You can keep your Cannes, I’m off to SxSW
In this guest post, Ogilvy’s Damian Damjanovski argues that SxSW, not Cannes, is where creatives should be looking
Ever since joining the advertising industry, I’ve heard people tell stories of Cannes. The glamour, the parties, the awards, the mingling with other ad folk the very pinnacle of AdLand – and all to the backdrop of the beautiful French Riviera.
Yet despite all the stories, I’ve not been able to bring myself to want to go to Cannes with the same passion and vigour that seems to drive so many others.
However there are four letters that inspire in me the same kind of passionate drive to pack my bags and haul-ass half-way across the world, and they are SxSW.
In case you don’t know what SxSW (South by Southwest) is – it’s quite simply a festival of music, film and interactive. It’s beyond anything you may have seen at any conference, seminar or expo you’ve been to before – it’s neither centred around a glitzy award ceremony, nor is it about walking through tens of kilometres of show-room expos. Rather, it’s about people who are passionate about movies, music or digital sharing that passion with others in a relatively informal but extremely intense forum.
This is the place where some of the most intelligent, most motivated, and most creative people in the world make their pilgrimage every year in order to connect with each other, learn from each other, and build things – whether websites, rock bands, or soon to be multi-billion dollar enterprises.
SxSW has been a sort of “proving ground” for start ups hoping to make it big.
Some of its recent success stories include Twitter and Foursquare, both of which were essentially unknown until they hit SxSW. The ability for the festival to blast a start-up into mass-adoption fame has brought even more entrepreneurial spirits to Austin with their wares in the hopes of attaining the approval of the early-adopter crowd.
At any given hour during the five days of the festival, there are over 12 concurrent sessions happening (and that’s just the more formal planned ones, many more happen ad-hoc), so choosing where to go and who to see are of the utmost importance.
So why are Ogilvy sending me and two of my advertising brethren across to this festival?
Quite simply, there is no better place to get information from the horse’s mouth. See, SxSW is one of those festivals where the true thought leaders get up and talk about what they’ve been doing. Not case studies, not examples they found on other people’s blogs, but their actual own workings – and allow it to be dissected, picked apart, and discussed.
I would happily argue that there is more potential to learn from the 800+ speakers at SxSW, than in every other event on the annual digital calendar combined.
Perhaps the reason that Droga5 (https://mumbrella.com.au/droga-5-advertising-happywhatever-fun-37505) isn’t having fun in this industry anymore, isn’t due to a lack of long lunches and long shoots, or even the anonymous comments but because those “ideas worth fighting for” are fewer and farther between.
Perhaps truly great ideas, not just ‘advertising ideas’ come about more frequently when you expose yourself to those with knowledge far outlying from your own.
Of the current 15,000+ registered attendees for SxSW, there are dozens and dozens of the most creative and inspiring agencies in the world represented.
Of which, there are two represented from Australia, with Ogilvy being one of them.
So you can keep the party in France. I’m off to experience one of the most epic weeks of intense learning, meeting, and sharing currently on offer.
- Damian Damjanovski is innovation director – strategy at Ogilvy. Along with creative director Barrie Seppings and innovation director – creative Brian Merrifield, he will be writing about his experiences at SxSW on Ogilvy’s dedicated site for the event.
Tim Burrowes founded Mumbrella in 2008. He worked on Mumbrella until 2021. At various points he was editor, content director and editor-at-large.
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Nice post Dan, look forward to reading, watching and listening to your take-outs. See you at the BBQ!
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See you there.
Though I’m only going for the honky-tonk and BBQ brisket 😉
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Damo you might find a few more agencies than two if you look beyond creative. There’s a decent contingent of media bods heading along too.
Enjoy, wish I could have made it this year!
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I’m heading over as well but I wouldn’t necessarily say one festival is better than the others. More important to expose the agency to a range of different thinking. And SxSw definitely achieves that. There may not be French champagne and parties with models but there will be Texan ribs and nerd toys – different but positives in both. I was actually surprised looking at the Australian contingency going over, there’s quite a few (and more than two agencies sending staff). I’ve got no doubt it will ignite great ideas for Australian clients.
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@Nic @Nathan – Apologies guys, I should have specified “creative agenices” – you’re right, including Media and PR there are more going, but sadly very few from the big creative agencies.
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Your fellow STW company DTDigital will be there too.
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Enjoy everyone – it’s a lot of fun but bloody exhausting! Especially if you’re doing tech and music. Get some sleep now while you can.
Great points, and I fully agree. It’s increasingly hard to see how Cannes is relevant any more, apart from networking with old-school types.
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Yep, couldn’t agree more, I had one of the most inspiring trips to SXSW last year and would agree that any traditional agency wanting to get their head around digital needs to be there, immersed in the tech/geek/nerd paradise that is SXSW.
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PS one of the best examples of an agency site for SXSW was from London agency Made by Many, they did a Twitter powered SXSW people-tracker: http://madebymany.com/blog/sxsw-countdown-one-week which collected all their staff’s various Twitter feeds in one place.
This year they’ve made the Holler Gram iPad App, which is such an awesomely simple concept and very well executed: http://itunes.apple.com/us/app.....66439?mt=8
“Holler Gram turns your iPad into a physical messaging platform – a glowing sign – that you can load with a message and hold up to show the people around you. At the same time, you can also tweet your message, with a hashtag, right from within the app.”
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PPS I’m f*&king jealous I can’t go again this year
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Just out of curiosity, who is the other Aussie creative agency represented?
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SxSW Rock’s its where the new money is!
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@ Matt R, we’ll be there. Not sure if we’re ‘the other agency’
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@Pascal – Yup, Host was the only other creative agency (that I’m aware of) sending anybody.
Though, to be honest, there may be others who are from creative but going of their own merit, or who haven’t registered through the SxSW Social.
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I think this kind of misses the point.
SXSW is about new ideas.
Cannes is about awarding the best creative ideas already out there.
They aren’t really comparable because they are entirely different things, although you can be inspired by both.
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Hi SD,
The awards event in the evenings at Cannes are indeed about awarding creative ideas.
They do have a pretty comprehensive programme of events during the day too though.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
Here at The Goat Farm we’re sending EVERY ONE of our staff to SXSW.
Apart from the goats, that is. Got knocked back by quarantine on that one.
Which leaves just me.
Joys of a startup. See you there!
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Agree Damo. Looking fwd to catching up over bad coffee when your in london mate.
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Bit strong there re Cannes?
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Now DD, you know I love you, but you seem to be suggesting you’ve never been to Cannes, yet you’ve decided SXSW is heaps better? I know ignorance is usually a terrific position from which to advance a proposition, especially if you’re a politician, but on this occasion, I reckon you might be wide of the mark.
I haven’t been to SXSW, and I’d love to go, but I have been to Cannes, and as well as the parties and the Gutter Bar, they do manage to fit in some pretty thought-provoking and inspiring speakers, showcase some of the best advertising creativity and craft from around the world, uncover new directors etc.
Yes, it’s very different to what you describe SXSW to be, but why can’t we have both? Why does it have to be one or the other? And where is it written you can’t be inspired and inebriated in the same week?
Maybe the reason we’re not having fun in the industry anymore not because “ideas worth fighting for are fewer and further between”, but because we’re all serious, and so caught up in “intense learning, meeting, and sharing” all the time, that we’d rather spend time in Austin, Texas than the south of France, and we forget to spend some time smelling the rosé…
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Hey DK,
Thanks for the thoughts, and you’re right, I know that Cannes certainly has it’s benefits and reasons for going.
This was written more from a position of somebody (i.e. Me) who has been to neither Cannes nor SXSW – and what drove me to want to go to SXSW so much.
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Hi @Matt R and others.
iris has our APAC Regional CD Grant Hunter speaking at SxSW on the Topic of ‘Urgent Genius’ (creating topical ideas at speed). This comes on the tail of the inaugural digital competition of the same name held recently. Judging by his tweets and blogging he’s having a ball.
You can follow on twitter:
@UrgentGenius
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