Paris (AFP)

Adidas, Puma, Coca-Cola, Starbucks, Unilever (owner of Lipton or Magnum), Ford ... Not a day without a big brand hanging its ads on Facebook, touching the heart of its economic model, even if the long-term impact of the movement remains uncertain.

More than 400 companies had joined the #stophateforprofit movement on Wednesday, which asked to suspend all advertising on Facebook and on the sister platform Instagram in July, and some of them were applying the same decision to all social networks.

Beyond the undeniable damage in terms of image, will the mobilization permanently weaken the economic model of Facebook and other large platforms, which generate most or almost all of their income by pub? Where has no regulatory authority or political discourse so far shaken the rise of the Gafa?

It is clear that Facebook, often criticized for its approach considered timid in the control of content, multiplies the ads for a few days: it has just banished the extreme right group "Boogaloo", promises to highlight the information sourced and documented, hardens moderation ...

"So far, social networks have managed to surf with speeches" on their efforts to moderate the most dangerous content, "but here it is their portfolio that is affected" says Laurent Benzoni, economist, professor at Paris 2 Panthéon -Assas and founder of the consulting firm Tera.

"I do not know how they will manage to find a compromise, by ensuring that they are not completely publishers" of the press, a label which the Gafa especially do not want, while "reassuring the advertisers" on the contents .

Daniel Salmon, an analyst at BMO Capital Markets, however, does not anticipate a "tangible financial impact at this stage".

- SMEs, Facebook's advertising reservoir -

Facebook in particular can count on a solid base of small and medium-sized businesses to fuel its advertising revenues, which come from some 8 million advertisers.

According to a count by the company Pathmatics, cited by CNN, the 100 biggest brands spending the most accounted for only 6% of the total advertising income of the social network last year, income which amounted to nearly 70 billion of dollars.

"It is difficult for a small business to leave Facebook", and even more so with the pandemic which has forced many local entrepreneurs to "convert to all-digital", judge Nina Goetzen, analyst specialized in the advertising sector, in a recent podcast.

Mark Zuckerberg's group also launched a new tool for small businesses in May, a sort of virtual "showcase" which allows traders to advertise ... and the social network to collect even more. of data. And therefore to offer ever finer advertising targeting.

Debra Aho Williamson, analyst at eMarketer, recognizes that the current mobilization "is different" from the weaker one that followed the Cambridge Analytica scandal of theft of personal data on Facebook.

But she points out that the brands that joined the boycott have for many "a long history of taking positions on social justice issues". To make the difference, it would have to be heard that a juggernaut such as Procter & Gamble, or Amazon joined the movement.

But will these big names want to do without the powerful tool that is the advertising targeting concocted by Facebook and others, thanks to a mass of personal data disseminated by Internet users?

Social networks "have built their business model on targeted advertising", recalls economist Olivier Bomsel, professor at Mines Paris Tech. To recruit as many potential targets as possible, "they were encouraged to maximize the audience by building sensationalist stories, exacerbating differences of opinion, conflicts of values".

Nick Clegg, Facebook's chief lobbyist, defended himself on Bloomberg TV of any such strategy: "We don't profit from hate, we don't encourage it." "It's our job to flush out this kind of content but I don't want anyone to imagine that we will get rid of it entirely because hate speech is part of the human condition."

In the longer term, in the very opinion of a company that boycots Facebook, the question of control of large platforms and their growing power is political.

"Because we advertisers have funded these platforms, we have a moral duty to offer alternative solutions", but "only democratically elected institutions can bring about lasting change. The real change (...) is to dismantle them, "said Joy Howard, chief marketing officer at Dashlane, a digital service provider, to AFP.

© 2020 AFP