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Why an industrial group has kept its digital marketing in the same hands since 2011

An industrial group with multiple companies, multiple brands and markets across DACH, Europe, Asia and America. Here, digital marketing means four disciplines that belong together: steering, paid campaigns, visibility in search and AI answers, analytics and reporting. All four sit with one partner.

Illustration "15 Jahre Partnerschaft mit ebm-papst" mit Standort-Pin-Symbol auf grünem Hintergrund, Untertitel "Vom ersten Google-Ads-Klick zur globalen KI-Sichtbarkeit"

The mandate has grown since 2011: new markets, new brands, group companies with their own needs and their own contract. In 2025, an aiva analysis of visibility in AI answers for the German market was added.

Why it lasts

No corporate group renews contracts for a decade and a half out of habit. 
Four reasons carry this duration:

  • When campaign, content and measurement sit with different providers, it's always the other party's fault in case of doubt. Full-service management is therefore not a question of discounts, but a question of accountability.
  • Alongside the annual budget for ongoing activity, there is a framework contract for special campaigns: budget is available before the occasion exists. That is the difference between a campaign for the trade fair and a campaign after the trade fair.
  • Hours worked can be viewed at any time, and an early warning is triggered once 80 percent of the budget is reached. And because measurement has been the responsibility of one party across all these years, the figures remain comparable. That is precisely the precondition for being able to assess marketing investments at all.
  • Since 2011, products, applications and target audiences have been known and no longer need to be explained. This head start appears on no invoice and is the most expensive item with every change of provider.

What remains

Fifteen years are not an end in themselves. Their value lies in the fact that things add up: figures that remain comparable over many years. Product knowledge that does not need to be rebuilt. And a well-practiced relationship in which even uncomfortable recommendations get through.

Just as important is that the collaboration itself has changed. The task of 2011 is not the task of today. New markets, new channels, new questions such as visibility in AI answers. That is why duration has never become routine.

 

"Fifteen years with the same agency is not an automatism, but a decision we make anew every year.
What convinces us: the standard keeps rising.
When the topic of visibility in AI answers came up, the proposal was already on the table before we had even asked for it."

Kai Halter
Vice President Marketing & Brand Management
ebm-papst Mulfingen GmbH & Co. KG aA & Co. KG

 

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