Cannes Lions 2026: The Connected Path to Growth

At Cannes Lions 2026, the industry conversation focused on creativity and connectivity across screens. Instead of chasing the next channel, format, or capability, marketers across the Croisette focused on how to make advertising work harder across the entire cross-channel journey. As audiences fragment across a multiplying number of screens, brands are under pressure to drive growth at every stage. Below, we break down the key takeaways from the week’s top panels on how leaders are balancing creativity, data, and connected media to deliver meaningful outcomes, build brand trust, and forge ever-stronger connections with consumers.

More Screens Have Made the Journey Harder to Manage

A central theme of the ADWEEK group chat, Outcomes, Everywhere, All At Once: Engineering Growth Across Every Channel, was that no single channel can carry the entire customer journey. Sara Brooks, Chief Growth Officer at BetterHelp, explained, “We don’t necessarily think about a channel that works the best for us. They all work together,” which reflects a wider shift toward understanding the role each touchpoint plays in building awareness, deepening understanding, and driving action.

That also creates more room for experimentation. Allison McDuffee, Global Head of Brand Insights and Measurement at Roblox, encouraged marketers to remain flexible as new environments emerge, noting that “people and brands are willing to get out there and try something new, although it might not be perfect the first time.” Dave Kersey, Global Head of Media at SharkNinja, echoed that mindset: “There’s a lot of power in being able to test and have an organization willing to figure it out, even if the playbook doesn’t exist.”

Brand consistency still matters, but consistency does not require repeating the same execution everywhere. The strongest work adapts to the audience, format, and moment while remaining recognizably part of the same brand.

Outcomes, Everywhere, All At Once: Engineering Growth Across Every Channel

CTV is Opening New Points of Connection

Throughout the week, conversations repeatedly returned to CTV, particularly the role of the HomeScreen as a discovery environment. During the panel, The Front Door to Omnichannel: Winning Attention on the CTV Homescreen, Daniela Kuehn, VP Marketing, Media, Social Media & PR at Sky Deutschland, described the opportunity as being able to “catch people when their attention is on the screen,” while Marine Gissy, Global Media Lead at AXA, emphasized the importance of pairing new placements with “the right creativity” so that the experience is memorable rather than simply visible.

The wider opportunity lies in connecting that moment on the largest screen in the home with activity across mobile, web, and commerce. Jem Ripley, CEO of Publicis Digital Experience, described CTV’s value as “the ability to actually connect commerce directly to that experience right there at the screen,” showing how the format can support discovery, brand building, and action within the same broader journey.

The Front Door to Omnichannel: Winning Attention on the CTV Homescreen

AI for Scale, Humans for Soul: Raising the Bar for True Creativity

The Teads Creative Awards Grand Prix kept creativity at the center of the conversation. Dorothée Gardon, Global Marketing Strategy & Integrated Media Director at IKEA, said, “Creativity doesn’t start with artificial intelligence. It starts with understanding deeply our consumers,” adding that AI can help create variations and personalization at scale once the core idea is in place.

Claudia Schneider, Senior Global Marketing Capability Manager at Heineken, framed the creative process around “art, science and courage,” with AI supporting the science while human judgment, instinct, and a willingness to test remain essential. Gordana Buccisano, Global Brands Strategy Director, Media & Marketing at Reckitt, added another layer, observing that “you can’t buy trust, you earn trust,” and that data is most valuable when it helps brands understand what audiences expect and how to create a meaningful value exchange.

That willingness to act before every outcome is guaranteed also came through in Alison Payne’s perspective. The CMO of Heineken USA described how the brand responded when World Cup fans drank Boston dry by sending truckloads of beer and a film crew to the city. As she put it, “Sometimes you have to just take a little bit of a risk and see what works.” It is a useful reminder that data can inform the opportunity, but creativity still requires the confidence to move.

Teads Creative Awards Grand Prix

Outcomes are Being Viewed Across a Longer Horizon

Conversations in Cannes also challenged narrow definitions of effectiveness, with marketers increasingly focused on how awareness, attention, consideration, and conversion build on one another over time. Elsa de Guzman de Saint Nicolas, VP of Marketing Excellence at Reckitt, stressed the importance of maintaining distinctive brand assets while adapting messaging to different platforms and contexts, and Attica Alexis Jaques, CMO, U.S. at Ancestry, described the need to invest across the upper and middle funnel “so that we can actually inspire, engage, and really start having conversations with our audiences.”

The conversation reflected a more holistic view of the funnel, where each channel has a different role and the combined effect matters more than any isolated metric. As Sara Brooks, Chief Growth Officer at BetterHelp, put it, the task is to understand “what’s right for the channel” while ensuring the same story comes to life across every touchpoint.

After a week of bold predictions, the takeaway was refreshingly practical: stronger marketing still comes down to better choices across creative, context, channels, and measurement. The tools are getting smarter and the screens are multiplying, but the work remains the same: create something worth noticing, place it where it belongs, and make every touchpoint count.