Laurent Burdin is Managing Director at SinnerSchrader, Germany's leading interactive agency, and one of the organizers of this year’s next conference which is all about the share economy: „We’re always trying to choose a theme which is a bit ahead of time. Behind the share economy is the fact that the internet is getting more and more complicated. People or companies want to share things to simplify them. Especially in this moment of crisis sharing things from one consumer to another or sharing platforms from one company to another is a good way to get stronger for the next step after the crisis.“ Laurent finds that the culture in Germany is changing slowly but surely: „All the banks are opening up to social media – they are careful about, but they are definitely progressing. The German Sparkasse with its website gut-fuer-deutschland.de is a case which is very well done. We as an agency are helping companies in having a look at what is Twittered and what’s happening on Facebook and blogs. By the way, the blog is not always the best solution. When you start blogging, you have to continue doing it – this can be very uninteresting for companies...“ Laurent recommends instead using social media for real time marketing: „The old habit is to do your marketing, put your message to the consumer and have him swallow it. The digital revolution changed all that – once the marketers have understood that, you can do a lot of things. Start with a Facebook group of two persons, ask questions and have people participate - then extend it and make it a regular thing. From that, progress and see what the reaction will be...if the users are not happy, we just let it go – but this is where you can start the pump.“ All of Viktoria’s interviews from next09 can be found here.