Many a powerful marketing trend came to the fore at the Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity 2025. The topic of artificial intelligence and how best it can be used by marketers cropped up virtually everywhere. The rise of influencer-creators as an unstoppable force came across loud and clear. The use and misuse of purpose by brands was hotly discussed.

But the one overarching theme I carried away from the event is that consistency in backing a big brand idea always scores over doing many little things. David Lubars, who won this year’s Lion of St Mark award for his lifetime of achievements in advertising, was asked whether big ideas matter more than little ones in today’s world. His answer: Big ideas build brands. What we need is lots of little executions of a big idea, to carry across all touchpoints.

Time and repetition

In another insightful session, Marc Pritchard, the Chief Brand Officer at Procter & Gamble, put forward five lessons in brand building. One of these was the need to build memory with advertising. “It takes time and repetition to build memory,” he said. “Have the discipline and courage to be consistent with your advertising.”

This is wise advice, particularly in today’s world of fragmented media and AI, with a perennial temptation to engage in “performance marketing” through short-term tactical campaigns that target consumers with a wide range of offers, deals and clever creatives. WARC, a global authority on marketing effectiveness, has re-emphasised this by highlighting how consistency delivers more brand profits.

Sticking to a strong creative platform, and refreshing it over time with multiple creative approaches, embeds the brand deeply in the minds and hearts of consumers.

Two benchmark examples from Cannes Lions 2025 illustrate the benefits of such consistency in marketing. The brilliant “shot on iPhone” campaign from Apple and the endearing ‘Real Beauty’ platform created by Dove. Both these long-running campaigns received the coveted Grand Prix awards this year.

The “shot on iPhone” idea was launched way back in 2015, primarily as an out-of-home (OOH) campaign. It was remarkably simple — billboards featuring real photographs shot on iPhones by real users. The photographs, techniques and iPhone models used have since changed many times, but the campaign has remained consistent in showcasing the powerful iPhone camera.

Dove’s ‘Real Beauty’ campaign has, since 2004, showcased radically different depictions of beauty

Dove’s ‘Real Beauty’ campaign has, since 2004, showcased radically different depictions of beauty

In sharp contrast to competitors who focused on megapixels and lenses, this campaign showed us what iPhone cameras could actually do. It has driven over 20 billion OOH impressions. In 2025 alone, it drove over 40 million visits to the iPhone product page. This single campaign, with all its local adaptations, has contributed significantly to building affinity and purchase consideration for the iPhone, leading to its spectacular growth over the past decade.

Enduring theme

Similarly, the ‘Real Beauty’ platform from Dove was launched in 2004, based on a finding that only 2 per cent of all women described themselves as beautiful. The brand, therefore, developed its creative objective — to help more women feel more beautiful every day. To do this, the brand developed a platform that showcased radically different depictions of beauty, and spoke about what real beauty meant.

The campaign decided to never use models in its advertising. Instead, women are shown as their true selves.

‘Real Beauty’ has seen many different creative executions over the past 20 years, but the core theme remains the same.

Dove, which had been an ageing brand before the launch of this campaign, is today purchased by 37 per cent of the world’s population, according to Kantar. The brand estimates that the ‘Real Beauty’ campaign has driven an incremental revenue of $28 billion. Truly amazing.

In India, too, we have seen some iconic brands develop consistent marketing and advertising platforms, though these have been few and far between. Tata Tea’s iconic ‘Jaago Re’ campaign was launched 15 years ago, and the brand has since remained consistent with this unique platform.

This powerful campaign, which has seen multiple executions, urges us to develop our sense of civic responsibilities, even as we enjoy our favourite cup of tea.

Amul’s topical advertising, which presents the brand’s interesting take on current events, is yet another example of consistency in advertising. Other Indian brands that have exhibited such consistency include Asian Paints and Fevicol.

Consistency is not easy to pursue in today’s world of fragmented media and short-term pressures. But these examples show us that the ongoing power of a strong creative idea, refreshed imaginatively over time, is perhaps the best bet for building a strong brand.

(Harish Bhat is an avid marketer and bestselling author. He was previously the Brand Custodian at Tata Sons)

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Published on June 29, 2025