Blurred Lines: Why B2B Marketing Belongs at Cannes Lions Festival

The Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity has been the global stage for B2C (business-to-consumer) brilliance for a long time, a place where the world’s biggest consumer brands flex their creative muscles and help set the tone for global advertising trends. 

But in 2025, the lines between B2C and B2B (Business to Business) marketing have never been thinner. As artificial intelligence (AI) reshapes how we reach and resonate with our audiences, the challenges facing marketers, regardless of what they’re promoting, are more aligned now than they ever have before. 

And that is why the pharosIQ team attended Cannes Lions Festival this June. 

The Converging Worlds of B2C and B2B Marketing

Traditionally, B2C marketing has been driven by playing on emotions, storytelling and mass reach, while B2B marketing focused on logic, lead-gen, data analysis and lengthy sales cycles. 

But nowadays, it’s important to remember that customers are customers. It doesn’t matter whether it’s a marketing director choosing a new piece of technology for their martech stack, or a person choosing a new pair of trainers. Today’s audiences expect personalization, a seamless digital experience and trust. 

Below we dive into some of the core challenges that both B2C and B2B marketers are increasingly facing. 

Shaking up Search 

With Google’s introduction of generative AI in search, the rules of discovery are being rewritten. Featured snippets, organic results and paid placements are all evolving, replaced by AI-generated summaries and conversational results. 

What does it mean for marketers: 

• B2C Brands: Need to rethink their SEO and SEM strategies to stay visible in AI-powered search results. 

• B2B Brands: Face the same urgency as B2C brands, especially as buyers increasingly rely on search engines for research and vendor comparisons. 

Whether your brand sells luxury products or enterprise solutions, your content must now aim to speak to both humans and algorithms. A tricky task for any marketer. 

Attention is the Ultimate Commodity

Both B2C and B2B buyers are time-constrained and content-fatigued. The platforms they consume might vary, for example, TikTok versus LinkedIn, but the competition is equally fierce. 

What does it mean for marketers: 

• Emotion-led storytelling isn’t just for consumer brands anymore, B2B marketing teams must now be just as compelling and creative. 

• Campaigns need to work across multiple formats, e.g., short-form video, interactive content and influencer collaborations. 

Data Privacy and Measurement Chaos

The collapse of third-party cookies and growing consumer privacy demands are forcing all marketers to rethink and rebuild their data foundations. 

What does it mean for marketers: 

• B2C marketing teams are experimenting with first-party data strategies, loyalty programs and contextual targeting. 

• Meanwhile, B2B teams are heavily investing in ABM (Account-Based Marketing) tools, CRM systems and first-party data providers. 

Success for either team requires a unified data strategy and trust-based data collection processes. 

The Human and AI Partnership 

Generative AI is transforming content creation, personalization, campaign optimization and customer engagement. But the value isn’t what the tools can do, it’s how you apply them. 

What does it mean for marketers: 

• B2C Brands: Using AI to produce personalized product recommendations and creative copy. 

• B2B Brands: Start to leverage AI to help write better nurture sequences, automate their A/B testing and scale account-specific content. 

In both cases, marketers must carefully balance automation with authenticity, ensuring they don’t lose the human touch. 

Why Cannes Lions Festival Matters for B2B 

The festival celebrated marketing, creativity, ideas and thought-leadership that move people and spark new, creative, emotive marketing campaigns across the world. And this is exactly what B2B marketing aspires to do. 

B2B brands are no longer just talking to their prospects through whitepapers, sales-decks and product demonstrations, they are building communities, sparking emotions and investing in long-term brand equity that sets them up for years of success. 

At Cannes Lions, the pharosIQ team learned from some of the world’s most creative minds and contributed to conversations around how B2B brands can lead with emotion, purpose and innovation. 

The marketer’s mission in 2025 is the same. 

Be relevant. Be bold. But most importantly, be human. 

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