The Vanguard: Markus Noder on Life, Leadership and Football

By his own admission, Markus Noder never misses an opportunity to talk about football. Obsessed with the beautiful game since he was a small boy of four, these days the values he absorbed playing with teams until he reached a semi-pro level form the foundation of his leadership.

A small child, looking up to the older cool guys’, he found himself absorbing their collaborative ethos and tactical leadership by soccer-based osmosis. “I think it was quite a good experience in the beginning. You see the dynamics of a team. There are leaders in the team, they’re doing the tactics, they’re reading the game, they’re playing, they’re helping others. You could really see the different roles in the game,” he reflects. “This was quite an impressive experience at this age, [as I was] making my way into school. You feel like you belong to something because you’re part of the team, the team as a culture, the team as a spirit. The team shares success, and maybe also losses.”

No longer a titchy tot, these days Markus is a) pretty tall actually and b) doing his bit to put everything he gleaned about team spirit into action at Serviceplan Group, the largest and most diversified owner- and partner-managed agency group in Europe and one of the largest worldwide. In his dual role at the group, Markus is managing partner of Serviceplan International and spokesperson and managing partner of the Serviceplan agencies in Germany. And he is also a Board Member of Serviceplan Group. He speaks fondly of the partners around the world that he works with and refers to Liverpool FC’s anthem ‘You’ll Never Walk Alone’ when he talks about Servicepla ’Group’s culture and ethos.

He says he wasn’t born a leader – but perhaps football made him one.

But while football was his first love, it was Markus’ second love, computing, that set him on a path to advertising. He headed to the University of Aalen to study data science – and during that degree he got his first taste of international working with a six-month placement in Newcastle at the University of Northumberland (and yes, that did involve attending a fair few Newcastle United matches!).

As Markus got his first experiences of the internet (this was back in the days of Netscape Navigator), he figured that he should try to find a job that was somehow connected to this new online world. He applied for a job at a digital agency in Munich, in project management, and this was where he had his first real exposure to advertising, where he learned about communications and got a real glimpse of what the internet could be. His horizons were expanded.

“There was a lot of vision but the hardware was not there to do it, and neither was the bandwidth from the telcos at that point of time,” he says.

What he also got was a taste for the bigger picture of how communications and technology could really affect change for businesses. “I found the business side even more interesting than just managing the projects. I think this is where it really started, where I was really digging into the industry,” says Mark. He started to get his head around the different types of agency, from creative and media to PR and digital and began to really appreciate the deeper impact they could have. “I found it super interesting because by telling a good story, you can create emotions, you can move people. I fell a bit in love with this. You can somehow influence them in a positive way, giving them better information or giving them a better life by using products or services.”

After four years at the digital agency, he got a call from BBDO to join their new integrated agency, BBDO Interone, which came out of the merging of a CRM agency, a data agency, a digital agency and a BTL agency into, well, one. For a decade, Markus saw the agency grow from a 90-people shop to a 900-people international network in 2009. But after helping drive the internationalisation of Interone, Markus started to feel an entrepreneurial itch. With lots of ideas, he figured he needed to free himself from the holding company holding cell.

And so Markus founded Liquid Campaign in 2008. It was envisioned as a modern, integrated agency and the team spotted an opportunity in Asia, with a focus on markets like China and India and Russia. “We started this business as a newcomer: no clients, no money, and a great idea. We had the strong belief that we could make it. And I think we did it.”

Talking to Markus, it’s clear that his enthusiasm for international adventure and business is deep rooted and really goes way back. He laughs that travel is still a massive passion of his, which many people find hard to believe given he more or less lives out of a suitcase for work. His eyes light up as he talks of the wild ride of hustling in markets like China and Korea in the early 2000s.

“At that point, you could really feel it in the streets of Beijing and Shanghai. It was a different world – different tastes, different kinds of food, different approach to people. Nobody really spoke to English, you needed translators to help you give your message through and you still needed to adapt to a kind of system they were up for,” he recalls.

South Korea, in the 2000s, hadn’t had its global cultural explosion and its chaebol brands did not have the same international ubiquity. But there he saw technology being used in people’s daily lives in a way that was years ahead of the rest of the world. It was a rich source of inspiration for the ways technology could be folded into communication.

All of that travel has set the stage for Markus’ current role at Serviceplan Group and has allowed him to learn how to work across cultures.

Liquid Campaign was growing, winning bigger clients, like BMW, which they serviced in Asia. It was on an upward trajectory, but the leadership team started to wonder if it could be accelerated. Serendipitously, Markus happened to meet Florian Haller, the CEO of Serviceplan Group and “my now partner in crime”.

They clicked immediately, started sharing their visions and could see clear connections. “He, at the time, already had full responsibility for the Serviceplan Group in Germany. They had a few partners in Europe. I had this smaller group of agencies in Asia. We said, ‘hey, Germany is known for a lot of things, most likely premium cars’, but they are not known for advertising. But what do you think if we take what we have in our hands on a global scale?”

The pair decided that an independent agency group on a global scale would bring something quite different to the market. Rather than operate as a rigid holding company or network, they would grow by joining forces with entrepreneurial partners across the globe. “Yes, there are agencies which have a global offering, most likely networks. There are some independents that have global offerings, but not the coverage we have right now. This idea was so exciting to both of us that we said we have to put it at the centre of our company strategy.”

That offering is encapsulated in the House of Communications concept, which brings together all communication discipline from creative and content, media and data to experience and commerce under one roof. 

And it’s turned out to be a pretty good company strategy. For nearly 11 years they’ve been working together to push things forward and in that time Markus found his leadership skills truly emerge. It’s never been something that he’s purposefully pursued for the sake of it.

Those footballing foundations laid all those years ago have proven to be invaluable. “I strongly believe in team spirit. I strongly believe in transparency, honesty, trust. So I think these are the ingredients to create great teams and make teams successful. Always having a vision of where you want to be in the next few years, so you’re not just working from day to day.”

And as Serviceplan Group has evolved, so too has the advertising industry. “I think the business changed totally. We are becoming business partners to our clients. I love that we are in this time because there are so many opportunities around us. New technologies are coming in, artificial intelligence, data, name it. I think it’s quite a complex industry, even if some of the people don’t really believe that it is a complex industry because it’s ‘just funny stories’. I think to shape stories, or create stories, to deliver stories, to manage clients, customers, data, is super complex and I think it’s a nice job to be in.”

Today at Serviceplan Group, Markus has the aforementioned dual role and for much of his time his focus has been on knitting together the international community and growing it. It’s something he genuinely loves and which pulls on all his prior experience with Interone and Liquid Campaign.

“Over the last 25 years, living out of a suitcase, I’ve made a lot of amazing experiences across the globe, which actually also shaped my approach to people, who were also giving me a different view on a lot of things. It’s not always your view. There are different views, there are different systems around you. They have a different perspective on it,” he says.

It’s not always a walk in the park creating a cohesive agency culture while also making sure there’s space for the nuances of the different perspectives and systems. However, Markus reckons that the partnership model and the shared values that underpin the group allows for a beautifully intertwined spirit of camaraderie and independence. He says it’s a ‘glocal’ approach, where there’s a global idea but which is adapted for each marketing.

“The global part means we have a value system which is super simple. We believe in entrepreneurship and we believe in ownership. This is the basic principle. And we believe in trust, and this is the minimum ingredient we have on a global level. This is due to the fact that we have partners and not hired country managers. We have partners that own shares in the companies that they run. We have a different connection to each other because this is an integral connection which is built on trust. If you want to build something with somebody, you need to trust this person. You’re not just paying money so this person executes things.”

The leaders around the world join Markus for a call every Monday, where they update each other on what’s going on in their part of the world, and share challenges and opportunities. It’s the highlight of his week and the bond that has been formed between the partners makes all of the hard work of building such an international business worth it.

“Building companies in different countries is not easy, being honest. There are a lot of different regulations, there’s a lot of, ‘oh my goodness, what’s going on there?’ At the end of the day, it’s a lot of fun and I get paid back every day, meeting with my colleagues, talking to them. Everybody is super enthusiastic about the story we are writing right now.”

Having established Serviceplan Group across EMEA and Asia Pacific, recently attention has turned to the big beast of advertising – the United States. In 2020 it partnered up with the legendary Pereira & O’Dell, taking on a minority stake, and in 2023 it also acquired a minority stake in hotshop Lanfranco & Cordova. Markus says it’s been a very deliberate strategy for Serviceplan Group to hold off throwing itself into the US market before 2020. 

“North America is a beast by itself, being honest. If you follow the strategy we have taken, we  said [if we are to take the bull by the horns], maybe this is the last [one] we should do. Let’s focus on Europe first and then stabilise our business in Asia and then I think we would be ready to step into the US market.”

Again, meeting Andrew O’Dell and PJ Pereira was an accident. Markus describes the first meeting as like a very successful speed date. “In 10 minutes it was clear that we would join forces. It took us literally a salad to find out there was something bigger than just collaborating on projects,” says Markus.

Since then the relationship has flourished, with Andrew O’Dell taking over as CEO for Serviceplan Group in the US. With locations in New York and San Francisco, Markus is effusive about the relationship, and Pereira & O’Dell’s unique ability to keep the rest of the group plugged into the latest developments in Silicon Valley, in particular with their AI Lab.

The US isn’t the only challenge Markus and the team are embracing right now. Between the rise of AI and the tumultuous year of elections across the world as well as economic and political upheaval, there are lots of challenges facing consumers and clients out in the real world. But for Markus, it’s in situations like these where agencies can really step up and make a real difference for clients.

It might be tempting, says Markus, to look around at this disruption and stick one’s head in the sand or just give up and stay in bed. “But this is exactly where my entrepreneurial heart kicks in and says, ‘there are a lot of challenges but, you know, in all these challenges there are also some positives that we can make use of and develop our business,” he says.

Indeed, the constant change and disruption that buffets clients’ businesses and agencies in 2024 are not unlike the twists and turns of a particularly nail-biting football match. There’s no room for complacency, but Markus and his team of entrepreneurs across the Serviceplan Group feel match fit and ready to score.

“I think this is where we always have to question ourselves,” he says. “Can we adapt to new situations? And there will be new situations and I strongly believe the companies which can adapt to them will move ahead, and I hope that we are one of them. At the moment I think we feel quite confident that we have a good offering, we have great talent, we have an amazing culture.”