Raphaël De Andreis is CEO at BETC Euro RSCG Paris. He recently attended the e-G8 meeting and would like to share his insights. The result is a sharp report on social media from a marketing expert on the inside.
I have just had a unique experience. At the e-G8, I witnessed the political triumph of the e-brands. Be it on stage, with Mark Zuckerberg (Facebook), Eric Schmidt (Google) John Donahoe (EBay/Paypal), or in the audience (LinkedIn, Twitter, etc.), they were all there, with the exception of Apple.
The e-brands have become so powerful that the eight greatest powers in the world need to dialogue with them in order to govern. They are powerful from an economic point of view (between 20% and 30% of GDP growth is tied to the Web) and powerful from a political point of view – their presence or absence in a country is a criterion of democracy according to French President Sarkozy and President Obama has already turned Facebook into the key medium of his re-election.
For the first time in corporate history, a handful of companies, aged 5 to 25 years at most, can credit themselves with playing a vital role in society. From Tunis to San Francisco, who could imagine living without them?
