Siegel & Gale Taps Cieslak to Push Interactive Forward

Brand strategy agency Siegel & Gale has bumped interactive media head Jason Cieslak up to executive director. The creation of the new position is part of a push to expand on the interactive success the Omnicom agency has seen in Los Angeles.

“We are going to try to spread what we have done in Los Angeles to New York in a big way. Interactive has been a significant growth driver in Los Angeles,” said Cieslak. “We want to create one unified organization to approach the market.”

Cieslak, who will report to company president Noah Manduke, says Siegel & Gale hopes its interactive work will help the agency distinguish itself from its branding-oriented peers.

The company plans to increase head count as part of beefing up interactive. Right now, Siegel & Gale has between 20 and 25 employees working on interactive, but Cieslak would like to up that by 20 percent to deal with expected growth.

“A lot of our growth over the last year and a half has been existing clients that have recommitted themselves to the online space,” he said. “From everything I’m hearing, it seems like a lot of clients are starting to recommit themselves. A lot of companies over the last three or four years have neglected a lot of their online activities.”

The Siegel & Gale interactive group does strategy and concept development, usability testing, information architecture, and branded content development. It’s also been expanding beyond the Web to interactive TV and mobile devices. In addition, the agency helps clients develop metrics with which to measure their interactive efforts. Interactive clients include Lexus, Sony Playstation, CureSearch, and Jiffy Lube.

Cieslak has been director of interactive media in the Los Angeles office since 1999. Prior to joining the agency, Cieslak was the marketing director for real estate services provider Lee & Associates.