MK thought leaders 2016: these are the winners

The winners of the MK thought leader election: Bertrand Blancheton, Ewa Ming and Thomas Hutter (from left).For the second time, MK was looking for the most popular thought leaders in the field of marketing and communications. Through public voting in March 2016, one winner was chosen from each of the nine finalists in the three categories "Client," "Service Provider," and "Research/Teaching/Associations." Read more about the process of the MK thought leader election here.The digital marketing expert Bertrand Blancheton (48.2 percent of the votes) beat Sandra Caviezel (Credit Suisse, 26.7 percent) and Irene Fischbach (Swissgrid, 25 percent) in the "Client/Customer Side" category.In the "Service Provider/Media/Implementer/Creation" category, trade fair queen Ewa Ming (54.8 percent), ahead of Oliver Stäcker (Gotomo, 25.4 percent) and Marc Walder (Ringier, 19.7 percent).In the category "Research/Teaching/Associations" Facebook guru Thomas Hutter (40.8 percent) ahead of Torsten Tomczak (University of St. Gallen, 31.3 percent) and Natalie Rickli (Goldbach Group, 29.7 percent).

Winner: Bertrand Blancheton

Bertrand Blancheton (*1982) was Head of Digital Marketing and CRM at PSA Switzerland until the end of March 2016. In this role, he made the Citroen and DS brand labels known on the Swiss market in an innovative way. He is a specialist in digital marketing, inbound marketing, lead generation, SEO, social media and growth hacking. In addition, Blancheton is the founder of the Urban Gardeners Republic, the largest Swiss community in urban gardening.Blancheton has a very broad network and occupies a top spot in Kuble's ranking of the most influential Swiss. As a digital native from the very beginning, he knew how to combine his passion for bits & bites with business from the very beginning. It is therefore not surprising that Blancheton sees his passion for digital as primarily results-oriented. This also applies to his career path: In 2003, Blancheton completed a year of study at the Institute of Technology (IT) Carlow, graduating with a National Diploma in International Business in the Irish town of the same name. Afterwards, the cosmopolitan continued his studies at the Euromed Marseille Business School, where he earned a Master of Science in Management.2007 saw the start of his stellar career, initially in classic marketing, with his first position as Marketing Manager at Carrefour Distributis AG in Dietlikon. Three years later, as International Sales Manager at Freitag Lab AG, he added sales expertise, particularly in the neighboring market of France. In 2011, Blancheton moved to electronics manufacturer Rotronic AG to expand traditional marketing to include digital marketing as International Promotion Coordinator. In 2014, he took up his post at PSA, whose digital presence he cultivated just as much as his zeitgeisty hobbies, which include blog curation, hipstamatic and iPhonography.

Winner: Ewa Ming

Ewa Ming (*1967) is founder and sole owner of Ming Agentur AG and Celebrationpoint AG. She is co-founder of Swiss Handicap, a trade fair for people with and without disabilities, and managing director of Suisse Emex, the largest marketing and event trade fair in Switzerland. Her main activities are consulting, marketing, media relations and implementation of projects in the field of experiential communication, the meeting business MICE and in the activity field of exhibitions. Ewa Ming also sits on the Board of Directors of GDZ Druckerei Zurich and Eulachhallen Winterthur.When Suisse Emex celebrates its tenth anniversary in August, the ambitious entrepreneur can look back on a remarkable career. She began with a diploma from the Ecole Hôtelière de Lausanne (EHL). After classic professional stations at the front desk and in the back office of the luxury hotels Hyatt International and Montreux Palace, she rose to become Sales Manager of the Mövenpick Hotel Zurich and later Marketing Manager of Candrian Catering AG. At the beginning of 1997, Ming founded her own communications agency, six years later the MICE expert network Celebrationpoint AG, and in 2006, together with partners, Emex Management GmbH and in 2012 Messe Swiss Handicap AG - four successful companies that she still manages today.The creative businesswoman, who speaks seven languages and also found time for the marketing planner and a CAS cultural management degree, always kept her finger on the pulse of the industry. The networker thinks cross-medially and also likes to pass on her expert knowledge as a lecturer for event management and trade fair marketing. She also cultivates her agency claim "Creating Emotions" in her private life: when discovering foreign cities, cultures and cuisines, when doing sports or when philosophizing among friends.

Winner: Thomas Hutter

Thomas Hutter (*1976) is the owner and managing director of Hutter Consult GmbH. He advises large and medium-sized companies, organizations and agencies in Switzerland, Germany and Austria on all aspects of Facebook marketing and the commercial use of Facebook. The online professional also teaches at the Zurich University of Applied Sciences and Arts, the University of Applied Sciences Northwestern Switzerland and the Media Training Center Lucerne. In addition, he teaches as a seminar leader at various German-speaking providers, speaks at major conferences on Facebook marketing and advertising, and writes professional articles for well-known newspapers and trade magazines.When it comes to current marketing developments, his Facebook and social media blog is considered the first source of information. A solid commercial education at Griesser AG and further training in IT formed the basis for the IT projects that Hutter took on at Griesser from 1995 and at Winterthur Leben AG from mid-1999. During the dotcom boom, he started his own business, RH Web Solutions, which he transformed into web-solutions.ch gmbh in 2003 and led as CEO until 2006. This was followed by two and a half years as a senior consultant at Assai Dialog + Digital AG - then a subsidiary of the Wirz Group - and six months as a sales manager and consultant at Online Consulting AG.With the knowledge he had accumulated in his specialist areas of content management, online marketing and the social web, the online pioneer founded Hutter eConsulting & Coaching in 2009, transforming it a year later into Hutter Consult GmbH, which specializes in Facebook and digital marketing. The renowned Facebook guru also sits on the board of directors of Koch Kommunikation AG, Nestor International Corporation AG and on the board of directors of the newly founded startup YEAHGOODS Ltd.

Other MK thought leaders

A directory with all nominated MK thought leaders including the finalists 2016 is available here.