Debbi Vandeven’s top tips for Titanium-plated wins

She joined VML at its Kansas City office in 2000, and she has been there ever since, just a few weeks ago celebrating her 25th year at the company. 

But she’s not been standing still. Today she is VML’s roving global Chief Creative Officer, and while still living in Kansas City, she travels worldwide to oversee the creative work of a company that was 130-strong when she joined, and now numbers 30,000 globally.

You can’t talk about Titanium without Dan Wiedan’s quote – “it’s work that stops you in your tracks and makes you rethink the industry”.

Her background was in design, after a fine arts scholarship at the University of Kansas, following that up with a more industry-oriented marketing and advertising Masters course at Webster University, and opening a design shop with her husband Jeff. 

“In 2000, VML had just started getting into digital work,” she recalls. “I was working on my Masters, getting more interested in marketing and advertising, and I wanted to learn more about it. In the past 25 years I’ve been through some amazing transitions.” 

She points to one of VML’s big clients, Wendy’s, for her favourite, stand-out piece of award-winning work, executed in 2020. “It was our first Grand Prix,” she recalls. “Wendy’s ‘Keeping Fortnite Fresh’.” The hugely popular game had announced a Food Fight between Team Pizza and Team Burger. So far, so tasty. Cue Wendy’s crashing the live stream on Twitch. “We were on another pitch,” she recalls, “and the team was all playing Fortnite, and [CEO] Jon Cook came in and asked, why are all those creatives playing video games?’ Well, there was a very good reason!

“When they announced Food Fight on Fortnite, Pizza Hut had grabbed one, Burger King had grabbed the other, and because Wendy’s whole platform is ‘fresh never frozen beef’, when we tried to figure out how to get in there, we decided, let’s go in and start taking out the freezers. Don’t play the game, don’t kill people. Just take out the freezers. So they hacked the game. And that was a totally different way in.” And pretty unique too – advertisers and gamers rarely mix well. 

Wendy’s strategy is to be like the people on the [gaming] platforms… So they don’t go in as a brand, they go in and behave like the people playing.

“Wendy’s strategy is to be like the people on the platforms, always,” she adds. "So they don’t go in as a brand, they go in and behave like the people playing. And to win a Cannes Grand Prix, that was the big one.”  

She knows what winning big is like, and now she’s about to double down on her work as President of Titanium as it marks its 20th year. “You can’t talk about Titanium,” she says, “without Dan Wiedan’s quote – “it’s work that stops you in your tracks and makes you rethink the industry”. It’s about a point in time, too. When you look at the 20 years of Titanium, it’s not always about the whole industry and what’s going to happen; it’s the best piece of work that defines that point in time.”  

She points to game-changing precedents such as 2015’s Titanium-winning CPB campaign for Dominos, where customers could order their ham and cheese via an emoji-based ordering system.  “It made people rethink,” she says. It was a really simple idea – ‘I didn’t know you could buy stuff with emojis’ – that’s where you really look at what’s happening in the world.” 

Nike’s Titanium winning Fuel+Band ushered in a new dawn of brands’ interaction with products and consumers.

Another Titanium campaign she points to is 2012’s Nike Fuelband – ten years into Titanium’s history – which she calls a game-changer in the way brands began to engage in products and services.  “Everything that is in Titanium is also in another category,” she says. “So does it have to be a really cool innovation piece, or a brand new tech thing, or can it be a way to look at the best idea that is out there in Cannes? Whether for a big or a small client, what matters is, was it an original way in, and was it really amazing for the brand?” 

You have to decide your casting – should you invite the client, is there someone, something else you need to bring to the [jury] room?

Leading the Jury in choosing the festival’s Titanium recipient is a tall order. The 20-strong shortlist needs to be locked in before the festival starts, because each of those 20 potential Titaniums are required to present to the President and jury. 

“You have to decide your casting – should you invite the client, is there someone, something else you need to bring to the room? The 20 on our Titanium shortlist present to us on the Tuesday and Wednesday, then our jury deliberates on who gets the Titanium and the Grand Prix. And my job is to keep them all calm.”

There are a lot of things that will decide what rises to the top, but presentations are really important.

Those presentations can be as crucial as the work behind them. Vandeven has some tips. “Before they come in we’ll watch the case study again, then they present for ten minutes. There are a lot of things that will decide what rises to the top, but presentations are really important." 

"You have 10 minutes to present, and 10 minutes for questions," she goes on. "And you need to give us information that we don’t know about the work. We’ve already watched the case study, we have supporting materials, and you don’t want to repeat yourself. Why is it truly Titanium? We go through all 20, make notes, deliberate on the Wednesday, and that may be my late night.”

When it comes to potential Titanium-plated game-changers that’s coming down the funnel, she points to AI’s integration into the creative. “You’re seeing more AI,” she says, “but I’m looking for how AI enhances the idea, not ‘we used AI to do this or that’, and I’m like, is the idea good? We are celebrating creativity so you’re looking for an idea that makes the creative better. And I’m still looking for really good humanity in our work,” she adds. 

VML's innovative Grand Prix-winning work for Wendy's.