"The agency of the future"

Rainer Reichl in an interview with AdTalk

What matters in the future? An industry is in transition, evolving from a purely cost-driven service provider to a valuable, "collaborative" contributor to successful communications strategies. Agencies must adapt to the needs of their customers: Customized Agency is the magic word for long-term successful cooperation and replaces the efficiency thinking of many purchasing organizations with quality. Holistic thinking is the order of the day to strengthen the competitiveness of brands and companies. Strategy, design thinking, new business modeling, design and creation, public relations, live experience, media planning (analog, digital, social) - these are the skills of an agency of the future.

 

Mag. Rainer Reichl in conversation with AdTalk

 

Ad Talk:
The full-service advertising agency is dead. Long live the full-service agency. What do you say?

Rainer Reichl:

Perhaps one thing in advance: the classic full-service advertising agency was and still is the best concept for many customers. It just has to adapt its range of services to the present. It was the greed for money of the large, international agency networks that broke up this system. And that's why one media agency after another was founded. Some couldn't stuff their goiters enough and created 4, 5, 6 media agencies under a holding company to also serve competing clients. The media agency system also worked. The customer pays supposedly very low fees, but receives a standardized, canned service in return. If everyone does this, the competitiveness of all companies is reduced to the same level. And oh shit: Google Facebook &Co don't play along with that. Billions in losses are the problem for the media multinationals at the moment. And people are looking for new tasks. At first, this worked out quite well with online, as some online marketers paid high fees to the agencies and customers supposedly shopped even cheaper. Until social media turned everything upside down. And since social media has a promising future, the business model of the media multinationals was lost, at least in this area. Yes, and so now media agencies are starting to get creative. The creative agencies of these multinationals are closing in the smaller countries, and new creative departments are being opened in the media giants' holdings in London, Paris, Frankfurt and wherever else. The end of media agencies is leading back to the classic full-service concept.

Ad Talk:
Reichl und Partner has been working very successfully with 170 permanent employees for 30 years. Could you describe in a few sentences how the interaction works here, what the advantages and challenges are? Everything from a single source. One Stop Shopping. One Face to the Client.

Rainer Reichl:

We have always thought holistically. And holistically develop our agency at an early stage. The classic full-service advertising agency has evolved into a modern full-service communications agency. Our full-service communications agency brings together under one roof a high-performance creative agency, a holistically structured media agency (analog, digital, social), a digital agency specializing in eMarketing, a Google-certified digital agency, a PR agency specializing in brand PR and a social media agency networked across all communities. In addition, our experiential marketing company covers the area of live experience communication. In total, 170 top-class specialists and generalists work in our teams in Vienna and Linz. We have not used freelancers since our founding. We serve all media fields: PAID MEDIA, OWNED MEDIA, EARNED MEDIA like no other agency group is able to do. That is our USP. When a customer commissions the media agency, he has access to the services of all units, if he so chooses. A client of the creative agency also gets access to all other units. And so on.

 

Ad Talk:
Are there agencies that offer media and creative services only in combination? So the one only with the other? Or could it get that far one day?

Rainer Reichl:

Yes, this has always existed and is also our recommendation. But, we are also guided by the ideas of the customers.

 

Ad Talk:
Are media agencies and creative agencies growing together again globally and in Austria - or are they deliberately moving apart?

Rainer Reichl:

Austria is a small country, the multinationals are not really doing well here. The competence sits in the head office. But the local people try to sell their tools. Not always in the interest of the customer. For a global corporation, multinationals are sometimes the best solution. An Austrian client should work with regional media agencies and take advantage of local knowledge. This is exactly our chance!

 

Ad Talk:
What does the "agency of the future" look like?

Rainer Reichl:

Customized Agency is the name of our agency concept of the future, which is already bringing us considerable growth. Customers want full service tailored to their business. Agencies need to adapt to the needs of their customers. Holistic thinking is the order of the day to strengthen the competitiveness of brands and companies. Strategy, design thinking, new business modeling, design and creation, public relations, live experience, media planning (analog, digital, social) - these are the skills of an agency of the future.

 

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