Canon recently launched two products into the Nigerian market. In this interview Somesh Adukia, sales and marketing director, B2c Canon central and North Africa tell Chinwe Agbeze about the company’s plans in Nigeria.
Canon has been in Nigeria for seven months. How has the journey been?
It has been an enriching experience. We wanted to understand the status of the Nigerian consumer, what they like, what they don’t like and what they expect from Canon as a brand. I’m happy to say that our future strategies for developing the Nigerian market is based on the feedback received from the Nigerian public.
One of the things we are doing is to establish our service network, because we understood that service is very important for the Nigerian customer. To further understand the local needs, we have appointed a Nigerian Country Manager. When we started to penetrate the channels, we felt there was need to keep in touch with the local community, and that was why we appointed Channel Account Managers.
With the kind of things we have achieved in the short term, I think we are happy. We have a long way to go, but it is much better than what it was last year and with each passing day, we are learning and implementing. We look forward to continue with our future strategies, so that we grow the business, have more associations and connect the Nigerian community.
What are Canon’s future strategies?
We want to grow the market of DSLRs in Nigeria. We feel that with a strong population of over 175 million, the current penetration ratio of less than one percent is undeserving. We want to focus on our entry range which will target the masses. Also, we want to focus on the high-end range which will target the professionals, photo clubs and Nollywood users.
One important step in this direction for us is the establishment of Canon Academy, where we will teach consumers how to operate a DSLR camera. We want to enhance our relationship with street photographers, because the street photography community in Nigeria is huge and 99 percent of them use Canon products.
We want to have some dedicated events focused on only the street photography community. This is because we understand that while there are many events and seminars for retail shops, SMEs and big businesses, the street photographers are always overlooked. We believe that they are our long term customers, and we want to take care of them by increasing our association with them.
Why the decision to launch into the Nigerian market when the country is going through recession?
It is understandable that the company is going through a recession at the moment. We are not here on a short-term basis; we are looking at a long term association with this country. We believe that Nigeria is a big market, because the population is huge, and is composed of mostly young, technology savvy people.
The economic instability is not conducive to business, but it will get better. We do not want to enter the country when things are okay, or exit the country when is going through challenging times. We feel that we are a part of Nigeria, and we also want to make Nigerians feel that Canon is a brand to be patronised, because we are going to be here, both in good and bad times.
We want to be in this journey because we feel that canon and Nigeria are going hand in hand. We are not having the best of the times in Nigeria at the same time; Nigeria economy is also facing challenges. So, we go hand in hand together. Nigerian economy is struggling and we are facing challenges but together we can come out of this and enjoy a good ride in future.
Our new ad campaign, which we will launch very soon will also revolve around, not Canon as a brand, but Nigeria as a country. Our message will be: ‘capture every spirit of Nigeria, and while you are capturing it, Canon is always there.’
One thing consumers are very sensitive about is pricing. How affordable are Canon’s products?
Nigerian consumers don’t want to compromise on the quality but search for affordable options when it comes to printing. We have considered the needs of the African consumers and we have given them options not just with one or two, and we have made these options not only affordable but easy to use and also good looking and stylish that can be showcased at home and at the office.
Recently Canon announced the launch ‘Celebrate Africa’ campaign that is targeted towards consumers from all walks of life. Tell us more about it.
Today, if you talk about Africans, they are facing a lot of challenges. But one good thing about the African population is that they like to enjoy every moment of their lives. They like music, dancing and spending time with their family. Canon want to associate with this spirit of Africans, and that was how we created the Celebrate Africa campaign, where people from all walks of life can participate in this online photo competition.
We created three teams: People Africa, African City Life and African Wildlife. We are quite amazed with the kind of entries that we have received. In the first two months, we received about 3,000 entries. We were amazed with the quality of the pictures and judgement on the ten best pictures was a real task.
How does Canon view the Camera-Smartphone debate?
We have accepted the fact that with the advent of smartphone cameras, the entry-level camera customer has shifted to the smartphone. So, now there are less and less people who use a compact range of cameras, because their needs have been fulfilled by a smartphone camera.
However, we being pioneers in imaging want to offer consumers with the right kind of solution and services, so that they can make their moments even better. There are many things which a smartphone cannot capture.
Moments such as the birth of a baby or the first time when he/she walks, or the marriage of your daughter require the kind of quality which only a DSLR can provide. So, the entry-level has shifted to the smartphone camera, which we have accepted. But from mid-high, as well as the DSLR range, there are moments which you need to capture with quality, and here Canon will come up with its innovation, so we can afford consumers the right kind of solutions and services.
What’s your share of the market?
As far as market share is concerned, Canon has a wide product category of good solutions. Our market share differs in most countries including Africa. In Canada, we are number one in DSLR camera. In most countries including Africa when it comes to Injek printers, we are strong number two and same is the case with laser printers.
We have made tremendous progress in Nigeria since last year when we opened our operations here. We are confident that with the kind of strategies we have in place, we will succeed in Nigeria and African market in general.
Earlier, you said Canon is focusing on Nollywood users as well. What products do you have that can appeal to them?
We have a range of products that suits the Nollywood industry. We need to inform the Nollywood users that there are good options available which promises quality, as well as ‘ease-of-use’ and affordability. We also want to cater to the affordable printing solutions market, without compromising on quality and one segment that we want to target, which has been left unexplored, is models.
This is because the education system has changed from what it was many years ago. Today, the kids have to do lots of research, lots of products and they have to make lots of presentations, which involves lots of printing. Normally, what happens is that the mother of the house faces two challenges; one is the consumables get finished quickly and this increases the cost of printing; the second thing is that replacements are not easily available for the model of the printer which you have at home. So, we want to have specific campaigns, which will be revolving around models.
Our team is working with schools in Nigeria, and we have done mappings of some good schools. So we would like to invite models, inform them about our range of products and help the schools in this changing school environment. Our objective is not just to increase our sales, but help the Nigerian school authorities in this face of the changing educational system and be a preferred brand among models.
When it comes to printers, you often hear people talk about small and medium scale businesses; people talk about computer village dealers; but nobody has ever talked about models and Canon will like to tap into that.
On the channels side, our vision is to enhance our visibility, create demand through the generation of activities like road-shows, give Nigerians the opportunity to have a feel of Canon products and when all these is done, we want to raise our brand awareness by investing in above-the-line like billboards and sign-boards.
What are your thoughts on the Nigerian film industry?
I think the Nigerian film industry has budding photographers and filmmakers who stand out today in the world. What we will like to do at Canon is to cement our association with existing filmmakers. Not only that, we want to create new filmmakers. What our team is doing now is getting in touch with budding filmmakers, going to filmmaking institutes and introducing them to Canon products. Sharing tips on photography with them and how they can enhance their filmmaking through a Canon camera.
We are confident about our strategies to penetrate the Nollywood market because while our eyes are set on channel penetration and becoming number one, our eyes are also set on becoming a major pillar in Nollywood.
