The Campaign Podcast

As the Fifa World Cup gets closer to crowning the winner, Campaign invites advertising creatives to review a selection of ads that are celebrating the football tournament. The episode includes Richard Brim, founder and chief creative officer at Ace of Hearts; Carren O’Keefe, chief creative officer at Digitas, and Dan Watts, chief creative officer at Pablo London.  Hosted by tech and multimedi...

The Campaign editorial team are back after spending last week (22 June - 26 June) at Cannes Lions International Festival of Creativity 2026. It was a week packed full with panels, parties and prizes and this episode of The Campaign Podcast sees tech and multimedia editor Lucy Shelley speak to the editorial team about their highlights as well as the work that took home the awards. Shelley is joined...

PARTNER CONTENT: Media fragmentation is often painted as one of marketing's biggest challenges. But what if the real issue isn't complexity itself – it's how organisations respond to it? Recorded from Campaign House during Cannes Lions, this special episode of The Campaign Podcast , sponsored by Camphouse and hosted by Campaign tech editor Lucy Shelley, brings together: Bridget Evans, global head...

The Campaign team looks back on Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity 2026. Editors from Campaign's sites around the world pick their highlights, including the Film Lions and Titanium winners and the big themes of the festival, plus the best parties. Gideon Spanier, UK editor-in-chief of Campaign, hosts the podcast, alongside Maisie McCabe, editor of Campaign UK, Jameson Fleming, editorial director...

The Campaign team has been busy in Cannes Lions and reports what's been happening so far at the festival, which runs from 22 to 26 June. Editors from Campaign's sites around the world discuss a 25% drop in award entries, the work that has been winning from their region and some of the key sessions in the Palais and at Campaign House. Gideon Spanier, UK editor-in-chief of Campaign, hosts the podcas...

The Campaign team looks forward to Cannes Lions in this preview episode about the festival, which runs from 22 to 26 June. Editors from our sites around the world give their tips for the festival and discuss everything that’s going on at Campaign House, our dedicated venue at Cannes. Plus they talk about how the Lions award entry rules have changed this year, the work from their region that they w...

Lord Heseltine tells the story of the birth of the European Space Agency. Why post-Apollo, when the US was spending £1.2 billion a year on space, the whole of Europe was spending just £200 million. Why the birth of ESA was driven by the self-interest of three major countries. Why the US general with a $29 billion budget for the Star Wars project wanted to invest in Heriot-Watt University in Edinbu...

Ahead of Cannes Lions Festival of Creativity taking place next week, Campaign catches up with three jurors to give us an insight into the judging process and what they expect from the festival and its winners this year.  Helen Rhodes, chief creative officer at Grey London; Amanda Morrissey, global brand president at iProspect and James Brook-Partridge, head of production at WPP Production UK...

In 2025, Cannes Lions was dampened by controversy after three awards were withdrawn over fabrication of case studies and concerns around their legitimacy. DM9’s “Efficient way to pay” was retracted after the DDB agency was caught using AI to fabricate news coverage and misleading the jury. Two others Lions were also removed from the agency. In response, Cannes Lions updated the entry process and i...

In 2025, there was a major rollback of DEI initiatives, and in 2026 the gender pay gap widened in advertising , while it shrinks in other sectors.  However, the IPA Cens us reported the proportion of women in C-suite surpassing 40% in adland for the first time , and ethnic minority representation at senior levels improved following two successive years of decline. Campaign’s School Reports hi...

Campaign's Media 360 opened its doors last week to a room of senior marketers, media owners and agency leaders. Food critic and Masterchef presenter Grace Dent opened the two-day conference in Brighton with speakers including co-host of The Rest Is Politics , Alastair Campbell , The Guardian 's global chief advertising officer Imogen Fox and Michelle Spillane, managing director, Paddy Power Online...

The advertising and media industry is going through a period of massive change, as a result of AI, economic and global pressures, organisational restructures and redundancies. In the latest market report from Campaign Red called “The Great Reboot” , we reported that the top holding companies cut 12,000 people from their businesses. As the industry is contracting, how are the people within it, its...

Adland’s agency networks have been forced to think differently, after a challenging year for holding companies with economic instability, a mega-merger and AI disruption. Publicis began calling itself a “platform organisation” years ago, while Omnicom restructured to become a “premier marketing and sales company” after the acquisition of IPG last year. In February, WPP’s chief executive Cindy Rose...

Media has seen a string of deals in the last year, poised to consolidate key areas of the market. Paramount Skydance seeks to complete its $111 billion takeover of Warner Bros. , and in the UK, Sky ponders its bid to acquire the broadcast and ad sales division of ITV . In publishing, after several other attempts fell through, European media group Axel Springer, which owns Business Insider and Poli...

Publicis Groupe acquired sports marketing and entertainment agency 160over90 this month, in a move it claims will “disrupt” the sector. In this episode, the Campaign team discusses why Publicis has made this "big bet" now, whether the sector needs disrupting and how influencers are changing the game. The team discusses why some say "the gap between brands and consumers is widening" and how at...

Last year WPP, Apple and Amazon increased their in-office days, with the latter two tech companies mandating five days in office. In February this year, adland’s best-performing holding company Publicis Groupe increased its mandated staff attendance from three days to four. In the age of AI and efficiency, this episode of The Campaign Podcast is asking if being in the office more does actuall...

In March, Meta and Google were found liable for designing addictive platforms that harmed a young user's mental health, a verdict both platforms disagree with and plan to appeal. Channel 4 also released its documentary called Molly vs The Machines about a 14 year old girl who took her own life after seeing harmful content online. Plus, the UK Government began a consultation for a potential ban for...

In-house agencies have been growing over the last few years, as brands have been taking more work in-house and building bespoke teams. In the last few weeks, Allwyn launched an in-house studio, ITV shifted its retained creative account from Uncommon to ITV Creative and Uncommon’s executive creative director Richard Biggs jumped to BBC Creative.  Campaign Red analysed this trend and last month...

In a break from the usual listen, we're bringing you the first three episodes of The Karman Line, a new podcast about the UK space industry from Haymarket Media Group, the owner of Campaign. This burgeoning sector is keen to communicate the extraordinary things it is doing to wider, complementary audiences. How do we solve population pressure and climate crisis in space? How has GPS allowed us to...

Campaign's annual School Reports scrutinise and assess 80 UK agencies from across the industry, giving them each a score between 1 and 9. Released last week, agencies across creative, media, social, digital, CRM and experiences are evaluated based on their individual history. The top mark of 9 is awarded to an agency that has had an outstanding year; 8 for an excellent year; 7 for a good one; 6 is...

Gaming has firmly entered the mainstream, with more than three billion players worldwide and engagement levels that now rival – and often exceed – social platforms. What was once seen as a niche channel is now a dominant cultural force, commanding time, attention and participation at scale. These shifts, and what they mean for brands, were explored in depth at Campaign’s recent gaming summit, held...

In a break from the usual listen, we're bringing you the first three episodes of The Karman Line, a new podcast about the UK space industry from Haymarket Media Group, the owner of Campaign. This burgeoning sector is keen to communicate the extraordinary things it is doing to wider, complementary audiences. What did the Space-Comm Expo conference and exhibition tell us about connecting space and w...

If gaming is not to be considered a media channel, what is it? Campaign hosted the Gaming Summit this month, and many speakers at the event asserted that gaming should be considered more than just a channel to activate to make the most of its 3.5 billion global audience. In this episode, Campaign's journalists from the event discuss why media should not be considered as as media channel, some of t...

The quote “good artists copy, great artists steal” also applies to advertising. Some ads are paying homage while some simply rip others off when creatives spot a good idea. In this episode, the Campaign team takes a look at some of the recent ads that look noticeably similar, including British Heart Foundation and Cancer Research , Crocs and the V&A , Experian and an Amazon ad from 2023, Primark a...

In a break from the usual listen, we're bringing you The Karman Line, which is a new podcast on the British space industry from Haymarket Media Group, the owner of Campaign. The UK space industry is a significant and strategic driver of the UK economy contributing over £19 billion in direct revenues. And it needs brilliant communicators to help tell its story. For most people, space is about rocke...