Digital News
MAD//Fest 2025 reflections – Why marketers mustn’t lose sight of humanity in the AI age
By Emi Ikemoto, Senior Digital Manager
This year’s MAD//Fest opened with a bold tagline: Be less boring.
Similar to Madano’s experience at SXSW London, AI dominated many sessions (unsurprisingly). But there was a refreshing counter-current that ran through the festival, one that put people, not platforms, at the heart of good marketing.
Apathy will be the death of brands
The value of brand loyalty is something that most decision makers won’t need convincing of. However, Havas Group’s Global Chief Strategy, Data and Innovation Officer, Mark Sinnock, revealed a stark truth from its new report: 78% of brands could vanish tomorrow and most consumers wouldn’t care, with that figure even higher in the UK (85%.)
Loyalty evaporates when apathy takes over. That’s why brands must decipher what their customers care about and maintain consistent, quality engagement.
In an increasingly turbulent world, a key theme that has emerged is the growing importance of personal agency, and consumer behaviour is one area where people can feel they can take control. 45% of people say they’ve stopped buying from brands that do not have the same views and values as them (Havas, 2025.) Brands must adapt to start selling through the lens of enabling personal agency amongst their customers to, in turn, reinforce attachment and loyalty.
Community prevails
Lululemon is a globally successful activewear brand known for fostering strong ambassador relationships and community-focused events, from run clubs to pop ups. What sets it apart from others, according to its Chief Brand and Product Activation Officer Nikki Neuburger, is their approach to community building.
They aim for a carefully maintained balance between global reach and local credibility and have community at the centre. Their ethos is that brands can facilitate communities but cannot truly own them. Ambassadors are a vital cog in this strategy and apply to not only B2C but in the B2B realm too; having those on side that can lend their credibility within your target audience whilst advocating for your brand is invaluable to any business. What Lululemon recognises, however, is that the partnership is a two-way street and going that extra step in supporting its ambassadors both in professional and personal capacities is key to a successful relationship and, ultimately, key in working together to foster loyal communities.
Social media is undoubtedly a key tool in fostering communities, and Madano’s Orange Paper analysed the leading social media channels to help brands determine which channels best cater to audiences, support community growth, and foster authentic engagement. It highlights that by adopting a community mindset, brands and creators can reap the benefits of an engaged and loyal online audience. Read more about it here.
Creative at the heart of any campaign
With budgets under pressure, creativity can sometimes feel like a luxury. However, Alix Sutherland, agency partner at Meta, spoke to the value of a considered and diverse approach to ad creatives when it comes to paid campaigns.
She revealed that 56% of the Meta auction is attributed to creative, and that 4 repeated exposures to a similar creative can result in a 60% decline in conversions.
Campaigns need diverse formats and placements to keep content feeling fresh and the audience engaged. A big push on creator content and partnerships also remains, tying it back to the theme of leveraging communities.
So how can brands adapt to better serve their communities?
The talks at MAD//Fest highlighted some key reminders for brands navigating today’s complex landscape:
- Open a dialogue to learn what matters most and to whom
- Act on what you learn quickly and meaningfully before it loses relevance
- Establish how to empower people to take more control over their lives
- Forster loyal communities by working in partnership with your brand’s advocates and ambassadors
- Keep audiences engaged, and keep the algorithm on side, through truly diverse creatives for your digital campaigns
- And ultimately, to tie it back to the event’s tagline: Be less boring.
At Madano, we help brands engage and build communities that last.