Copyright tribuneonlineng
Practitioners in the nation’s advertising space will, again, converge this week, on Abuja, for this year’s National Advertising Conference. For these stakeholders, comprising practitioners, agencies and regulators, this year’s edition of the conference, scheduled to hold between November 12 and 14, is significant for many reasons. Besides providing the much-needed avenue for practitioners to discuss issues of common interest in the industry, it is also designed to test the waters, and see whether the industry is on that steady sail towards the N1trillion mark, in the next four years, as predicted in some quarters. For instance, the doyen of advertising in the country, Dr. Biodun Shobanjo, raised the N1trillion question recently, while advising 45 new fellows of the profession, in Lagos. The Chairman of the Troyka Group, at the induction event, organised by the Advertising Regulatory Council of Nigeria (ARCON), had described advertising practice as ‘a serious business’, likely to hit the N1 trillion mark by 2029. Shobanjo, who was recently admitted to Loeries Hall of Fame, however, cautioned that for the industry to be able to achieve this, advertisers must be ready to up their games and give the practice their best shots. Interestingly, while the annual advertising conference predates this prediction, not a few stakeholders in the industry are seeing it as one of the steady steps the industry is taking in actualizing that ‘dream’. They believe the conference, which has continued to attract and shape industry discussions and opinions, in the past few years, provide a veritable platform for stakeholders to converge and vent their views on critical industry issues and proffer solutions on how to move the industry forward. For instance, it is on record that in less than two years of its inception, the conference was able to provide some form of statistical data, stakeholders can hold on to, regarding the industry’s contribution to the nation’s GDP. The significance of the development is the fact that this was coming from a sector, that had hitherto been suffering from data drought, despite its immense economic potential and strategic importance to the nation’s economy. The report, which put the value of the nation’s advertising industry at N605.2 billion, about N395billion short of the predicted N1 trillion, represents a remarkable compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 18.7% over the past six years, from ₦216 billion in 2018. The study, conducted by PwC, also came out with the estimate that for every ₦1 spent on marketing communications in Nigeria, the nation’s GDP increases by a staggering ₦16.5, a multiplier effect that highlights the industry’s substantial value contribution. Explaining the rationale behind the report, the Director General, ARCON, Lekan Fadolapo, had explained that the idea was to underscore the industry’s paramount role as a catalyst for consumer demand, business expansion, employment, and innovation across sectors. Interestingly, organisers of this year’s conference are assuring that the edition would deliver much more. For instance, the fireside chats, usually used to flag off the conference, remain one of the strongpoints of the conference, and which they intend to leverage this year. Usually held in the evening of Day One, the chats provide practitioners and other attendees the opportunity to go down the memory lane, discuss the present, and project into the future, since they always feature practitioners that have made their marks in the industry. Speaking on this year’s fireside theme, “A Different Generation, A Different Industry’, the Chairman of the NAC Planning Committee, Mr. Tunji Adeyinka, explained that the chat is expected to continue with the tradition. The second day, he added, will feature discussions on sub-national branding opportunities, while the last day will host multiple breakout sessions, including one dedicated to the academia, as well as masterclass on artificial intelligence, public sector communications and destination branding. In his review of past conferences, the President of the Association of Advertising Agencies of Nigeria (AAAN), and Chairman of the Heads of Sectoral Groups, Mr. Lanre Adisa, is of the opinion that the conference has been able to demonstrate the economic relevance of the industry, especially with the idea about the need to release a report on the industry on its contribution to the nation’s GDP, and the eventual release of the report, showing that every N1 spent on the sector generates N16.5 in GDP.
