1. Who is Mathias Klüver?
Hi there, I'm Mathias Klüver from Lübeck. I am an account director at monoceros PR. I'm married, have three children and volunteer as a palliative attendant in Essen. Communication has accompanied me since my school days. I wrote for our school newspaper. And after my apprenticeship as an industrial clerk, I have liked to work in marketing. Since this was not available at my company, I decided to study communication science, German language and literature and sociology in Essen after a few career stops. During my studies, I wanted to do something with the media. After training to be a radio journalist, I ended up in PR and have stayed there ever since.
2. What are your core topics at monoceros PR?
Thanks to many years of PR work and my experiences, I have a lot of knowledge of public relations. Besides that, I am also a lecturer and trainer. I have established myself as the chief copywriter at monoceros PR. My range goes from press releases and commentaries for and with our clients to multi-page specialist articles in the trade media - across all sectors. Through our client structure, it has emerged that I mostly write for cyber issues in addition to strategic consulting.
I have always found "text" to be the most appropriate subfield in PR for me. I like to read a lot, but I love to write even more.
I like coming up with stories for our clients for the trade press, looking for where we place who, when what comes next and how we can best raise awareness about products and customers. I also love it when a plan works out ;-) That also benefits me in my second hobbyhorse: workshops! I am active as a lecturer and trainer throughout Germany, both in person and online, and I give seminars on all kinds of communication topics. That ranges from strategic communication planning to corporate communication in all its forms and depths.
3. What do you think are the challenges of PR work today?
Many companies today neglect the communication strategy in favour of quick Linkedin posts, for example. I find that alarming. And, in many cases, it is money down the drain. "It'll hit someone. At least it's quick, and we have a publication!" But without knowing the communication goal for the dialogue groups, the path is just harder to achieve an impact, a reaction or a conversion. Sometimes it takes a lot of convincing - especially with start-ups - to take a strategic approach here because that is always our way, which then also pays into the value creation of the company.
Otherwise, everything has become much more nimble and short-lived. One press release follows the next. One topic trumps the next. And the expectations of customers have also accelerated. Compared to 25 years ago, we work much faster today. A small anecdote: In my first agency in Krefeld, we still coordinated the CD manual of a world market leader with the graphics department and the client by fax. That was hundreds of pages that went back and forth. Today, I can't imagine how we have been able to control the status and details. The worldwide internal print telephone directory was also a constant.
Apart from that, you always have to keep at it - that is the fascination about communications work for me. Never standing still. Constantly developing new topics with new clients. A good example is this year's DMEXCO in Cologne. There I discovered a cool video tool that will definitely end up in our repertoire.
4. Keyword: Essen as a location. Why Essen and not Berlin?
Essen, the green lung of the Ruhr region and world capital of culture, is the centre of my family's life. I connect from the office to the Berlin headquarters several times a day. Thanks to the many communication channels we use, remote work is no obstacle to the day's work - on the contrary: I've always liked to have peace and quiet, because I like to read my texts and those of my colleagues aloud to hear how they sound. That still comes from my radio days - I've somehow kept it up. And otherwise: with one team call everyone is already picked up. The daily coordination happens via Slack, Drive and the coordination of the ongoing business via Asana.
The location in North Rhine-Westphalia is ideal for being there flexibly for the customers. I can relieve the team in Berlin from the Essen office because I simply have shorter distances to some customers.
5. Keyword: Dad@Work. How do you reconcile work and family?
If I am travelling for work, for example, for workshops or a customer appointment, my wife should be able to do the same in her job. I always make sure that parenting is fairly distributed. When I travel, I usually take one of our three children with me - as long as it is compatible with school. This way, our children see how and often where I work, a new city and are slowly introduced to counselling. ;-) Besides, it's nice to have some one-on-one time with a child. When my wife is away on business as a landscape architect, for example monitoring the fields, I work from my office at home. That works out wonderfully and is a natural part of the corporate culture at monoceros PR. Here the family is part of it and doesn't run alongside the job. That's why I'm very happy to be part of monoceros PR, not to mention the fantastic team, the exciting clients and the good sense of humour at work.
monoceros is a strategic communications agency based in Berlin. We develop customized, target-oriented PR campaigns for digital disrupters, startups and tech giants. The basis for our outstanding results: Over ten years of PR experience on the corporate and agency side and the motivation to establish an agency with the highest standards. On our monoceros blog we regularly highlight essential topics of our PR work and report on the latest developments from the digital economy.
