Cannes is a time for grand announcements. Even if they mean nothing.

So DAN and Tencent signed a deal that apparently will ‘transform mobile marketing‘ according to Campaign asia and usher us in a ‘new era of future marketing‘ according to Yahoo Finance.  Neither of the articles go beyond gibberish and jargon to suggest actual ramifications of the partnerships. One of the clearer outcomes is a ‘university’ to teach digital marketing. But that in itself is not very revolutionary, now is it?

Campaign asia talked about ‘exclusive’ partnership. So that’s how agencies are going to build superiority now – walled gardens, rent seeking. Damn, we are really out of ideas now aren’t we.

The deal apparently helps “gain valuable data-driven consumer insights” which essentially is an euphemism for collection of and selling of behavior data of consumers. I understand there is money in it. But damn, that’s a shady business to get into with a smile.

The truth is the mobile stack is just a gimmick to get clients to think that Dentsu ‘gets’ mobile marketing. I am sure some good will come out of it. But it certainly won’t ‘transform’ anything. The lack of vision in the PR article on two websites was indication enough of a clear lack of vision among agency leaders.

Sigh. I so wish for leaders in the industry to actually read, learn and think hard to actually become more useful to more people, more businesses. Instead we get these hogwash deals.