Somewhere between the three-hundredth campaign deck and the four-hundredth, a curious thing tends to happen to advertising judges: they begin to crave simplicity the way a traveler craves water.

That phenomenon was on full display at the recent judging of The Drum Awards for Marketing 2026 in New York, where senior marketers confronted the annual pile of case studies, sizzle reels and platform integrations that constitutes the modern awards entry. What emerged, according to participants, was a pronounced preference for work that could be understood in roughly the time it takes to read this sentence.

"The cases that stood out were the clearest ones," one judge said during deliberations. "You understood the emotional insight almost immediately."

The observation would seem unremarkable — clarity has been a virtue since Aristotle, and probably before — except that it arrived in a year when entries were more technically elaborate than ever. Judges reported that weaker submissions often arrived groaning under the weight of platforms, optimization mechanics and references to artificial intelligence, as if complexity itself were the product being sold.

The stronger work, by contrast, trusted its audience. It got to the point faster. (A radical notion, getting to the point.)

Lali Lobzhanidze of Novartis described marketing as increasingly becoming "a science," but several judges noted that the highest-scoring campaigns balanced rigor with humanity rather than allowing data to flatten the work into something technically proficient and emotionally inert.

The role of artificial intelligence proved particularly instructive. Judges suggested that A.I. appeared most effective when it sharpened an idea rather than becoming the idea itself — a distinction that may prove durable as the tools spread.

For years, the industry has rewarded complexity: more data, more channels, more personalization. Inside this year's judging room, the work that cut through most effectively did something simpler. It made sense.

Original story published in The Drum: "Inside the Jury Room: In the AI era, clarity is becoming a superpower | The Drum"