The Top 5 Big Ideas of 2023

1. True Patriot, ‘Remastered Memories’: The big story of 2023 is GenAI. The idea here was to use letters to home written by servicemen in WWI and WWII as prompts for MidJourney. The images of the past it created are unsettling and hallucinatory. At Cannes Lions, it won no awards, perhaps because jurors are uneasy about the future.

2. Cadbury Celebrations. ‘Shah Rukh Khan – My Ad’: Over 2,000 submissions to Cannes Lions were ideas that utilised AI of some sort. This campaign is an incredible fusion of tech and creativity to give thousands of little shops their very own ad with Shah Rukh Khan mentioning them by name. It won the Grand Prix for Effectiveness at Cannes.

3. Mint Mobile, ‘ChatGPT writes our Ad’: On the subject of AI, Hollywood star Ryan Reynolds put ChatGPT to work for Mint Mobile. Just as he had written and produced funny and likeable advertising himself to turn Aviation Gin into a brand that he sold for $630 million, he did the same thing with Mint Mobile. In March 2023 he made $300 million from its sale. Advertising works and it took a film actor to remind us.

4. Partners Life, ‘Last Performance’: At the end of the episode of the TV series The Brokenwood Mysteries, a dead character comes to life before the credits roll to wish that he/she had taken out life insurance. An innovative collaboration between agency, production company and broadcaster. Brilliant.

5. EBM, ‘Schoolgirl Newscasters’: Broadcast on the three main news channels in Pakistan on World Human Rights Day, this idea made the point powerfully that the education of girls is how the country can prosper. A worthy winner of a Gold at Cannes Lions.

Patrick Collister is Custodian of The Caples Awards, formerly of Ogilvy London and Google NACE. patrick@creative-matters.com