Cannes Creative B2B Lions: What Award-Winning B2B Marketing Looks Like In 2022
By Lane Ellis
What does award-winning B2B marketing look like?
For the first time since the prestigious Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity began in the 1950s, the recently-held 2022 event saw dedicated B2B-specific marketing award categories, offering a new opportunity for B2B marketers to have their efforts shine on the global stage.
The new Creative B2B Lions event and awards were established in conjunction with the B2B community — most notably The B2B Institute — the industry think tank funded by LinkedIn* that researches the future of B2B marketing and decision making.
Now that the inaugural Cannes Creative B2B Lions awards event has taken place, let’s take a look and see what award-winning B2B campaign efforts look like in 2022, and where they may be headed in the years ahead.
1 — B2B Marketing Efforts Shine at Cannes Lions
The Creative B2B Lions presented awards in a wide array of 11 services and products categories:
- Cross-channel Storytelling
- Brand Experience
- Innovative use of Broadcast & Content
- Targeting & Engagement
- Effectiveness & Measurement
- Long-Term Brand Building
- Breakthrough on a Budget
- Challenger Brand
- Corporate Purpose & Social Responsibility
- Market Disruption
- Craft in B2B
The B2B brand experience and targeting and engagement award winner was Spotify, for its “A Song For Every CMO” entry, which received a Bronze Lion for brand experience and a Gold Lion for the engagement and targeting category.
The Spotify campaign — which used hyper-targeting to deliver a music-oriented push specifically to CMOs — resulted in some 75 percent year-over-year growth, leading the firm to more than €1 billion in advertising revenue for the first time.
Apple was awarded a Silver Lion in the craft in B2B category for its “Escape From the Office” video campaign.
Apple’s long-form nine-minute film followed workers from work to home, and augmented by a series of 15-second social media ads, the campaign received more than 30 million views in its first month, along with a 353 percent increase in website traffic.
A complete list of these and all of the other big winners at the first-ever Creative B2B Lions is available on the Cannes event website, highlighting the variety of B2B entries submitted.
2 — What The Cannes B2B Awards Tells Us About Future Marketing Shifts
Having dedicated B2B marketing categories at Cannes for the first time was a major opportunity for B2B brands and marketers to showcase advertising campaigns in a way that hasn’t been possible until now, and 2023 is likely to see a greater variety of entrants from the rapidly changing faces of more traditional B2B firms.
The pandemic has certainly sparked upheaval in the B2B marketing space, whether it’s the shift to digital-first efforts, always-on campaigns, or — as the B2B Institute recently explored with the Ehrenberg-Bass Institute, a move to category entry points (CEPs) — cues used by customers …read more
Source:: Top Rank Blog
