Experts in the integrated marketing communications sector have urged marketing practitioners in the country, desirous of staying relevant, to brace up for the new market reality that is increasingly enhancing the relevance of consumers.
The experts gave the charge at the Media Consortium Conference and Awards, held in Lagos.
They admitted that value is gradually shifting, with the modern-day consumer getting more informed, empowered, and increasingly value-centric, a development they believed would require marketing practitioners and brand custodians to devise strategies that would enable them to see such consumer beyond a mere buyer, but also a decision maker and part of the brand-building process.
In her keynote speech tagged: ‘The Value Shift: Strategies for the New Market Reality in the Age of the Empowered Consumer,’ President, National Institute of Marketing of Nigeria (NIMN), Dr Bolajoko Bayo-Ajayi, described today’s consumer as the ‘most dangerous’, due to the humongous information at their disposal.
According to Bolajoko, who was represented by Femi Adeniba, Managing Partner at Sustmark Consult, the present-day brand has lost marketing control. Unlike the old arrangement, when the consumer only listened while such brand told its story, today’s consumer no longer waits for the brand to explain the market before taking decisions, due to the huge information at such consumer’s disposal, she argued.
The NIMN boss attributed the development to the advent of internet, social media, smartphones, e-commerce, fintech, creator economies and now Artificial Intelligence (AI), which, she stated, had successfully transferred the market power from the seller to the buyer.
‘The consumer gained information, then choice, then voice, and increasingly, intelligence. Today, you can control your advertisement, but not what customers say about it. You can control your website, but not what customers say about their experiences. You can spend millions buying attention, but you cannot force people to care,’ she stated.
She described the case of the Nigerian consumers as even more interesting, since they are becoming more demanding and choosy due to the prevailing economic downturn in the country.
She said while the consumer is concerned about pricing and would always demand a fair price, such consumer has also become value-centric, which makes her want to get high value for products purchased.
Bolajoko, therefore, wondered what becomes of today’s marketing practitioners after being stripped of the power to control the market and conversations surrounding their brand.
The first female president of NIMN argued that value shift and the new market reality have made it imperative for marketing practitioners to come up with strategies that will not only see the Nigerian consumer as price-sensitive, but also value-driven, due to the economic pressure and extraordinary aspiration she is facing.
She stressed the need for marketing practitioners to always deliver on their brand promise, since brand promise elicits consideration from the buyer.
‘Marketing must increasingly move into product development, pricing, customer experience, data, technology and business strategy. We often say, ‘The customer is at the heart of everything we do.’ But let us test that claim,’ she added.
According to her, one of the responsibilities of the NIMN is to ensure practitioners move beyond making products attractive by ensuring the marketing profession evolve, to enable future and practising marketers understand data, AI, behavioural science, customer experience, digital ecosystems, sustainability, analytics and commercial accountability, without losing the human understanding at the heart of marketing.
For Bolajoko, NIMN has a responsibility to move the profession beyond qualifications and professional recognition, but also ensure that the market does not move faster than the profession.
Speaking in a similar vein, Head, Digital, Globacom, Femi Opadere, also corroborated the claim of the new market reality, where the consumer decision is no longer informed by how catchy a product advert is.
He said the present-day consumer expects relevance, convenience, trust, value and voice, adding that while the consumer of the past listened and bought, with the brands doing all the thinking, the present-day consumer compares and validates before choosing.
Co-Founder, Media Consortium, Godwin Anyebe, explained that the conference theme was informed by the need to discuss the new market reality, which, he argued, requires more than incremental adjustments, but bold, forward-looking strategies, deep cross-sector collaboration, and an unwavering commitment to customer-centric innovation.