Cannes Lions: Creative Effectiveness winners 2023 /

The top prize in the Creative Effectiveness category at Cannes Lions in 2023 went to Cadbury for Shah Rukh Khan-My-Ad, a campaign that helped the Mondelēz International brand grow its business by 35%.

Using artificial intelligence, Cadbury and Ogilvy Mumbai created a deepfake of Bollywood star Shah Rukh Khan and then allowed small businesses to use this digital avatar of the actor to promote their wares.

Cannes Lions requires entries to have been shortlisted or won a Lion previously in order to qualify for the Creative Effectiveness category and Shah Rukh Khan-My-Ad, won a Titanium Lion at the 2022 Cannes Lions festival, as well as two Golds, two Silvers and one Bronze.

Devika Bulchandani, global CEO at Ogilvy and jury president of the Creative Effectiveness category, said that when it came to assessing entries, the jury asked if a campaign created economic value for the brand and business, and then questioned ‘Was it really pushing the boundaries of creativity?’ Bulchandani warned about the need to get a balance between business and creativity because ‘You can go into the rabbit hole of effectiveness and forget about the creativity.’

She told Contagious: ‘We’re not just awarding effectiveness, this is not an effectiveness award. This is a creativity event. So we were really diligent about making sure that the idea had cutting-edge creativity, something that had never been done before it, something that moved the industry forward from a creative perspective.’

The jury also looked to how representative the contenders were of the brand.  Bulchandani explained that that a key question was: ‘Are they true to the brand platform?’

Finally, the jury also considered the size of the initiatives and how scalable they were.

Given that the Grand Prix was developed by Ogilvy, Bulchandani had to recuse herself when her fellow jurors discussed the campaign in the judging room but said that the jury had awarded the top prize to Cadbury because it was clearly linked to the brand’s platform of generosity, while also being innovative.

The sales results were undeniable, Bulchandani said. She told Contagious that during the Diwali holiday period, the occasion when the campaign was launched, Indians typically do not buy chocolate and instead offer their loved ones traditional sweets. ‘But people actually started gifting chocolate. So it was amazing fundamental behaviour change.’ She added, ‘It fed the ecosystem of economic value because it brought smaller businesses into it. It’s a classic example of personalisation at scale, done in a creative manner.’

The other campaigns that were in with a shot at winning the Grand Prix, but ultimately missed out, were Heinz’s Draw Ketchup, Brahma’s Foamy Haircut and Madrid Fusion’s Invaluable Food.

Bulchandani said that it was telling that all the Gold winners were from food and beverage brands, ‘central to the human condition’. ‘We felt good about the fact that what rose to the top were the things that unite us as humans,’ she added.

Creative Effectiveness Gold Winners /

Heinz Draw Ketchup, for Kraft Heinz, by Rethink, Toronto

The Foamy Haircut, for Brahma, by Africa Creative DDB, Sao Paulo

Invaluable Food, for Madrid Fusion, by Leo Burnett, Madrid