MANILA, PHILIPPINES — Gaming has arguably been one of the fastest-growing categories in recent advertising works, resulting to Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity debuting the very first Entertainment Lions for Gaming at the 2023 awards. One of its pioneer set of judges was Octopus & Whale Founder & CEO Joey Tiempo, who shared insights from the Cannes Lions judging room at this year’s Digicon 2023, organized by IMMAP.
As the only judge representing the Philippines for the inaugural category, Joey made it a point to share some lessons with the event hall full of marketers and creatives at Digicon, inspiring the country’s top brands and agencies to go after that Cannes Lions trophy.
“Gaming is driving pop culture today; Gaming is modern creative marketing,” stated Joey, sharing how gaming has truly transformed the industry in recent times with more engaging work and effective campaigns.
Joey’s session was straightforward. She listed down five top lessons as a jury member for Entertainment Lions for Gaming, detailing what it is about the pioneer batch of winners that made them win the coveted metals from Cannes Lions.
The lessons are as follows:
- The best gaming work benefits the player and the brand in a symbiotic way
- On brands entering gaming: Anything disruptive will be met with skepticism.
- There has to be a deep understanding of the nuances of brand and player relationship
- Gaming is more than the game itself. Explore the broader ecosystem: the fans, influencers and the community around the game
- Differentiate commercial success vs progress. Is the idea taking the industry forward?
She then showcased these lessons at work by playing the case studies for the winning work. Specifically that of “Clash from the Past” for Clash of Clans, which was awarded a Grand Prix for convincing the game’s passionate community of players that it has 40 years worth of history under its name; “Unbranded Menu,” a proudly Filipino campaign for McDonald’s Philippines that branded all “unbranded” McDonald’s lookalikes in games; the “Fighting to Remember” campaign which raised awareness among Gen Zs on the reality of Holocaust on Israel’s National Holocaust Memorial Day; and so much more.
Here are a few of the award-winning work that Joey showcased:
Presenting this to the marketers and creatives in the room, Joey encouraged the brands to use these lessons to play more with gaming work, engage the Filipino gaming community with insightful campaigns, and hopefully raise the Philippine creative banner in more international shows like Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity.
adobo Magazine is an official media partner of DIGIMAX: IMMAP Digicon 2023.
