The Publicis Groupe is bringing a new campaign to the Croisette aiming to make a lion (no, not the trophy) go viral to demonstrate to marketers that creator and social-led campaigns can generate Super Bowl level reach for a fraction of the price.
The campaign launches on 16 June with a joint Instagram post from top wildlife influencers @shandorlarenty (9.3M TikTok, 596K Instagram) and @Pubity (40M Instagram, 17M TikTok), to introduce the lion.
@shandorlarenty Snack time for the family… 🥩 what’s your bestie’s favourite snack? 🦁 #GeorgeTheLion #ShandorLarenty #SnackTime #animals #wildlife #safari #lion ♬ La La La – Sped Up Version – Naughty Boy & Sam Smith
From there, the activation will expand across Influential and Captiv8’s network of creators, covering 90 per cent of influencers with more than 1 million followers, and 95 per cent with more than 5000.
The Lion Tracker at Influential Beach will monitor the lion’s growing audience in real time. By the end of the Cannes Lions Festival, he will have reached big game reach – through the power of Publicis’ unique influencer platform.
To drive the point home, the program is backed by a playful digital OOH play, comparing the cost of a Super Bowl-worthy influencer buy to a Cannes week tab: a handful of business class tickets, a quarter of that beach party budget, or just a sliver of the awards entries that some flood the system with to rack up metal.
Arthur Sadoun, CEO of Publicis Groupe commented: “With every acquisition — from Captiv8 to Influential — and every innovation, like CoreAI, we’re building a future-ready platform to help clients navigate an increasingly complex and challenging marketing landscape. At Cannes this year, we’re focused on turning AI hype into business upside — with practical, Monday-ready solutions our clients can put to work immediately”.
Publicis acquired Captiv8 last month. It acquired Epsilon six years ago, though its data has recently come under attack from WPP Media, claiming its inventory falls below accepted industry norms for viewability and attention. Publicis fired back: “We don’t normally respond to [WPP’s] desperate moves, as it doesn’t help our industry,” a Publicis spokesperson said in a statement to Ad Age that accused WPP of unethical behaviour and threaten legal action. “But in the face of such obvious falsehoods, we can’t stay silent.”
“WPP continues to claim innovation, this time by inventing their own ‘audits’ of their competitors,” the spokesperson said. “They’re doing it in a domain where they’ve recently excelled—throwing mud at their peers rather than focusing on their clients and their people.”