In Search of a Contrarian Advertising Agency

Occasionally I get to lead an APCON team on visits to organizations where advertising is practised in the country. I recall an interactive session at one of our top advertising
agencies sometime in 1999 during which discussions steered toward reasons why I did not seek employment in an advertising agency if I was convinced that the ‘business’ was lucrative.

To the surprise of the CEO I gave my condition thus: sign me up the day the first ad agency is quoted on the Nigerian Stock Exchange! Having helped in “regulating” advertising in Nigeria for close to 15 years, I believe my opinions about the industry should receive a fair hearing.

The Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria (APCON) was established via Act 55 of 1988 in the hope that the ‘business’ of advertising would transform to a ‘profession.’ Unfortunately, 16 years after the secretariat of the Council commenced operations advertising is still far from being a profession; this is in spite of spirited efforts made by the Council.

The industry is a shame otherwise why would the media be owed as much as N8 billion by agencies? Interestingly, these same media continue to accept fresh campaigns from their debtors while they are unashamed to say that if they did not receive the businesses, other competing media would! One is also aware that the moment an agency is able to pay half of the total sum of money owed chances are it will be let off the creditor’s hook. That, of course, is different from separate individual deals (staff) executed at the detriment of the media. Most times, according to agency operatives, the media claims are spurious.

Unfortunately the industry would not give APCON’s Guidelines on Debt a chance as they prefer the HASG (heads ad and sectorial groups) umbrella, which has, to my mind, achieved very little. On the part of advertisers, it beats my imagination that you could owe an agency so much, sack it and then jump on the next willing ‘sucker.’ Meanwhile both the sacked and the new agencies belong to the same association!

Why should agency CEOs junket round the world at the organization’s expense, drive sleek cars, live in mansions, own homes abroad where their children also school, have fat foreign accounts, etc. yet 99.99% of them owe printers, models, media, etc. for eternity? What moral justification do they even have for owing staff salaries? Both media and ad agencies now pay salaries in arrears of three months!

The agency is too distracted to entertain consumers with great and memorable advertisements; most ads look the same. Take radio commercials for example- must they all be dramatized? Yet my colleagues believe Nigeria produces the best radio ads in the world! Most of our ads do not have any differentiating platform anymore.

I remember a friend whose agency self-promotes a lot and as such consciously or unconsciously interprets every brief using the Hype strategy. Out of curiosity I chose to patronize an airline company which he was promoting aggressively as he dangled a lot of “uniqueness” about the company in its marketing communications.

Funny I did not experience anything different from what other airlines offered and when I told him this he simply laughed if off. He actually laughed to his bank at the end of the campaign. Today the same airline has been grounded after a crash involving one of its aircraft; many souls actually perished in the process.

There is too much advertising around that is insipid, inane, incomprehensible and just dumb. Why is everybody in a hurry to set up his/her agency in spite of insufficient quality experience? I am even wondering if APCON should not play a role similar to that of the Central Bank- all ad agencies should recapitalize! It is high time agencies went Plc! It looks like operatives may have to be forced to do this.

That owners of ad agencies make money is not the attraction as far as I am concerned. Of course I would like to be rich but joyfully, not carrying a guilty conscience around. Our ad agencies should stop living in the past. When are we going to experience a paradigm shift in the way advertising is practised in Nigeria? Agencies which go against the crowd can hope to achieve successful differentiation. Our agencies must truly be media neutral in their planning and they should be able to coordinate and execute creatively in any channel of communication.

The industry as a whole must realize that advertising that uses new media channels is rapidly changing from a mere research activity to an era of media maturity where business models are worked out for optimum results.