Why Nigeria’s Rebranding campaigns Have failed -O’Tudor

The principal consultant of ADSTRAT Branding Management Consortium, Mr. Charles O’Tudor has said that the ‘rebranding Nigeria’ campaign championed by the now late Minister of Information, Professor Dora Akunyili did not achieve desired results was because it lacked the basic principles of strategic branding.

Mr. O’Tudor pointed out that branding or rebranding could not be done without understanding the culture and lifestyle of the people who are supposed to be rebranded ,stressing further that the rebranding campaign was not rooted in the culture and practices of Nigerians which is necessary for the campaign to succeed.

He said ”I spent a lot of time criticizing the’ rebranding Nigeria’ campaign of the late Prof. Dora Akunyili. I wrote several articles in the dailies on the issue, stressing why the campaign could not fly and the reason is simple: the campaign lacked the principles of strategic branding, I mean, you don’t rebrand from slogan or logos”

The Principal Consultant who spoke to MarketingEdge in Lagos, added that for Nigeria to get it right, the rebranding process must begin internally, stressing that ‘you don’t create a brand from the outside, you must create it from the inside.’

“You have to know the people, you don’t create a brand from externality, the DNA was missing in Prof. Akuyili’s ‘ rebranding Nigeria’ campaign, we didn’t identify the DNA, we didn’t identify the SWOT analysis, we didn’t critically analyze who we are as a people, our culture, our languages, our behaviours, our attributes, all those must come into play when you are creating a brand, that campaign didn’t factor in those attributes, it was created from just a logo, a slogan, did it talk to you” he said.

O’Tudor however, stressed that the President Muhammadu Buhari led administration was trying hard to usher in a new moral orientation in the country through the fight against corruption, adding that in rebranding the country, “we have to fight our innate negativism”.

“So I think that fighting corruption is good but at the same time, we also need to fit the economy, focus on the economy and also focus on the needs of the people and then drive the brand” he added.