Client-Agency Relationship: Conservatism in Creativity

Since the inception of advertising in Nigeria more than 80 years ago, international advertising awards have continued to elude Nigerian agencies despite entries made during international competitions like Cannes Lions Festivals. As the Dubai International Advertising Festival, the creative advertising competition for the Middle East and Africa, draws nearer, Yetunde Ogundipe takes a look at some of the problems limiting Nigerian agencies from maximizing the advantages of international advertising credit.

Experts say that one of the problems on the advertising industry in Nigeria is the lack of drive to compete with foreign counterparts. This shyness is prompted by a usually tense client-agency relationship that reduces the number of creative works presented by Nigerian agencies at international awards. Although, many indigenous adverts are good and can compete internationally, other countries usually produce a number of good quality works that far outweigh what Nigerian agencies offer.
Speaking to M2, Nigeria’s representative to the Cannes Lions Awards and MD of Chini Productions, Nnamdi Ndu, says that “Few Nigerian agencies have entered for the awards but that is not enough to say that Nigerians have entered and they are not winning. For instance, in the last Cannes Lions Awards only one Nigerian agency entered three materials, while another country in Africa (South Africa) entered 750 materials. So how do you compare 750 materials with three? You need to be fully involved to win,” he explains.
M2 gathers that clients play a major role in the outcome of creative works. It is argued that it takes courage and boldness to think out of the box and create something truly different, but clients are less likely to be interested with such adventurism. This is a major industry challenge not limited to Nigeria.
Ndu points out that, “When running a business, clients don’t want to take unnecessary risks with their bank accounts. This is why clients are rather conservative. They don’t want to do something that will backfire in a way that they will not be able to manage.”
He further explains that the end product for a client is to makes sales from messages communicated to consumers, while on the other hand, the end product for an agency is not only to meet the client’s target but also to carve a niche for itself in terms of developing creative ideas. “Clients are not interested in creative material that will win awards but those that will make sales, which translates to: what is an agency going to tell its consumers so that can buy the product, or so that they don’t switch to another brand? So it is the responsibility of the agency to educate its client. And that is why this year, we have introduced a marketing category to our Young Lions Competition. This will encourage the people from the clients’ side to get involved in creativity,” he discloses.
Experts say many corporate brand managers are not adequately enlightened about market trends and hardly understand communication. This is because they do not have research departments. Regrettably, they ultimately influence market trends, churning out decade long creative communication which the target audience may find repulsive and boring. Clients tend to think that consumers will not understand more sophisticated messages, especially in a market where the average consumer questions the immediate reasons why he/she has to get a product.
An industry player who craves anonymity points out that “it is safe to say that we encounter certain constraints on the job and we have tried all sorts of approaches from the rational to the very functional. It just doesn’t cut ice with the client!”
He goes on to say that the moral lesson is that you may know all you do but you can’t be more Catholic than the Pope. So creativity begins with the client. It is the client that identifies his product’s problem, then writes the brief and sends to the agency. When the agency is done, it returns the material back to the client.
The way a client relates with the agency influences how the agency will treat the creative material that is used in communicating with target consumers. “As long as a client can see an agency as his creative partner and not just as an agency and understands that he manages the brand and the agency manages the creative – helping to create a personality for the product, he will support them,” says Ndu.
Presently, most informed clients are taking steps already to arrest this situation by hiring brand executives directly from advertising agencies but the agencies equally need re-orientation in order to effectively achieve mutually desirable objectives. There is also need for both ambitious professionals and clients to subscribe to creative communication courses and study marketing strategy books.
The bottom line is that agencies, without hindsight, will continue to take on frustrating briefs and ultimately produce works marred by avoidable errors which undermine the message. While the agency thinking is good, critics contend that it lacks depth, a non-negotiable recipe for outstanding creativity.