Yomi Olaniwun, the chief executive officer of digital marketing/PR agency, Bold Brand Buzz, has disclosed that leading to the 2023 elections, 2022 will be an eventful year for Digital Marketing Agencies in the political space as candidates look for ways to entrench themselves into the minds of the electorates.
Olaniwun said the marketing agencies will be busy in developing marketing campaigns, crafting key messages, tactics and ensuring effective budget spend all in a bid to ensure a candidates attention-grabbing messaging has an impact on voters on all marketing channels.
He stated this while expressing his views on the digital marketing outlook for 2022, insight into the PR practice in Nigeria, as well as expectations of the industry in light of the forthcoming 2023 elections.
In his assessment of the digital marketing and PR industry, he said the industry has evolved, putting into perspective how brands have leveraged digital tools to create awareness and shape perceptions in the last few years.
‘’Digital platforms have created more reach for brands and more opportunities for direct conversations and feedback which have helped brands improve on promise delivery and own their narratives. Most importantly, the digital space has created an opportunity for brands to measure PR activities and mileage’’, he asserted.
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On the projected shift of advertising budget to digital, he said digital advertising is the new TV advertising and the shift is driven by the changes in consumer behavior—especially on mobile devices.
‘’Research shows the amount of time people spend with digital media on a daily basis continues to climb each year with mobile devices making up the time spent and as consumers spend more time accessing the Internet, advertisers have become savvier about reaching potential clients across various digital platforms and devices.
‘’Clients know that digital advertising allows brands to segment their audience and hit the bull’s eyespot on, rather than casting a wide net, which makes one able to reach segmented audiences—the exact types of clients people are looking to retain, so my expectation is that clients are going to get more satisfaction from result driven campaigns by the digital agencies who have a deep understanding of consumer’s online behavioural pattern and can creatively think without the box’’, he added.
He listed three challenges the industry might face in 2022 which are the lack of substantiated data; Non-predictability of approval processes by digital channels; and the influx of quacks.
Explaining it, he said many agencies do not have access to data from qualitative research that can help mine insights to develop effective marketing campaigns that can be gotten only from verifiable data, digital platforms are not very consistent with measures guiding the approval of contents.
In a bid to be very creative, clients are going to struggle with key messaging substances that will be lost by approval processes.
On the influx of quacks, he said the entry barrier into the profession is low due to the affordable starter pack it requires and this has given room for the influx of quacks.
