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| Mrs. Bunmi Oke |
Mrs. Bunmi Oke is the Chief Operating Officer of 141Worldwide. Recently she announced her resignation from
the company. Her resignation takes effect at the end of July after a
meritorious service spanning several years in the service of the agency. Until
then, she is still the Chief Operating Officer/Executive Director of 141
Worldwide, a prominent world-class advertising agency in Nigeria. She remains
the second female President of AAAN in history. As the pioneer Chief Operating
Officer/Executive Director, she led a prolific team of professionals over the
years, and built 141 into a prominent world-class advertising agency in
Nigeria.
In this exclusive
interview with the Editor of BrandInfo,
OLUWAGBENGA BANKOLE, Bunmi speaks on the effect of the current recession on
advertising industry, her next step after leaving 141Worldwide, why government should
implement 2014 national conference report and other typical issues. Excerpt !
Recently Marketing
Edge Magazine gave you an award as the Marketing Personality of the Decade. How
do you feel winning an award of this magnitude?
I thank God for
giving me the priviledge to win the award because I believe honour is from Him.
If a magazine of integrity like Marketing Edge dimmed it feet to know me not
for a year but for a decade I think it is big achievement. I have spent a bit
of time in this industry and it is good to be acknowledged and recognized as
somebody who has made great contribution to the industry along with my team.
What is the main
reason behind your decision to resign from I4IWorldwide?
Like I said before there is a point in time in life that you
sit down and ask yourself what are your next step. Just like is applicable to a
brand, it is the same thing as far as human being is concern. You look at your life
circle, your career circle, and you ask yourself does my product needs
refreshing, relunching, rebranding,
collaboration etc.
I simply took the decision because I have a lot of career
adventures I want to go into which some of them are ideas I gathered over the
years and I want to do them now before I get old. It is a career decision to go
on a career adventure.
How would you
describe your days at I4IWorldwide?
The good part is that I spent 12years. It is good to know
that am leaving an agency that is one of the best in the country. Am leaving
when the ovation is loud and I wish the agency very great success.
Tell us a day you can
never forget while at the helm of affair at the advertising firm?
There are many days I can never forget but I will give you
two. The most interesting and defining one was when we won Etisalat account. It
was very defining in my career because it was an international pitch from Abu
Dhabi. The pitching was very interesting. We were about 15 agencies which were
later reduced to five and eventually we became the winner. That was the
defining moment for me in my career. It was purely on merit. There was no
bribery or corruption, but on professional merit. That to me says a lot both
for those who conducted the ROP and for myself and my team. I give God all the
glory because 141Worldwide is still on that account even till now that am
leaving. It is about nine years now and it says a lot about me. It is one thing
to get a business and another thing is to maintain or keep it.
Another one I will tell you was when we also won the Western
Union account about five years ago, although we are not on the account again.
The account was interesting because it was also an international pitch. At some
point I was very professional. I was asking for finance fee and the client was
curious to know why we asked when nobody was asking for that. I told them that
we belong to an association and that is the way things are done. They were not
familiar with Nigerian environment or rules and regulations because they are
from Casablanca, Morocco. At a time they said we should bow out of the pitch if
we are not going to meet up with their understanding of how to pitch for
business. They asked me to bring documentation which I did. What I found very
humbly was that because is an American company that has standard and operation
guidelines, a week later they wrote beck to us that they have checked our
proposal and understand our professional standard. They asked us to come back
for the pitching and I give God glory that we won the account after competing
with about four agencies. They told us that one of the reasons why they gave us
the business was because we were the only agency that came out categorically
with our operational guidelines, the rules, we are honest and they saw the
trajectory of our growth.
The experience taught me two things that you must be true to
yourself in what ever thing you do and there is always the God factor in what
so ever human being does. Since then we have won some other accounts and I give
God the glory that he gave me the opportunity to be the leader of the band.
There is rumour
making rounds that in the next few weeks you will unveil your own advertising
agency. How true is this ma?
I will just say watch this space (BRANDINFO). I don’t know
about the rumour, but I have told you I want to go and do other things. I am a
very principle person. Ethics dictate that I should not formally launch any
firm until I totally disengaged from 141Worldwide and by then I can engage in
what ever I feel. That time will be more exciting and I will surely invite you
to let you know what the space will evolve.
The advertising industry has evolved and there is a need for new module
and I thank God that gave me the opportunity to come up with something
different.
The economic downturn
in the country has affected so many industries. How has it affected the
advertising industry?
To be honest with you, the only thing that has kept us going
is the grace of God as well as professionalism. The truth of the matter is that
even in recession some fundamentals don’t change and I will give an example of
what I mean. You and I will still go to the market because we have to eat, we
have to sleep, we have to maintain our body systems etc. Life will go on
irrespective of recession. Some people get married in war; thank God Nigeria is
not in war. No matter how things are, life goes on. The only different is that
people re-priorities. Fundamentals will not, you still have to do some things. The recession is both a blessing and a
challenge to the advertising industry in different ways. The blessing is that
we all have to rethink the way we do business. We are all restructuring
ourselves in line with economic realities. We are now repositioning and
packaging ourselves for the new economy. I think the challenge has actually
brought out champions in the industry.
How can advertising
agencies survive in this period despite the economic challenges?
Persistent is one of the ways advertising agencies can
survive. Another thing is that they must know their onions. If you know your
onions and you are persistent you will survive. No clients in this period want
to spend money anyhow, but if you give them the reason why they need to spend
and how there spending would make them to get more value, you will remain in
business. This is the time when the men and the boys will be separated in the
advertising industry in terms of professionalism and if you know your onions.
Clients now need real help and proper guidance. They can’t afford to
experiment. They will rather deal with those who know their onions. Clients
don’t want waste and unnecessary expenses. They want agencies that can help
them solve their problems. Clients only look for agencies that can give them
value. Advertising agencies must think about solutions to solve the clients’
problems.
You were part of the
delegates at the 2014 national confab. Majority of your agreements at the
confab have not been formulated. What is your message to this present
administration regarding that?
Everything in life is about choice. Fortunately there are
advantage and disadvantages about the present situation we found ourselves in
this country. APC made a choice not to necessarily consider the report of the
national conference. It does not mean they cannot visit issues that were
discussed there. We need to have an opened mind. There are issues affecting the
country presently which were discussed at the conference. Restructuring is part
of them. To me the conference report will help to fast track some possible
solutions. The current government needs to visit some of the topics discussed
at the conference. The beauty of a report is that it can always be referred to
at any point in time. It can be used today, in 10years or 40years time. If you
go to country like USA they have constitutional reports that are 100 years old.
It is there for posterity, political studies students, for current government
or future governments to consider. What I am really concern about is that there
were issues and topics discussed during the confab that are still relevant and
are currently blowing in the minds of Nigerians. I think we over politicise
everything in Nigeria. Electricity is still a problem in this country whether
it is PDP or APC that is in government. It is still a catastrophe that we do
not have stable electricity in Nigeria. There are so many topics in the report
that are still relevant with the present situation of the country.
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