Expert charges EXMAN on transparency, integrity in practice
Chief Operating Officer and Lead Consultant, Aster Integrated Marketing Limited, Tolulope Medebem has admonished the leadership of Experiential Marketing Association of Nigeria (EXMAN) on the need to put in place regulatory mechanism that would ensure that transparency and integrity challenges in the industry were nipped in the bud.
Speaking in exclusive interview with MARKETING EDGE in Lagos, Medebem, former vice-president of EXMAN stated that lack of integrity and transparency issues were major clogs in the wheel of progress of the industry, adding that the twin evil was responsible for the ever frosty relationship existing between agency operatives and their counterparts in multinational organisations.
According to the foremost experiential marketing practitioner, the common practice whereby multinational companies continued to review downwards agency fees and overall advertising budgets was traceable to lack of trust and mutual suspicion between clients and their agencies.
She noted further that the raging controversy regarding the 120 days payment policy newly introduced by the multinationals could only be attributed to lack of trust, integrity and transparency concerns between agencies and clients.
To this end, therefore, she maintained that EXMAN being the sole industry regulator must rise up to the task and fashion out an acceptable industry-wide policy to address transparency and integrity challenge in the industry.
“At EXMAN, one of the things that I think we should be trying to do is getting to a point where we can have a collective relationship, an industry wide relationship such that this issue of transparency may be reduced a bit.
“Again, it still translates back to the issue of values. If between our clients and ourselves we understand the value we are bringing to the table for each other, I am not sure we would get to that point where there will still be any issue,” she said.
According to her, EXMAN must have to look into the negative practice where some agency practitioners turn back to accept briefs from clients after the same briefs were rejected by a sister agency owing to some infringement or breach in the term of business.
“Those are the things we are even trying to fight. In advertising, they have pitch fee rejections. We don’t have any such at our own end and this is still part of the things that EXMAN must try to put in place. It will take a while, but by the grace of the Almighty, we will get there. And, hopefully, the issue of transparency will be addressed permanently,” she added.
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