Post by Lars Finke

My first Cannes Lions. After many years in the industry, that felt slightly overdue. As expected, there was no shortage of conversations about AI. What stood out was the fact that most discussions have (finally) moved beyond the question of whether AI will transform marketing. The focus is now on what organizations need to do to create value with it. AI makes companies faster. It doesn't automatically make them better. It amplifies what is already there. Strong capabilities become stronger. Weak foundations become more visible. Which is why technology alone won't be the differentiator. As more of marketing becomes automated, creativity becomes even more valuable. Not as an isolated discipline, but as the glue embedded into products, services and customer experiences. The real challenge is knowing where human judgment, taste and originality create disproportionate value and where technology should do the heavy lifting. That also changes what leadership in marketing looks like. The CMO is increasingly becoming the architect across marketing, technology, sales, service and product. Success depends less on optimizing individual functions and more on connecting them to create better customer experiences and stronger business outcomes. Many of these themes came up in my conversation with Baerbel Egli-Unckrich from Campaign Germany during Cannes. You can read the full conversation here: https://lnkd.in/esxBkQr8 Ndidiamaka Oteh, Nick Law, Bob Markham, Rebecca Bezzina, Dan Aukland, James Temple, Petra Seipp, Joel Van Durme, Thomas Mueller, Joy Bhattacharya, Ambrogio Terrizzano, Rupal Parekh, Mohan Ramaswamy, Thomas Knüwer, Christian Barth, Helena Binder