CTV Creatives Best of Cannes Lions 2025 Ad Week

 

CTV Creative Showcase

As a long-time Cannes Lions attendee and Creative Director at Saatchi & Saatchi, I’ve spent over a decade watching our industry redefine what television advertising means. The Croisette may not have changed much, but the screens we create for—and the minds we aim to move—certainly have. Today, the 30-second TV commercial doesn’t stand alone. It competes in a complex new ecosystem, where Connected TV (CTV) has become the most powerful, data-rich canvas for brand storytelling.

CTV isn’t just the next evolution of television—it’s the reimagination of it. Over the past ten years, I’ve seen this transformation not just from the festival stage or jury rooms at Cannes, but from inside the war rooms of campaign strategy meetings, where brands now demand measurable creative outcomes alongside big emotional ideas. Our work with partners like Teads and others at the cutting edge of CTV delivery for luxury brands has shown just how far the boundaries can stretch. Premium storytelling is no longer the privilege of prime-time slots—it’s available programmatically, at scale, and with unprecedented precision.

The Shift: From Broadcast to Bespoke

What sets CTV apart is its ability to merge emotional resonance with targeting intelligence. Unlike traditional broadcast spots that shout to the masses, CTV whispers directly to the right audience—on their terms, in their living rooms. This demands that creatives rewire how we think. It’s not about one big execution anymore, but a fluid set of brand expressions that adapt to moment, mood, and viewer mindset.

Creative versioning has become a necessity. In the past, we might develop one flagship TVC and adapt it slightly for digital. Today, we're building modular creative systems that swap in headlines, visuals, or calls-to-action depending on who’s watching, where they are, or what they’ve seen before. It’s more like directing a branching narrative than shooting a single film.

And then there's sound. In a world where so much mobile video plays muted, CTV is delightfully and defiantly sound-on. This means audio design is having a renaissance of its own—giving rise to a new focus on sound branding, nuanced voiceover performance, and immersive audio that deepens the connection between brand and viewer.

CTV Creative Best Practices – Optics

In preparation for this year’s MiQ-hosted Campaign House at Cannes Lions, I’ve been reflecting on the emerging creative disciplines that are shaping our CTV work in 2025. Here are a few of the key themes I’ll be exploring in the closed sessions and informal conversations to come:

• Precision Meets Emotion

CTV gives us data. But data doesn’t tell stories—people do. The most successful CTV campaigns today blend precision targeting with timeless human insight. The best ads still hit you in the heart, they’re just better aimed now.

• High Impact in Low Seconds

There’s no doubt about it: shorter ads are dominating. But short doesn’t mean shallow. Our work is increasingly focused on building resonance quickly—often in 6 to 15 seconds—without losing sophistication or meaning. It’s a craft all its own.

• Dynamic AI Storytelling by Design

We’re moving beyond sequential messaging into dynamic narrative structures, where AI ads react to audience behaviour and preferences in real-time. This is especially effective for product storytelling and luxury where pacing, visual tempo, and personalisation matter deeply.

• CTV as a Luxury Brand Showcase

CTV environments—especially home screens and pre-roll—are the new catwalks for luxury. We’ve seen success here with visually restrained but emotionally rich campaigns. The format invites deeper attention and rewards design discipline.

• Collaboration is the New Creative Muscle

CTV requires deep collaboration between creative, data, media, and tech teams. Success increasingly hinges on mutual fluency—where a creative understands how a DSP works and a data strategist appreciates the shape of a compelling story arc.

What Cannes Means for CTV in 2025

If Cannes Lions was once a celebration of the best big brand films on big screens, it’s now also a forum for those of us inventing new creative grammar for the home screen. We’re entering an age where storytelling is addressable, data-led, and on-demand. That’s not a constraint—it’s a liberation.

I look forward to joining discussions at Campaign House this week to debate the direction of our craft and meet those who, like me, are obsessed with the potential of CTV to create real moments of connection at scale. From retail brands to luxury icons, everyone is experimenting. But those that understand the new balance—between data and emotion, speed and craft, versioning and vision—will own the screen.

See you in Cannes. Let’s reframe the frame.

www.campaignatcannes.com