Subject areaChannels and tools
Also known asGoogle Apple Facebook Amazon
GAFA stands for Google, Apple, Facebook and Amazon, the four large US technology companies that control a good part of online search, devices, social media and e-commerce.
The acronym is used above all in Europe, and Facebook has been called Meta since 2021, but the original form remains current.
For marketers the term signals a dependency: whoever buys advertising on these platforms accepts their rules, prices and measurements. In the European Union the Digital Markets Act, Regulation (EU) 2022/1925, places specific obligations on the large platforms that act as gateways to digital markets.
Source: Meta Platforms, Introducing Meta: A Social Technology Company, 28/10/2021, per il cambio di nome; regolamento (UE) 2022/1925.
An example
The site's article on performance marketing (marketing paid for on measured results) cites the GAFA channels to explain channel overload: the places to advertise are always the same, so competitors crowd into the same spaces.
Related entries
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Enrico Giubertoni. Licensed under CC BY-NC 4.0: you may quote, translate and adapt this entry with the author’s name and a link, stating any changes. For commercial use, write to info@enricogiubertoni.com
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