Following a long day of judging for the second Cairns Crocodiles Awards, the esteemed jurors headed to Ela along the glittering Cairns harbourfront for a hard-earned refreshment and dinner.
But with their judging juices flowing, there was still more entertainment and fun to be had. Accenture Song’s Sam Geer engaged the jurors in a game of ‘Croc or not?’. Over the course of the dinner, the most important topics in the industry were tackled one after another to prove, definitively, whether it was a croc or not.
It’s safe to say that few questions have proven so pithy and even fewer so profound.
The first topic of discussion—whether content creators are now more culturally influential than ECDs—in light of global brands shifting budgets into creators, including Unilever, committing to 50 per cent of its total global budget, would prove controversial.
With the seasoned and celebrated creatives on the panel, including Dipshika Ravi, the national creative director of Schbang and Matt Stoddart, the ECD of TBWA and Eleven, there were opinions aplenty.
The room was split with some marketers claiming that creators’ authenticity and speed to react to trends gave them a level of cultural power that an ECD could never hope to replicate with long production timelines.
Others, however, felt that creators more often than not reacted to online culture rather than creating culture writ large.
The next question would really put the cats among the pigeons. What will the impact of AI be on brands and agencies. The responses were mixed, with some marketers even questioning the service they have received from agencies because, simply, they can do stuff cheaper.
That said, many in the room felt that without a human touch on all forms of marketing, more harm than good would be done.
The conversations continued flowing through the night. It was only the first day but it seems like we’re in for a brilliant Cairns Crocodiles.
To find out who wins, you’ll need to keep your eyes peeled on B&T and be in the Cairns Convention Centre come Thursday afternoon.
