Keyword Gabriel
Markus Gabriel is celebrating Angelink's fifth anniversary and is two years ahead of his time.
Markus Gabriel celebrates five years of Angelink and is two years ahead of his time.it all started with Socks. It was in 1995, when US President Bill Clinton's cat received the first virtual visit from surfers from all over the world at the White House in Washington. The purring of Socks on a website became a media topic. The advertiser Markus Gabriel also read about Socks at the time and wanted to know: "What does 'Internet' mean and what new opportunities would it open up, perhaps for our industry?" Permission marketing, viral marketing or search engine marketing and keyword advertising have since become terms that Gabriel recently tried to explain to the younger of his two girls on Swiss Schools Daughter's Day, when she spent a day at the agency on Zurich's Bolleystrasse.
Today, the ten-year-old already understands more than veteran advertising bosses from various major clients did back then, when Gabriel invited people to an information day at his former agency Schminke und Gabriel at the start of the Internet euphoria. The lack of knowledge in the advertising industry gave Gabriel the niche idea for his crossover agency. "Angelink", as his new agency is called in reference to "Angel" for angel Gabriel, "Ink" for ink and texts and "Link" for the valuable connections, offers "the orchestration of online and offline communication across all areas".
To make sure his daughter understood, father Gabriel explained the search engine marketing method using a simple example. According to him, it hardly brings in any customers if someone who wants to sell books enters the word "book" into Google. However, it would bring a lot if the bookseller defined "order book" as a keyword. Such entries are recorded by Angelink and Co. for potential customers, whether through technical interventions in the website or by placing keyword-supported ads that direct surfers to the relevant pages and thus entice them to buy.
In the USA, keyword advertising of this kind is the form of advertising "with the biggest boost, and there is no let-up," says Gabriel. It is the fastest growing sector in online marketing, with growth of 100 percent last year. Advertising with search terms already generates half as much revenue as banner advertising. The figures in Germany are also pointing upwards. The company is still two years behind the trend here. "But time is working for us," the Angelink pioneer is convinced. The number of employees at the agency has grown from two to six in the five years of its existence. The agency also works with freelancers, such as programmers in Siberia.
In search engine marketing, a specialty of Angelink for years, the agency has now also joined forces with its "toughest and at the same time most valued competitors". Search engine marketing, the latest form of direct marketing, has been outsourced by the full-service agency. Together with the web specialists Insign and Envia, Angelink Yourposition GmbH was founded. The search engine marketing agency Angelink Yourposition has already been entrusted with six accounts in the first month after its foundation. In addition to the online socks distributor Blacksocks .ch and the cement group Holcim, for example, for the Student Travel School and the online computer retailer ARP Datacon.
Angelink's most important clients in the classic advertising disciplines that it still cultivates include the Helsana Group, Rivella, Swarovski and Henkel, for whom Angelink was even able to export a concept to Germany. However, many of these projects are not pure classic advertising, but crossover concepts. "This merging of the real and virtual worlds is where we can play to our key strengths," says Gabriel.
The crossover specialist started working as a copywriter straight after graduating from high school. He worked at Wirz and Advico before becoming a CD at McCann at the age of 30. As he is "fundamentally more attracted to the new than to what already existed", the Internet came at just the right time for Gabriel. He was fascinated by multimedia because he had to "master and harmonize more instruments" than in traditional advertising.
But Gabriel has not only mastered the instruments of the World Wide Web. In his spare time, the advertising man also plays meditative cassettes on the didgeridoo and is one of the top five Swiss harmonica blues players. "If all else fails, I could make a living from the string band," says the unknown studio musician, who has already performed on stage with Eddie Harris, Super Charge and Louisianna Red and can be heard on a Nena record.
Plays virtuously with the possibilities of the web and with those of the "Schnurregiige": Angelink owner Markus Gabriel.
Andreas Panzeri
Today, the ten-year-old already understands more than veteran advertising bosses from various major clients did back then, when Gabriel invited people to an information day at his former agency Schminke und Gabriel at the start of the Internet euphoria. The lack of knowledge in the advertising industry gave Gabriel the niche idea for his crossover agency. "Angelink", as his new agency is called in reference to "Angel" for angel Gabriel, "Ink" for ink and texts and "Link" for the valuable connections, offers "the orchestration of online and offline communication across all areas".
To make sure his daughter understood, father Gabriel explained the search engine marketing method using a simple example. According to him, it hardly brings in any customers if someone who wants to sell books enters the word "book" into Google. However, it would bring a lot if the bookseller defined "order book" as a keyword. Such entries are recorded by Angelink and Co. for potential customers, whether through technical interventions in the website or by placing keyword-supported ads that direct surfers to the relevant pages and thus entice them to buy.
In the USA, keyword advertising of this kind is the form of advertising "with the biggest boost, and there is no let-up," says Gabriel. It is the fastest growing sector in online marketing, with growth of 100 percent last year. Advertising with search terms already generates half as much revenue as banner advertising. The figures in Germany are also pointing upwards. The company is still two years behind the trend here. "But time is working for us," the Angelink pioneer is convinced. The number of employees at the agency has grown from two to six in the five years of its existence. The agency also works with freelancers, such as programmers in Siberia.
In search engine marketing, a specialty of Angelink for years, the agency has now also joined forces with its "toughest and at the same time most valued competitors". Search engine marketing, the latest form of direct marketing, has been outsourced by the full-service agency. Together with the web specialists Insign and Envia, Angelink Yourposition GmbH was founded. The search engine marketing agency Angelink Yourposition has already been entrusted with six accounts in the first month after its foundation. In addition to the online socks distributor Blacksocks .ch and the cement group Holcim, for example, for the Student Travel School and the online computer retailer ARP Datacon.
Angelink's most important clients in the classic advertising disciplines that it still cultivates include the Helsana Group, Rivella, Swarovski and Henkel, for whom Angelink was even able to export a concept to Germany. However, many of these projects are not pure classic advertising, but crossover concepts. "This merging of the real and virtual worlds is where we can play to our key strengths," says Gabriel.
The crossover specialist started working as a copywriter straight after graduating from high school. He worked at Wirz and Advico before becoming a CD at McCann at the age of 30. As he is "fundamentally more attracted to the new than to what already existed", the Internet came at just the right time for Gabriel. He was fascinated by multimedia because he had to "master and harmonize more instruments" than in traditional advertising.
But Gabriel has not only mastered the instruments of the World Wide Web. In his spare time, the advertising man also plays meditative cassettes on the didgeridoo and is one of the top five Swiss harmonica blues players. "If all else fails, I could make a living from the string band," says the unknown studio musician, who has already performed on stage with Eddie Harris, Super Charge and Louisianna Red and can be heard on a Nena record.
Plays virtuously with the possibilities of the web and with those of the "Schnurregiige": Angelink owner Markus Gabriel.
Andreas Panzeri
