Conversation starter on IMC in Nigeria

Ikem Okuhu (2019), Pitch: Debunking Marketing’s Strongest Myths. Lagos: Brandish Media. ISBN: 978-978-975-704-6

Pitch: Debunking Marketing’s Strongest Myths entered the market in the best traditions of marketing communications. The decibel has been loud and intense, as has been the effort to reach consumers and make them at least buyers and probably readers of the book. The author of Pitch demonstrates that you can achieve high levels of awareness and reach for books in Nigeria bypassing the traditional book distribution channels. Or almost.

Those building brands deploying public relations with modern platforms such as Facebook, WhatsApp and Twitter are following the paths of old masters such as Anita Roddick and her The Bodyshop line that predated the Internet. The idea was to tell stories around the brand through various activations including events. The media then reported it. 

Since its formal presentation in Lagos, Pitch has grabbed the Facebook platform and gets a mention every week. It does this deploying Walter Fischer’s Narrative Paradigm Theory. Narrative Paradigm states that all meaningful communication is in the form of storytelling. Communication happens between the narrator and the listener in the form of a story. Ikem Okuhu has consistently shared a series of stories around Pitch, from Lagos to Enugu with promises of adding Abuja and other towns. Friends have shared similar stories of donating the books to university libraries, mass communication and marketing departments.

Consequently, engaged professionals in integrated marketing communications in Nigeria have heard of the book. They should, as it addresses issues within their purview and professional competence.

Pitch is a journalist’s look at various issues in marketing communications that he feels do not serve the best interests of stakeholders, from consumers to brand owners and media platforms. He calls them “marketing’s strongest myths”. Okuhu makes bold assertions and strong claims.

A central assertion and thesis of the book comes early in the preface. Okuhu states, “There are far too many things that have been taken for granted in marketing. Perhaps out of respect for the ‘icons’ of the industry that laid the foundation for the cultivation of the ideas or merely because many people find it hard to interrogate certain issues, we have carried on with a lot that don’t just work. The consequence has been dire-wasteful marketing spend”.

In 12 chapters across 178 pages, Pitch discusses the marketing role of the CEO; the “death of advertising”; the significance of mindshare versus market share; line extensions; and the growing role of technology and artificial intelligence in marketing. It also treats the role or non-contribution of innovation, pricing, globalisation and corporate social responsibility. It examines the matter of nation branding and what it takes to brand successful nation brands.

An icon of advertising, Mr Lolu Akinwunmi, offers a strong endorsement. Akinwunmi in the Foreword pats the author on the back with a “well done”. He observes, “Dwelling mainly on some of the things marketers hold very dearly and consider sacrosanct, the author offers some new and potentially controversial perspectives into some of marketing communication industry’s strongly held views.”

There is much learning in Pitch, particularly for persons coming to marketing communications anew and students of the discipline. The material on CEO Types and their impact on the business is very informative. It draws on the western templates against which Okuhu rails but offers deep insights into character traits and metrics. He ends it with a useful guide to CEO positioning and branding.

Chapter 11 on “Every nation is not a brand” illuminates the challenges of branding Nigeria and some of the reasons why previous efforts failed. It contains material on the indices for national competitiveness and comparison of branding efforts by countries such as India. Usually there is a congruence of the internal and the external with communications being the culmination of various other efforts.

Pitch offers many mini-cases and narratives of successes and failures in the marketplace. Narratives include Hero lager beer, Star and its many line extensions, Guinness Stout, Origin beer, Thermocool, Access Bank etc. The account of the fate of Heineken Magnum is particularly instructive as it makes the case for the place of culture in communication and marketing. The stories however come across as the impressions and opinions of the author. They would read better, as both journalism and marketing literature, if there is a balance featuring interactions and interviews with the brand custodians to explain why and how they took the decisions they made with actual data on market share and competition. A revised edition should take care of this.

The controversies will centre around his assertions in chapter three on mind share versus market share. He mentions the battle of Coca Cola versus Big Cola, Gala versus Rite Bite and the war of the beer and detergent brands. In this segment, the author falls into the trap of the use of unverifiable data of which he accused the industry. He allots market share of Coca Cola 51%, Pepsi, 41%, Big Cola 4% and Bigi, 1%. The author credits this data to “Market Intelligence”. The book could do with better statistics from identifiable and reliable sources. 

Line extensions remain controversial in marketing since Ries and Trout (1972). The chapter on line extensions is hard-hitting. It is a surprise that since the book hit the market, none of the brands skewered has offered a rebuttal or an explanation of what happened, why and the learnings. The chapter raises a significant issue in marketing. Marketing professionals distinguish between brand extensions, line extensions and licensed merchandise. According to Mathew Healy (2010), in What is Branding? brand extensions function vertically; custodians use the same brand in a new category where the brand’s meaning still makes sense to customers. Line extensions tend to be horizontal and geared to higher or lower segments within the same category. Licensed merchandise applies the brand to an item that may be unrelated to the original brand.  

The author of Pitch assumes that the reader is familiar with the pillars of marketing and its myths and does not bother to explain them for context before busting them. Marketing revolves around these pillars: attracting new clients; retaining and growing relationships for the brand and company; increasing name recognition and awareness; and creating targeted effective communications using all the tools including advertising, public relations, trade promotion, sponsorships and social media as well as community involvement.

What are the myths that Pitch then busts? The reader must infer that they include the primacy of advertising using traditional media; the role of line extensions; the link between pricing, brand value and customer acceptance; the role of innovation; the role and limitations of branding, the place and importance of globalisation and the routes to market.

The assertion that “advertising is dead” should generate a lively debate. Much advertising features online and social media platforms. So how is it dead? Is it advertising that died or there is a change in the platforms for delivering it so much so as to leave the traditional ones lost?

Pitch is a must-have for professionals as well as students in the related fields of marketing, mass communication and cognate disciplines such as sociology, economics and psychology. It has started a conversation that invites the active engagement of the IMC field. How well the industry responds to the issues the book raises would also be an index of its health and capacity for intellectual engagement. The nation awaits and watches.

                   `        =ENDS=b