Insecurity: Advertising industry must look for creative ways to survive – Medebem
By Amechi Obiakpu
The lingering insecurity situation in the country has continued to alter the way of life of Nigerians. The business environment is also not immune to this as not only is it dealing with the twin problem of high operating cost occasioned by harsh economic climate and low consumer patronages, it has included dealing with insecurity to the mix.
To scale through these challenges business owners especially advertising agencies must continue to find creative ways of surviving. This view was expressed by Tolulope Medebem, President, Experiential Marketers Association of Nigeria (EXMAN), in an interview with MediaConsortium recently in Lagos.
According to Medebem who is also the Chief Executive, Aster Integrated Marketing, one of the leading Experiential Marketing agencies in Nigeria, “to remain stagnant is not an option, we just must find ways to innovate and remain creative so we can make money, which is what we are doing”.
Reacting to the state of insecurity in the country and how it is affecting businesses, Medebem said: “the issue of insecurity is a conversation I just heard with a couple of my colleagues, not along the line of activities that we are doing but along the line of how it has affected all of us generally.”
“For us, as an experiential agency and within the ecosystem, security has always been very key within the ecosystem, because our job is the kind that depends on a secure environment to thrive,” she added.
Explaining her statement the EXMAN boss hinted: “Before now, if you want to have an activation, you would ensure that you have spoken to everybody around including the security operatives, and you have gotten even the omo oniles, as security, but now whether or not we like it, we have to even take extra caution because the omo oniles that, supposedly are part of the security could also be part of the problem. So we want to make it a win win for everybody, and so honestly, like someone said, even in churches, they are cutting down on night vigils. So there would be some things that the experiential marketing would look at cutting down on. Probably your activity is an all-night thing, and if you look at the areas, you would think of either reducing it or you don’t use that area to ensure that the brand shines, and to ensure that there is no repercussion”.
As a way of shoring up their bottom line she adviced every business owners to creatively look inward and find more ways of creating value to consumers where lies business survival.
In her response to the state of the experiential marketing landscape in the last six months, Medebem said though it could be better however, the industry has not been terrible.
“If you look around you actually see activities happening. And one of the things that you find now is that a lot of us, especially agencies as well, we also have to think in terms of return on investments regarding whatever activities that we do. And we also have to think long-term. So I think it’s been good, all the activations that I have seen have taken a step further beyond the usual and do something towards longevity, and ensure that whatever it is that brands have invested is coming out in a way that gives them enough mileage over a period. So I think it’s not been terrible,” she posited.
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