After all of the results were announced at the 2015 Cannes Lion Festival last week, people noticed a trend in the winning campaigns – advertisements with empowering messages brought home the most prestigious awards.
The Cannes Lion Festival, a global awards ceremony held for top professionals in the creative communications and advertising industry, had a spike in the number of awards given to the campaigns with a powerful message.
There are over 18 different advertising and media related categories and a top prize, the Grand Prix award, awarded to one campaign in each group. In the PR category, the #LikeAGirl campaign for feminine care brand Always created by ad agency Leo Burnett transformed the negative term “like a girl” into a strong message for women. #LikeAGirl won the award over 1,969 other entries in the PR category.
Other highlights included the LifePaint campaign for Volvo created by ad agency Grey London, Lucky Iron Fish by agency Geometric Global, I Will What I Want for Under Armour created by Droga5 and Red Light App for Vodafone by Y&R Team Red Istanbul which all received a Grand Prix award, the highest honor of the ceremony.
Many of the winning campaigns promoted topics like women empowerment, awareness of various issues such as iron deficiency in Cambodia and safety. According to USA Today, many of these campaigns have made a positive impact towards their cause. The Lucky Fish project for example was proven to have improved the overall iron intake of Cambodians, who are prone to iron deficiency leading to diseases like anemia.
Although the 2015 Cannes Lion Festival has awarded many other campaigns for being innovative and original, the creative communications with the most powerful messages were clearly the most successful in their efforts. Will heartwarming and empowering become the next big thing for PR and advertising?
