Influencer marketers make big bets on Cannes Lions this year

Just a few weeks ago, influencers took over the Cannes Film Festival. Now, they’re coming to Cannes Lions.

As the influencer marketing industry continues to grow—expected to be worth $21 billion this year, according to Influencer Marketing Hub—so too does its presence at the annual ad festival.

Take Captiv8, an influencer marketing platform that’s investing in its first full-on Cannes activation this year with a flight to the festival full of dozens of marketers and creators on a boutique airline.

Between its own activation, the villas, and the beach set-ups dedicated to influencer marketing this year, Meridith Rojas, chief brand officer at Captiv8, told us that “there are all these pretty strong signs to say that the influencer marketing piece is becoming much more main-character energy.”

Let me be Franc(e)

With Twitter’s ad business declining, it’s perhaps no surprise that the tech company will not return to its prime spot on the beach at Cannes this year. That spot has since been booked by Influential, an influencer marketing platform that’s worked with companies like McDonald’s and Pepsi.

“We were watching like a hawk to see what Twitter was going to do with their space,” Ryan Detert, CEO of Influential, told Marketing Brew. “When they didn’t renew, we hopped on it and wanted to bring the creator economy to the Croisette.”

Despite being a “humongous expense,” Chief Communications Officer Chris Detert said getting that spot was a way of “[taking] it up another notch” from last year, when the company hosted its events on a yacht in the harbor. Partnering with Brand Innovators, a marketing events company, is one way, he added, the company was able to pay for some of the reported seven-figure price tag.

After attending the festival for three years, Captiv8, which has worked with companies like Walmart and Kraft Heinz, decided to up the ante at the festival this year, according to Rojas, which is how the flight came to be. She said the flight will consist of 75 CMOs, senior marketers, and creators with programming on topics like “how viral creators are an endangered species in 2023.”

“One of my main recommendations, having been to Cannes as a brand and realizing the caliber of marketers and what they want while they’re there…was that we not just show up, but create something that can engage our key constituents,” Rojas said.

While the goal behind the more significant Cannes investment is to generate brand awareness and positioning, she said it’s also about developing long-term relationships. “If you have five minutes to say, ‘Hi,’ to somebody on the beach or grab a coffee, there’s nothing wrong with that. But there’s something that’s uniquely different when you get to spend eight hours on a transatlantic flight,” she said.

Billion Dollar Boy is another business in the influencer space putting on its first event this year. Founder and Europe CEO Thomas Walters told us the agency will be taking over bocce courts that have never been used as part of an event at Cannes Lions with hopes of generating new business and exposure within the industry.

He said that the growing presence of influencer marketing at Cannes, both in awards categories and on the ground, is great for the sector overall: “It’s a landmark event. Having a presence, in one way, gives authority to [influencer marketing] and shows that it’s being taken more seriously.”

Here for the Cannes-tent

It’s not just that more marketers are showing up. In recent years, Chris Detert said he’s noticed a “paradigm shift” at Cannes where “creators themselves, not even being necessarily paid or brought out, just started showing up and wanting to be a part of [the festival].” Ryan Detert said his belief is that FOMO has driven some creators to attend on their own in recent years and will continue to drive attendance in the future.

In the past, popular creator events like VidCon have conflicted with Cannes, which may have accounted for fewer being in France. Ryan Detert said that may be changing based on conversations with creators and brands, in which more are saying they’re “opting in for Cannes over VidCon” this year. He added that “events always have crescendos, and [VidCon] may be slightly past the crescendo. We’re not really sure yet.”

This year, Ryan Detert said Influential plans to bring “hundreds of creators,” including Adam Waheed and Eric Bigger, to its events. “We’ve told all of our friends, creators, managers, agencies that they should be there—that’s where the brands are,” he added.

When asked if this will be the biggest year at Cannes for influencer marketing, Chris Detert said he thinks that’s the case, adding that he expects to see “maybe double what you saw last year, in terms of major players in our space” on the Croisette.

“I don’t think we’ve reached the apex of it yet,” he said. “I think it’s gonna get better and better.”