Matt Williams at the Cannes Seminars
Matt Williams, content editor at The Engine Group, London offers his take on the Cannes Seminars running throughout the week, exclusive to CB.
I don’t know about you, but I’m starting to get a bit of Mad Men fatigue.
Not with the show itself – that’s still brilliant – but with the constant stream of advertising-related articles, seminars, conversations, tweets and blogs using the show as a hook of some sort.
‘Where have all the Mad Men gone?’, ‘Why was advertising better in the Mad Men era?’, ‘The Next Generation of Mad Men’, ‘How to Get More Mad Men fun into Your Agency’, ‘Meet the Real Mad Men’…the list of features and conversation starters goes on. No doubt you’ve read some of those very pieces, or attended lectures with similar titles.
As you’d expect, it’s even harder to get away from this approach at a festival like Cannes. Which is why I was delighted to attend a seminar with George Lois and Lee Clow – two advertising legends who more than most could justify playing off and representing that era – that barely contained a mention of the show at all.
Instead, both Lois and Clow talked openly and honestly about their careers, and more importantly, the state of the industry today.
And whilst there was a hint of nostalgia in some of the stories that the pair told, their infectious enthusiasm meant they were far more comfortable talking about the issues of the moment rather than listing all of the reasons “why advertising was better in my era.”
So where do these advertising greats see the industry to be at? At a very pivotal time, it turns out.
“It’s hard for me to define what an advertising agency now is,” Clow explained. “There’s a shaking out in the industry that’s happening. New media is still in its infancy, technologists have had the lead for a while, but the artist will take over.”
“We’re still confused and clients are still confused. They don’t know completely know to use it all creatively yet.”
“There’s a danger that people focus too much on technology,” Lois added. “The name of the game isn’t technology, the name of the game is creativity.”
So what must be done to ensure that the very best creative people and the very best brands make it through this fuzzy period and get shaken out the other side?
Here Clow looks to his most celebrated client, Apple, for the answer: “The industry is too fragmented at the moment,” he said. “We need to remember that the way brands live in our culture hasn’t changed, it’s just that brands have to understand that every touchpoint in which they exist is now an ad. That’s from the packaging to the (bricks and mortar) stores to the online communities talking about them. Brands need to be dedicated to who they are and what they believe. But very few brands have the ability to tell a cohesive single-minded message.”
Lois, meanwhile, wants one particular attitude creeping into the industry to change most. “Guys come to me and say, ‘It must have been great back then, when clients would accept good work.’ And I say, ‘What the fuck are you talking about?’ (and if anyone has seen Lois in full-blown rant mode, it really is a joy to behold).
“You have to remember that it’s not enough to have great talent, you have to force clients to accept the work. The minute you start doing bad work because it’s ‘forced on you’, then you ain’t worth shit.
“At the end of the day, it’s about finding clients who let you do great work. And if they don’t let you do great work, fuck ’em.”