Until six weeks ago, he managed a media budget of more than US$8 billion. He has been involved in 150 pitches. He has the ear of some of the most powerful men and women in the business. And, it turns out, Bernhard Glock is also something of a party animal.
At this month’s Casbaa (Cable & Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia) Convention, Glock was a fixture at the post-conference parties - his six-foot-plus frame making him literally stand out from the crowd. It’s a surprise to see a man who spent 24 years in the conservative culture of Procter & Gamble (P&G) so actively schmoozing. But as he embarks on a career as a consultant, he is clearly aware that now he has to do the chasing.
At the start of October, the German-born Glock, who is also president of the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), stood down as global VP of media at P&G - a role that saw him described by one magazine as a “media rock star”.
“Rock star” might be pushing it a bit - his demeanour is more John Cleese than Johnny Rotten. What he is, though, is chatty, articulate and straightforward; one Asian media executive who knows him describes him as “a smart, even visionary, person with a balanced point of view”.
So does he feel liberated now he has struck out on its own? “Not liberated, but independent,” he says in an accent that retains a German twang despite his years of living in Cincinnati. “Now I can say yes or no on my own. It is eye-opening.”
Glock first came to Asia 15 years ago, when after early success in his career in Europe, he was given responsibility for P&G’s media in the region. He recalls the cultural alignment courses he had to attend to immerse him in Japanese and Chinese customs. “It was the first time I really had to get into a new culture,” he says.
One of P&G’s biggest challenges at the time was overcoming an ingrained culture of - to Western eyes - corruption in markets like China. “There was no room for maneuver. That made it difficult at times,” he recalls. “But we never compromised. We put foreigners into the finance and media roles. Now the country is better in that respect. We have Chinese executives leading media buying.”
Glock’s solo career begins at a tense time for advertiser-agency relations. Media agencies have spent much of this year engaged in a series of international pitches, many of which have reputedly been little more than price-squeezing exercises. On this point Glock is unwilling to be drawn. “There are points on both sides,” he says. “There is a genuine need among clients to reduce costs. But if you do not pay a fair price you open the door to your partners looking to make money elsewhere.”
In his guise as WFA president, he has been active in developing guidelines to govern how both sides should act. However, he will not go as far as to say that agencies should simply refuse fees if clients cross the line. “I would like that the line is transparent when it’s being crossed,” he says. “We have to draw a line as advertisers and say which services we pay for and which we get for free.”
At P&G Glock gained a reputation as someone who was keen to experiment - including the drive by the company’s FMCG brands into online. Not all of his experiments paid off, though. One of the blips was Project Apollo, an ambitious research initiative in the US that sought to track exposure to multiple media and link it up to sales. Though backed by P&G, the project fell apart early last year after commercial support dried up. Despite its failure - which Glock describes as an “unfortunate accident” - he insists it was a step in the right direction, and that Asia’s media industry should be paying attention. “That’s where we will end up in five years’ time,” he says. “At the moment it still starts with the medium - I have a medium, I need to market that medium. It needs to start with the consumer.”
The problem with Apollo, he argues, is that the data was “not conclusive and cost a lot of money. But there will be other opportunities.”
Now Glock has other concerns - though he seems keen to stay at the experimental end of the media industry. His new clients include media owners and agencies, but he is working with a number of start-ups. One, he says, is a TV format he has never seen before. “If this works, TV will cease to exist. The computer will replace it,” he insists.
Given Glock’s background, he’s in a good position to judge.
Bernhard Glock’s CV
2009 Founder, The Bernhard Glock Media Leadership Company
2007 Vice-president, global media purchases, P&G
2006 Vice-president, global media and communication, P&G
2003 Manager, global media and communication, P&G
1999 Director, media and direct-to-consumer, Europe, and media, Asia, P&G
1998 Director, media, Europe; director, media, Asia, P&G
1994 Various media roles, rising to European Media Manager (Brussels), P&G
1985 Market research assistant, fabric care, diapers and beverages (Germany), P&G
This article was originally published in 19 November 2009 issue of Media.
At this month’s Casbaa (Cable & Satellite Broadcasting Association of Asia) Convention, Glock was a fixture at the post-conference parties - his six-foot-plus frame making him literally stand out from the crowd. It’s a surprise to see a man who spent 24 years in the conservative culture of Procter & Gamble (P&G) so actively schmoozing. But as he embarks on a career as a consultant, he is clearly aware that now he has to do the chasing.
At the start of October, the German-born Glock, who is also president of the World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), stood down as global VP of media at P&G - a role that saw him described by one magazine as a “media rock star”.
“Rock star” might be pushing it a bit - his demeanour is more John Cleese than Johnny Rotten. What he is, though, is chatty, articulate and straightforward; one Asian media executive who knows him describes him as “a smart, even visionary, person with a balanced point of view”.
So does he feel liberated now he has struck out on its own? “Not liberated, but independent,” he says in an accent that retains a German twang despite his years of living in Cincinnati. “Now I can say yes or no on my own. It is eye-opening.”
Glock first came to Asia 15 years ago, when after early success in his career in Europe, he was given responsibility for P&G’s media in the region. He recalls the cultural alignment courses he had to attend to immerse him in Japanese and Chinese customs. “It was the first time I really had to get into a new culture,” he says.
One of P&G’s biggest challenges at the time was overcoming an ingrained culture of - to Western eyes - corruption in markets like China. “There was no room for maneuver. That made it difficult at times,” he recalls. “But we never compromised. We put foreigners into the finance and media roles. Now the country is better in that respect. We have Chinese executives leading media buying.”
Glock’s solo career begins at a tense time for advertiser-agency relations. Media agencies have spent much of this year engaged in a series of international pitches, many of which have reputedly been little more than price-squeezing exercises. On this point Glock is unwilling to be drawn. “There are points on both sides,” he says. “There is a genuine need among clients to reduce costs. But if you do not pay a fair price you open the door to your partners looking to make money elsewhere.”
In his guise as WFA president, he has been active in developing guidelines to govern how both sides should act. However, he will not go as far as to say that agencies should simply refuse fees if clients cross the line. “I would like that the line is transparent when it’s being crossed,” he says. “We have to draw a line as advertisers and say which services we pay for and which we get for free.”
At P&G Glock gained a reputation as someone who was keen to experiment - including the drive by the company’s FMCG brands into online. Not all of his experiments paid off, though. One of the blips was Project Apollo, an ambitious research initiative in the US that sought to track exposure to multiple media and link it up to sales. Though backed by P&G, the project fell apart early last year after commercial support dried up. Despite its failure - which Glock describes as an “unfortunate accident” - he insists it was a step in the right direction, and that Asia’s media industry should be paying attention. “That’s where we will end up in five years’ time,” he says. “At the moment it still starts with the medium - I have a medium, I need to market that medium. It needs to start with the consumer.”
The problem with Apollo, he argues, is that the data was “not conclusive and cost a lot of money. But there will be other opportunities.”
Now Glock has other concerns - though he seems keen to stay at the experimental end of the media industry. His new clients include media owners and agencies, but he is working with a number of start-ups. One, he says, is a TV format he has never seen before. “If this works, TV will cease to exist. The computer will replace it,” he insists.
Given Glock’s background, he’s in a good position to judge.
Bernhard Glock’s CV
2009 Founder, The Bernhard Glock Media Leadership Company
2007 Vice-president, global media purchases, P&G
2006 Vice-president, global media and communication, P&G
2003 Manager, global media and communication, P&G
1999 Director, media and direct-to-consumer, Europe, and media, Asia, P&G
1998 Director, media, Europe; director, media, Asia, P&G
1994 Various media roles, rising to European Media Manager (Brussels), P&G
1985 Market research assistant, fabric care, diapers and beverages (Germany), P&G
This article was originally published in 19 November 2009 issue of Media.