Creators are the new kings of advertising's biggest bash

Move over, Mad Men. Cannes is a creator town now — at least for the next week.

A legion of influencers will be among the estimated 13,000-plus attendees headed to this year's Cannes Lions advertising festival, which kicks off in France on Monday. Creators are jostling for brand deals, paid speaking gigs, VIP party invites, and plenty of opportunities to shoot content along the glittering Côte d'Azur.

More than 250 creators are expected to attend, according to a list compiled by a coalition of marketing firms. Attendees include "Call Her Daddy" host Alex Cooper; "Feed Me" founder Emily Sundberg; makeup artist and creator Cindy Chen; TikTok stars Josh Richards, Golloria, and Keith Lee; and YouTubers Eleanor Neale, Colin & Samir, and David Dobrik, all of whom are expected to mingle with marketers throughout the week.

"When I was first going to Cannes, if you saw Martin Sorrell walking down the street, that was the big-name celebrity," said UTA's Margot Hauer-King, who was referring to the former WPP CEO and current S4 Capital exec chairman.

Now? "Alix Earle," Hauer-King said, referencing the attention the "get ready with me" influencer drew when she hit Cannes in 2025.

This year, creators are moving from the margins of Cannes to the center stage. That shift reflects an industry reckoning with fundamental changes in how consumers interact with media. As broadcast advertising becomes less effective at reaching fragmented audiences, marketers increasingly view creators as a critical channel for attention and influence.

EMARKETER, a Business Insider sister company, expects 88.7% of established companies in the US will invest in influencer marketing this year, up from less than 40% a decade ago. Brand spending on influencer marketing is forecast to reach $12.42 billion this year.

SharkNinja's chief brand and experience officer, Michelle Crossan-Matos, said that "influencer marketing," as a term, even feels outdated. She prefers "creator commerce," which emphasizes the extent to which creators have become involved in shaping both the products that brands release and how they market them.

Shweta Bhardwaj, a partner at Bain & Company, said creator strategy is now a core part of the marketing playbook.

"Many of the CMOs I talk to say the marketing of yesterday was us talking about our brands," Bhardwaj said. "The marketing of today is consumers talking about our brands, and our role as CMOs is to enable that conversation as authentically as possible."

Creators' Cannes agenda

Star YouTube creator Dhar Mann is returning to Cannes Lions for the second time this year, his calendar jammed with speaking sessions, including an interactive workshop in the Palais where marketing execs will compete for a $200,000 brand integration on his main channel.

Mann said he senses the power dynamic between creators and brands is shifting this time around.

"Creators aren't just showing up to network and learn from brands — now more brands want to know how creators work," Mann said. "Creators get feedback every day from millions of viewers. We know what makes them care and what makes them share."

There's still some work to be done to reduce bottlenecks, Mann added.

"The traditional process of working with traditional advertisers takes months — endless decks, meetings back and forth," Mann said. "Brands are learning that in order to survive this new climate, you have to move at the speed of culture. Who can do that? Creators."

Sundas Khalid, who posts content about AI and data science to her 1 million-plus followers, is heading to Cannes Lions for the first time this year. She's planning to catch up with brands she's already worked with, like OpenAI and Teachable, make new connections with marketers, and pitch up at LinkedIn's space on the Hotel Carlton rooftop to create content and meet other creators. (LinkedIn says there's just one rule: No swimming in the pool.)

"If there's one thing about the content creation space, it can be very lonely — I sit in my basement and record most of my videos there," Khalid said. "I proactively put in time to be in places where other creators are going to be."

The other hot topics: agentic AI, soccer, and M&A

Influencer marketing isn't the sole topic on the agenda at Cannes this year.

The ad industry is attempting to shake off angst about artificial intelligence and its potential to wipe out jobs and further concentrate power in the hands of the tech giants.

"Agentic" will be the central square on every Cannes buzzword bingo card as companies tout AI agents that can automate media buys, conduct research, and shop on consumers' behalf.

Brian Kotlyar, CMO of the marketing platform Hightouch, has two tips for marketers fielding those pitches. First, ask to see the thing in action in a live environment, not a staged one. Second, "When someone says they have an agent, ask them: What can your agent do that Claude, ChatGPT, or Gemini cannot?"

This year's festival falls during the final round of World Cup group-stage matches, ensuring that live sports — one of the last remaining mass-reach media vehicles — will again feature heavily in Croisette conversations. The World Advertising Research Centre forecasts the tournament will drive a $10.5 billion surge in worldwide ad spend this year as brands look to capitalize on the event's feel-good factor and global, cross-generational appeal. Plenty of companies at Cannes are hosting watch parties for big games, with the European time zone ensuring the festivities will run late into the evening.

Attendees can also expect a healthy portion of M&A chatter alongside their glasses of rosé. Speculation is rife about whether Publicis' acquisition of LiveRamp and Accenture Song's buying of Whalar could spark copycat deals in the data and creator spaces. Meanwhile, marketers will be quizzing Omnicom execs about how the integration of its $9 billion acquisition of Interpublic Group will affect its clients, for better or worse.

PepsiCo CMO Jane Wakely hopes "creative effectiveness" — campaigns that can demonstrate their business impact — will be the breakthrough trend once Cannes draws to a close this year. (Wakely is on the jury panel for the Cannes Lions Creative Effectiveness Award.)

Cannes Lions tightened its awards rules for 2026 after several of last year's winners drew scrutiny about whether the big claims made in their case studies could be verified. Wakely welcomed the changes.

"Two or three years ago, a lot of the work that was celebrated was not effective; it was stunts," Wakely said. "I think as an industry we were beginning to lose our way."