Ad Campaigns
Global campaign to engage youth in concluded UN’s Summit of the future
Mumbai: The United Nations Foundation recently launched Once Upon a Future, a global campaign calling on young people to engage in the Summit of the Future and join the millions of people worldwide taking action for our common future.
Hosted by the United Nations, the first-of-its-kind Summit brought decision-makers together with civil society and young people to reset and reboot global cooperation to better manage the risks and opportunities of the 21st century.
Once Upon a Future highlighted the stakes of the Summit for Gen Z and future generations, and amplified their calls for leaders to agree on the Pact for the Future — a new agreement that would strengthen the multilateral system to better help countries think, plan, and act for the future. The Pact addresses important issues ranging from peace and security to digital cooperation, to how we finance our development goals and better deliver for generations to come.
The Once Upon a Future campaign aimed to swap doom and gloom for optimism and hope for a better future, by asking the simple, yet powerful question: “What if we get it right?” Developed in partnership with award-winning creative agency Droga5, Once Upon a Future went beyond traditional tactics to create a compelling narrative designed specifically to engage a young, global audience. In addition to highlighting the voices and expectations of young people, the campaign also encouraged people to take small actions in their daily lives to help build a better future for all through the ActNow platform.
Once Upon a Future campaign utilised a suite of eye-catching graphics, animations, and video content to drive awareness and understanding around the Summit and its outcomes. Once Upon a Future puts young people at the centre, elevating their expectations and aspirations through user-generated content.
To engage young people — especially Gen Z — the centrepiece of the campaign was a youth-centric broadcast of the Summit developed in partnership with Droga 5 and produced by Tim Bierbaum and 1stAveMachine that premiered on YouTube. The broadcast unpacked the Summit and Pact for the Future so that it is both educational and entertaining for a young audience by featuring creators and content they care about — meeting them where they are. Hosted by Lea’h Sampson and Hallie Haas, the Broadcast also featured Heidi Becker, Felipe Neto, Dan Rosen, Pooja Tripathi, and Liah Yoo alongside other creators and UN experts.
“The Summit of the Future may be taking place in New York, but everyone has a stake in this,” said UN Foundation President and CEO Elizabeth Cousens. “When we imagine our world in 10, 50, or 100 years it’s clear: the future belongs to young people and the generations that follow. They have the biggest stake in this Summit and that is why we launched this campaign: to help bring the Summit to them.”
“In a world facing obstacles, it’s time for bold action,” said UN Foundation chief communications & marketing officer David Ohana. “Working closely with the UN we are determined to not only raise awareness but also drive lasting change — through exciting, thought-provoking and unconventional approaches.”
NATIONAL: Amazon Ads has laid out a sharply tech-led vision for the advertising industry in 2026, arguing that artificial intelligence, streaming TV and creator partnerships will combine to turn brand building into a more precise, performance-driven business.
At the heart of the shift, the company says, is the fusion of AI with Amazon’s vast trove of shopping, browsing and streaming signals, allowing advertisers to move beyond blunt reach metrics to campaigns designed around real customer behaviour.
“The future of advertising is not about reaching more people, but the right people with messages that resonate,” said Amazon Ads India head and vice president Girish Prabhu. “By combining AI with deep customer insights, we help brands move from broadcasting campaigns to having meaningful conversations wherever audiences spend their time.”
One of the biggest changes, according to Amazon Ads, will be the collapse of the wall between media planning and creative development. Retail media, powered by first-party data, is increasingly shaping everything from brand discovery to final purchase, pushing marketers to design campaigns around audience insight rather than internal instinct.
AI is also moving from a support tool to a creative engine. Agentic AI, which automates and accelerates production, is expected to make high-quality creative accessible even to small businesses, compressing weeks of work into hours and giving challengers the ability to compete with larger brands on speed and scale.
Behind the scenes, AI-driven analytics will take on a bigger role in campaign optimisation, identifying patterns, spotting opportunities and recommending actions that would previously have required teams of analysts.
Streaming TV is another big battleground. With India’s video streaming audience now above 600 million and connected TV users at 129.2 million in 2025, advertisers are set to treat streaming not just as a branding channel but as a performance engine, measured increasingly by sales, sign-ups and bookings rather than just reach.
Finally, Amazon Ads sees creators and contextual advertising reshaping how brands tell stories. Creators will act less like influencers and more like long-term partners, while scene-aware ads on streaming platforms will allow brands to insert hyper-relevant offers into the flow of what viewers are watching.
Taken together, Amazon Ads argues, these shifts mark a move towards advertising that is both more human and more measurable, where AI handles the complexity, and creativity does the persuading.
