Nigeria can become African hub for advertising companies – Redmond
Ronan Redmond, Commercial Director, TVC Communications, has said that Nigeria can become an African hub for advertising firms. Mr. Redmond, who stated this at the just concluded National Advertising Conference organised by the Advertising Regulatory Council of Nigeria (ARCON) in Abuja, also expressed optimism for the future of advertising in Africa.
Citing that Nigeria is projected by PWC to be the World’s fastest growing Media and Entertainment Market, Mr. Redmond enjoined the state to be more attentive and receptive to the ad industry. He believes that such attention and reception will enable Nigeria to learn from other markets such as the United Arab Emirates and Egypt who each invest back into the Media & Entertainment Industries in their own countries.
“There they have each established Creative, Media and Production Free Zones, where advertising and media companies operating in these zones are exempt from all types of taxation such as Value Added Tax (VAT), Income Tax, Corporate Tax and Customs,” he revealed.
Also, Mr. Redmond emphasised the need for Nigeria’s ad industry practitioners to demonstrate to the government that advertising is a suitable sector which they must support, and in return another option as a means of diversification away from dependency on oil revenues.
“Let me begin by making a bold observation based on my years working in Europe. It is my firm opinion that those of us in leadership positions in the communications and advertising industry, that some of us can be described at times as being poor communicators.
“While on the one hand we may be very proficient at producing and airing great adverts which help in the selling of our client’s products and services, but we can be then on the other hand poor communicators when it comes to making a convincing case which could articulate and sell the importance of our own industry to others,” he stated.
The advertising and marketing expert noted that admen can be guilty of underselling the important contribution the advertising industry makes to a company’s bottom line or indeed the important contribution it can make to grow the economy.
“It is generally accepted that advertising’s contribution to growing “sales” and “profit” is well known and understood. All of the World’s leading brands have been built through consistent marketing and advertising, which has created demand and increased revenue for these businesses.
“But advertising also plays a very important role in market economies by facilitating communication between businesses and their customers. It provides consumers with information to support their purchasing decisions and strengthens incentives for businesses to enter markets, grow exports and to develop products through innovation and new product launches,” he said.
Mr. Redmond mentioned that the broad role advertising has in the economy means its economic impacts are far-reaching and not just focused on the advertising sector itself.
He also cited the global advertising spend this year estimated to be $655Billion, according to The World Advertising Research Centre (WARC).
He however, noted that the global advertising outlook is gloomier for next year because economies are stalling, as inflation rises sharply due to supply-side pressures exacerbated by the war in Europe and a slowdown in Chinese manufacturing.
“The top markets account for over 70% of the Global advertising spends. The USA accounts for 35%, China / Japan / South Korea 20%, Europe 15%, South America and Canada and so on.
“Africa only accounts for up to $6Billion or 1% of Global Advertising Spend (WARC) and Sub-Saharan Africa (SSA)still only accounts for $3Billion or 0.47% of the total Global Advertising Investment (Source: Africa Index / Group M).
“These very low Africa numbers in comparison have been attributed to the fact that Africa is made up of many different countries with many different cultures and languages, unstable rules and regulatory environments, and a historic lack of data to help understand the marketplace,” he said.
Mr. Redmond, therefore, advised that the Nigerian ad and marketing industry can learn from these studies to plot a path to grow the advertising market and convince the government for more support.
“To me it is clear what we need to do: firstly, we must establish the real size of the Nigeria advertising market. In order to do this correctly we need to define what sectors are included in the computations. Advertising is so much more than just 60 seconds spot adverts. Today clients invest as much budgets into branded content creation, sponsorships and real-life activations, and we need to include these spends into our market size findings,” he said.
The advertising and marketing guru firmly and convincingly concluded that when practitioners have established the real size of the advertising market, then they need a reputable study by a Deloitte, PWC or one such other firm to establish the multiplier effect of the Nigeria advertising industry on the GDP of the Nigeria economy.
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