry. In typical Cannes fashion the seminars aren’t just a case of taking to the stage. My favourite was Digitas’ unique format – bringing Cage Fighting to Cannes. Delegates were treated to five three minute “rounds” of debate from experts including actor Common, Monty Miranda and Gavin Palone. The battle summed up the way that the lines between brand integration and brand interruption are blurred. Just as TV spots are evolving into more integrated brand content the A-list Hollywood “star” is also having to get in on the act. Nick Cannon or Mr Mariah Carey, who judged the fight commented that today he is more than an actor and TV presenter, but also producer, network head and brand in his own right. Common reinforced this view when talking about how he now has to align his own brand with that of the brands he “acts” with via product placement and also represents through traditional advertising channels. Collaboration and creativity are a must for this relationship to work.

2. Parties
SapientNitro’s Opening Night Gala on Tuesday at the Carlton Beach saw thousands of delegates enjoy an evening under the clear Cannes sky fuelled by “banging tunes”, a sumptuous buffet and the odd glass of vin. But party head aside what was most interesting was the buoyant mood of the festival in contrast to a more muted feel in recent years. The industry is all set to capitalise on global economic recovery and ready to embrace a new order – namely integrating production, new media and all things digital with the traditional armoury.

3. Networking
Of course a trip to Cannes is incomplete without a few late nights at the Gutter Bar (which I finally discovered was named by a group of Australians way back when, who wanted a cheap(er) watering hole. Gutter comes from the fact that you end up standing in the road). As always by 3 am the joint was heaving. Any earlier and you’re likely to catch a local having a quiet slurp of brandy on their way home for supper. Being in the know of the bar’s location is enough to let you join the ranks of CEOs, ECDs and other industry high-rollers. With rich network pickings like these who needs Monaco? If you’ve happened to sleep the day away (which I hasten to add, I hadn’t) the bar enables you to catch up on all the gossip and key learnings of the day at the Palais. Social media is clearly the issue de jour (see I learnt some French too), yet sometimes you can’t beat the real thing.

Finally, I would love to be able to report on the shenanigans in the tent at the top of the Palais, but entry was restricted solely to Creative Directors. Sometimes there are limits to the skilful PR blag, despite going to such lengths of photoshopping my business card!

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The General Election is unlikely to be dominated by social media, as it was in the 2008 American presidential election. It will, however, be the first in this country to be influenced by its presence.

One only has point to Barack Obama’s success to see the benefits of using social media as a grassroots support tool. While millions of dollars were raised and on-the-ground activists united behind Obama, I did not detect much political discourse permeating through the official channels of his social media platforms.

Arguably, the opposite is the case in the UK – little political online activity in this country is aimed at recruitment and fundraising. There are, however, a number of politicians and commentators who seek to communicate with voters and influence the political agenda through social media – @kerrymp, @torybear, and @campbellclaret, to name just three.

Indeed, both the major party leaders, David Cameron and Gordon Brown, have sought to harness social media with their own viral video efforts – Webcameron and the Number 10 YouTube channel – with debatable degrees of success.

It’s fair to say that politics and social media in the UK is still the preserve of a comparatively small group of people either inside the Westminster bubble itself, or those with a strong interest in what’s going on in the corridors of power.

However, discourse within that small group is having an impact on a wider scale – and much of that conversation is generated through social media. For example, many people will have seen the numerous parodies of the David Cameron ‘We can’t go on like this’ Tory posters generated by @mydavidcameron and documented in the wider press.

Even at this early stage of electioneering, political capital has been gained and lost by the major parties’ presence on social media and other users’ reactions to the parties.

This is only likely to intensify as the number of people interacting with politics via the Internet increases. Moving forward, social media avenues such as Twitter, Facebook and YouTube will be vital to engaging with the electorate as a whole and in particular youth voters, a highly apathetic generation, according to a Guardian article.

So while we probably won’t see Gordon and David ditching their despatch boxes any time soon, it’s certainly worth noting that their stance and success are going to be increasingly influenced by online activity, starting with this year’s election.

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One of the biggest stories dominating the media over the past week has been the BBC Strategy Review and Director General Mark Thompson’s decision to shut down BBC 6 Music. For a nation of licence fee payers, it’s inevitable that any change to the structure of the BBC is greeted with a tide of reaction. While we are all entitled to voice our opinion, should we have any say in the way the BBC is actually run?

The BBC is one of Britain’s greatest remaining institutions, and is rightly respected the world over.  But due to the unique way it is funded, it is faced with the impossible task of pleasing everybody all of the time. Many have viewed Thompson’s announcement as a pre-emptive measure in the face of the possible election of a Conservative government which, according to many, will continue to kowtow to Rupert Murdoch in exchange for the support of News International.

With Murdoch effectively dictating Conservative media policy for his own ends, the heat on the BBC could become almost unbearable in the wake of a Cameron government. Yes, there is without doubt a debate to be had about the way our licence fee is spent. But that debate should be led by the public, and not triggered by the demands of a commercial rival.

6 Music may cater to an audience of ‘only’ 700,000, but when it costs just £6m a year to run ( a mere 2% of the BBC’s total radio output) compared to the £100m that the terminally dire BBC Three haemorrhages, you have to wonder if it’s being held up as something of a sacrificial lamb. Is £6m really that much to the BBC in the overall scheme of things?

As you would expect of an audience of DAB listeners, fans of 6 Music have utilised social media to launch a campaign to save the station. With the high-profile support of megastars like David Bowie, Radiohead and Lily Allen, not to mention a U-turn from Tory culture spokesman Ed Vaizey, hopefully the BBC Trust will see sense and block Thompson’s proposals. Otherwise, we’re left with Fearne Cotton as BBC radio’s voice of alternative music. And how depressing is that?

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Last week, Eulogy! put out a story for one of our marketing services clients on opt-out rates, exploring how many people in certain areas of the UK are dropping out of circulation lists for marketing communications.  While researching how big companies react to this kind of news, I found myself wondering, not for the first time, why the business world is so insistent on separating ‘consumers’ from ‘businesspeople’.  Why can’t we be realistic and realise that people can be both?

In PR, we obviously distinguish between consumer and B2B, because the type of work we do for clients in these spaces is very different.  With consumer projects you are often trying to sell the idea of a product or service, while B2B PR is generally more about instigating and maintaining debate and discussing industry issues. However, in terms of audience, we need to be very careful not to pigeonhole people into separate camps. Just because Joe Bloggs is in marketing or runs a successful business, doesn’t mean that he’s not a consumer who prefers  to read NME over Heat magazine or likes Cornflakes better than All-Bran.

Particularly with regard to the rise of online technology and social networks, we have seen a raft of articles in the business and marketing press advising companies on how to talk to their consumers. However, what we mustn’t do is create an ‘us and them’ atmosphere and talk about consumers as if they are a breed apart.

It’s the fact that we are all consumers, and have our likes, dislikes, preferences and pet hates, that makes us able to work better as businesspeople and indeed as commentators on what consumers respond to.  I certainly think I do a better job writing about these issues because I reflect on my own responses to marketing. I don’t consider myself an insider because I work in the world of marketing services; I am an insider because I draw on my own experiences as a consumer to make a judgement.

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