media, marketing & effectiveness Vancouver
Developing Future Demand, Demanding Premium Video, and Warning Signs Around Unintended Media Bias
Those were the key themes at this week’s Media, Marketing, & Effectiveness event in Vancouver. We had a packed room of engaged brands, agencies and publishers keen to learn, engage, and bring practical insights to their everyday jobs.
Conference Highlights:
FUTURE DEMAND, James Hurman
James Hurman, effectiveness expert and author of Future Demand, shared key learnings from his latest book, revealing how marketing to tomorrow’s customers can help brands escape the performance trap and unlock sustainable, profitable growth.
WHY PREMIUM MATTERS, Justin Lebbon
Justin Lebbon, founder of the Future TV Advertising conference, consultant and podcast host, delivered an unfiltered presentation that included an impassioned argument for prioritising Canadian premium media and an overview of the challenges brands face in today’s online space.
MIND THE (MEDIA) GAP, Steve Levy
Steve Levy, Ipsos Canada, shared the latest Ad Nation research, exploring the differences between the media habits and advertising perceptions of industry professionals and Canadian consumers – and what those differences mean for the assumptions we make about audiences.
TV WORKS (ON EVERY SCREEN), Catherine MacLeod
Catherine MacLeod, President & CEO of thinktv, detailed the power of TV to drive business results through its scale, impact and profitability.
FROM HEAR TO HERE, Caroline Gianias
Caroline Gianias, President, Radio Connects, shared the results of an Angus Reid study on the Canadian audio landscape, including insights to inspire and inform audio planning.
speakers
JAMES HURMAN
Founder, Previously Unavailable; author, Future Demand
James Hurman is a New Zealand-based entrepreneur, investor and advertising effectiveness expert.
He’s the founder and chair of Previously Unavailable, a creative company that partners with, creates and invests into high-growth startup companies.
He’s the author of two acclaimed advertising effectiveness books – The Case for Creativity (2015) and Future Demand (2026) – which bring together evidence-based research to help organisations better plan brand, marketing and advertising strategy. He’s also the author of several major data-driven marketing effectiveness studies including The Effectiveness Code (2020) with Cannes Lions and WARC, and The B2B Effectiveness Code (2021) with the LinkedIn B2B Institute and WARC.
James is the programme director of the Master of Advertising Effectiveness, a global online professional development programme for marketing and advertising people whose alumni includes executives from Airbnb, Disney, McDonalds, New York Times, Salesforce and all of the major advertising agency networks.
He also consults large organisations across the world, is a senior advisor at LIONS Advisory – the consulting offering of Cannes Lions – and is a co-founder of several high-profile New Zealand startups including Tracksuit (brand health tracking SAAS) and New+Improved Ventures, a venture studio specialising in AI and SAAS marketing technology companies.
CATHERINE MACLEOD
President & CEO, thinktv
Since her appointment in April 2015, Catherine has led the transformation of thinktv from an information bureau to an industry advocate for the power of television advertising to drive brand and business results.
Prior to thinktv, Catherine was SVP, Specialty Channels at Bell Media where she was responsible for brand and programming strategies across all of Bell Media’s non-sports specialty & pay television channels and digital assets
STEVE LEVY
Ipsos Canada
Early in his career Steve spent time in Sales at Xerox and Marketing at Mars foods in the UK. Since the late 80’s Steve worked with several research organizations in Asia and Canada before merging with Ipsos where he has had several leading roles both domestic and internationally. He is the author of (among other things) the Most Influential Brand Study (Globally). He is a Canadian Marketing Association lifetime achievement award recipient, a Fellow of CRIC (Canadian Research and Insights Council), a Young Lions Jury member and a frequent public speaker/commentator. Steve is also a very active member board member of the Earth Rangers charity and the St, Mikes Foundation. Passionate about the world of public speaking he frequently runs workshops on the subject for a broad range of organizations. His bio would not be complete without saying that he takes his eyewear very seriously.
JUSTIN LEBBON
Founder & Media Industry Advisor
Justin Lebbon is a globally respected figure in the media and advertising industry, with television at the heart of his experience.
He founded what became the world’s leading TV advertising event series, later acquired by Adwanted Events. Through that platform, and the global conferences he continues to host, Justin has helped shape some of the most commercially important conversations in media.
He has a rare and current view of how television is being planned, evaluated and challenged across markets. Crucially, he does not view TV in isolation. He understands the wider media ecosystem through the lens of its key stakeholders – media owners, technology platforms, brands and agencies – and how their decisions are changing as competition for advertising investment intensifies.
Justin closely follows and frequently draws upon the work of the world’s leading advertising effectiveness thinkers and researchers. He argues that while this body of evidence is tremendously valuable, too often it is not reflected in how media investment decisions are actually made. Increasing complexity, competing incentives and industry noise can make it difficult for marketers to translate established effectiveness principles into practice. Justin is not a researcher himself; his perspective comes from sitting at the centre of these conversations and seeing how the evidence collides with the commercial realities of the media market.
Alongside his conferences, Justin consults across the industry (brands, media and tech) and runs private forums that put him in direct dialogue with senior marketers, media owners, agencies and technology companies across multiple markets. This gives him early visibility into where investment thinking is moving, the pressures influencing those decisions, and how commercial realities are reshaping media planning globally.
What sets Justin apart is his ability to connect these worlds. He cuts through industry noise and brings a grounded, independent and commercially realistic perspective to the forces shaping media investment – and what they mean for the future of television.
CAROLINE GIANIAS
President, Radio Connects and the World Radio Alliance
Caroline Gianias brings more than 30 years of agency experience working with leading Canadian and global brands, followed by a decade representing Canada’s commercial radio industry. A Chartered Marketer, Caroline is a past Chair of the Canadian Marketing Association’s Media Council, the current Co-Chair of the IAB Canada Audio Committee and a member of the Numeris Audio Executive Committee.