Outdoor advertising business also needs palliatives to bounce back —Ajufo, OAAN President

President of the Outdoor Advertisers Association of Nigeria, Mr. Emma Ajufo, shares his views about the state of outdoor advertising business in Nigeria with AKIN ADEWAKUN, insisting that the sector remains the worst hit, among all sectors in the nation’s marketing communications industry and will, therefore, need some government intervention to bounce back. Excerpts:

HOW has the industry been?

It has been very rough. You know our issue is particularly bad because our outdoor advertising business thrives on movement of people, the mobility of people outside. So when people are not free to come out, or now come out at a particular period of the day, it affects our platforms.  Nigerians are highly mobile people, and when you cage them in, that advantage that we feel is no longer there. But you would have noticed that since the government began to ease the lockdown, people are beginning to come out and that has enhanced the strength of our medium. But, I still believe that it will be better if they stop creating confusion, because as you see, there is confusion everywhere. A state will say we are locked down, the other  one will say, we are not. So, clients do not really know where they stand, concerning the lockdown, and so that brings confusion to the minds of our clients.

The sector must have lost quiet a fortune, then, during the  period of the full lockdown?

Yes, quite a fortune. We recorded a lot of cancellations of orders. And as I alluded earlier on, you can’t blame the client. They are giving you money because they expect some service, and that service is for people to see their products outside. So when you lock people in, that service is not being rendered. That is why with the partial easing of the lockdown, we have started seeing those who have been using our platforms come back gradually.  And, we expect that  as the lockdown begins to ease, things will improve.

Since the advent of COVID-19,  has there been any form of collaboration between the  association,  government and relevant health authorities in fighting the pandemic?

We recognise  that we can only participate with what we have. You will also observe that some of our platforms are being used for government messages on COVID-19. We have written to the Federal Ministry of Health to collaborate with them, and we are still awaiting their response. We believe strongly that at this stage of the pandemic, what Nigerians need is adequate communication. For instance, it seems communication is only being strengthened  at the city centres. Meanwhile, a lot of Nigerians in the hinterland are not sure whether there is COVID-19, or not. There is still a lot of ignorance out there. But,  due to the fact that we,  as an association, have a national base, we believe we can help government spread the information, through our platforms to every  nook and cranny of the country. And to that extent we have written to all regulatory agencies, saying that our  platforms are available to communicate messages relating to the pandemic. We have also written to CACOVID (Coalition Against COVID-19), the private sector-led coalition against the pandemic, expressing our readiness to partner with them to talk about what they are doing. So we are awaiting their response.  Lagos is already collaborating with us; a few other states, too. Enugu  and Rivers states have  collaborated with us. So we have written to every state that has a regulatory agency. We’ve written to some that have town planning people that manage their outdoor space to say that we are available to collaborate with them. This is not the time to sit back. This is the time for everybody to show concern. Like I said, we can only use what we have to show this concern. We may not have money to give, but we have our platforms and when you value what we put on our platforms and you add it up, it surpasses some of the things that other people have been donating in cash.

How does this collaboration work? Is  the association offering those platforms free of charge?

Well, in some cases, it is free of charge. The one we are proposing to CACOVID,  we are saying that since it’s a private sector initiative,  instead of  charging  the regular rates, we are ready to do it at a discounted rate, as part of our support.

Many believe  a lot of things will change, post-COVID-19. What are those things you envisage will change, concerning outdoor advertising in Nigeria?

We can only postulate at this stage. So what one can only say is that when this type of thing happens, things must change. But the form such change will take,  we might need a crystal ball to find out. But what we have done is to set up a committee to look into the effects of COVID-19 and also to anticipate a post-covid era for us to discuss. So, as an industry, we are analyzing the impact of COVID-19. By Friday, this week,we are having a webinar, and senior advertising practitioners are going to be talking to us about the emerging realities. And when they talk about emerging realities, I think that  is to signpost what is to come. So we take it gradually, one step at a time.  Whether things will change, they will change, and they will change even to our benefit.

People are talking about palliatives for businesses; since it is apparent that the pandemic has left many businesses vulnerable, and may need government intervention to bounce back. What sort of palliatives would you demand for the sector, if you were to talk to government?

We knew all along  that we would need palliative, and we have actually been pro-active about it. When the lockdown started, we wrote to our regulatory partners, telling them to suspend bills until we come back. Like I said earlier on, it is only when you are outside that you can appreciate our medium. And with all these lockdowns and others, it’s obvious that our financial capability has reduced. So that was why we told them we needed to talk about it. The first palliative we expect from government is that government should understand our plight, concerning regulatory fees. This is a time to give us some breather to enable us recover a little bit, and we hope that they will listen to us.  You’ll  also recall that CBN (Central Bank of Nigeria) gave us names of some industries slated for some palliatives, but we found out that that we are not part of it. So we have asked our regulatory body, which is APCON (Advertising Practitioners Council of Nigeria)  to appeal to CBN that we’ve also been a  good sector, supporting government, and contributing our quota to the economy, and so we need the CBN palliative. So that letter has also gone, and we hope that CBN will  see it in positive light and accede to our requests.

What are you doing to mitigate the effects of the pandemic on members and the sector?

There are two legs to it. For members, I have told you that we are negotiating with government to see how government can  review what they are charging us, or suspend what they are charging us. If they do that, it will help us in terms of management of our cash flow. It will go a long way in helping our members, since the  little resources at their disposal can then be applied to other areas of the business that will keep the business going. For our client we also know that they have also gone through a hard time. So, as a body, we have also offered them our own kind of palliative, by giving them a kind of discount, to allow them come back. The pandemic is like a chain reaction. It’s affecting everybody, at different levels. So we are telling our clients that for a period of five months, between May to 30th of  September, that they can come on our platform at  a discounted rate. That, we are hoping, will make them to come back on our platforms and help re-engineer the economy, because you know that once customers see the products on our platforms, they are encouraged to buy. And when they buy, the companies produce more. So that is the two-pronged approach we are taking for both our clients and our members. For us, we believe that everybody should try and be in business, as against profit-making. We believe that the pandemic  thing is for survival now, since it’s affecting every sector of the economy.

Don’t you think giving such discounts to clients, at this time, will only work when the regulatory authorities are in tune with your request for a rate review? If they don’t and you are going ahead to give such discount to your client, are you not further short-changing  the business?

I told you before that we had a lot of cancellations and suspension of contracts, as a result of the lockdown. And I  also told you that what we sell is visibility, so  people must come out, before they can view those things. As we speak, once clients decide not to use our platforms, they have other places they can plough their resources to. And so, it’s not as if the budget is even growing, rather it is shrinking, because the clients are not even doing as well as they ought to do, as a result of the pandemic.  And so we have said to ourselves, is it not better for us to give palliative to our clients so that they can  do something, so that  we remain in business? That’s one leg of it. The other leg of it is that we have said to our regulatory agencies that the times are not good, also partner with us. Remember, it is this regulatory agencies that we have offered to collaborate with, in terms of communication, concerning the pandemic. We are not billing them for that. So we feel all things being equal, the regulatory agencies should be on our side in this case. We don’t think that it is all about profit this year. It is about staying in business, and we believe even the clients will also want to stay in business.

What are your words of assurance for stakeholders in the sector that are apprehensive?

Well, all of us are apprehensive.  But, of course, we are Nigerians. And, you know that one of the things we are known for is that never- say- die spirit. This is not the worst thing that we have seen. There was a time it seemed that this industry was down when LASAA (Lagos State Signage and Advertisement Agency) came the first time. But, we were able to weather the storm. COVID-19 is a general phenomenon. It has to do with everybody. So if the right things are done, all of us will come back. So my appeal to members is that we should all keep calm, manage the little that we have. This is no time to be extravagant in terms of things that are not too necessary. We just hope that by the end of the year, things will begin to look up. Let everybody keep hope alive.

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