ADVAN president tasks practitioners on enabling business environment
By Felicia Nwosu
Osamede Uwubanwmen, the President of Advertisers Association of Nigeria (ADVAN) and Regional Vice President, Africa, World Federation of Advertisers (WFA), has asked for enabling business environment for the Integrated Marketing Communications (IMC) industry to thrive.
Stressing that such move will help promote professionalism and address industry-specific issues, the ADVAN boss, while speaking with MARKETING EDGE in an exclusive interview, said the IMC ecosystem requires definite regulations that are beyond the ease of doing business alone, but must be legally appropriate and well-defined to enhance efficient business operations.
“In addition to the regulation that allows the ease of doing business, I think we need the regulation that ensures we do the right thing by law without being hampered by our day-to-day activities. For me, regulation is to ensure that people are not going out deliberately to harm the environment, society or to cause discord as they go about doing their business. Most importantly, they should do their businesses within the ambit of the law. So, it is all about putting the right regulations in place,” he said.
Assessing the IMC in Nigeria, the WFA VP admitted that the industry indeed is growing and evolving simultaneously, but noted that it is still a work-in-progress. The African regional advertising leader also called for more dogged and resilient practitioners whose commitment will spur growth, strengthen brand positioning and add prestige while giving consumers outstanding customer experience journey .
“We understand the basis regarding the consumer, the things around delivery and execution is where we need to get better at. So, I will say we are work-in-progress. When you hear about Nigeria’s top brands, there is a group of people ensuring that those names are in your head and in your mind all the time. So, when you buy a brand off the shelf, basically you are buying the promise, trust, purpose and what we have been able to assure you. I will say the industry is good but I will also like to encourage our members to do more,” he advised.
Mr. Uwubanwmen highlighted some of the challenges the industry is grappling with, while harping on the need for collaboration amongst sectoral groups. He noted that accurate data gathering remains an inhibitor to measurement accuracy.
“The major challenge in the industry for me is data. With accurate data, the whole talk around audience measurement will begin to have a clear direction. You will know if you can up your game, what the percentage is and where you want to be. We also need collaboration. Different sectoral groups should work together and see how we can move up the game,” the IMC expert said.
The marketing guru noted that the impact of technology in the marketing ecosystem has already prepared key industry players to swiftly adopt and adapt for the next phase of the generational shift by responding to Metaverse and AI technology.
“Another thing that IMC practitioners do so well is trend analysis. We analyze trends so well that we can predict where people and how events will be in the next five to ten years. So, product development is part of what we do. When the virtual reality, Metaverse and AI stuff came, we were already prepared for it,” he concluded.
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