Friday, August 6, 2010



MARKETING MIX IS THE ONLY PUBLIC RELATIONS AGENCY IN NIGERIA
- Akin Adeoya, CEO Marketing Mix
Akin Adeoya had his primary education at the Palmer Primary School, Sapele and later, St. Malaki Secondary School in the same town. His parents lived in Sapele and so he grew up there.
The Public Relations guru did not complete his secondary education in Sapele and had to move down to Ekiti State. After this, he left for Ughelli, Delta State, where he did his A levels.
After his first degree in Obafemi Awolowo University, where he studied English, he taught for a year in Anambra State during the National Youth Service Corps Programme (NYSC).
Shortly afterwards, Akin got a job at Rosabel Advertising and that brought out his creative talents and it opened his eyes to many things. From advertising, he found himself in the newsroom writing a column called, ‘Campaign’ at Thisday Newspaper.
That was the beginning of what has today become a success story as it led to the establishment of Marketing Mix, the company that was awarded The Best PR Agency in Nigeria at the just concluded NIPR Eagle Awards.
In this interview with A&B, the Ekiti State born dude tells the story of his agency and why he believes there is only one public relations agency in Nigeria.

How do you feel about your company being declared as the best PR Agency in Nigeria
Thank you, I feel great and honoured. It came as a shock when I heard our name mentioned as the winner of PR Agency of the year. The award is first of its kind and it’s a great privilege to be honoured.
Public relations is our core service at Marketing Mix and its team works we did made us to clinch the award. It was a great task for us here to choose which of our job should be submitted for the awards and the ones we eventually submitted was nominated in four categories.
These include Best Use of PR in Print Media regarding our job on MTN Project Fame West Africa Seasons 1&2, Best Use of PR in Electronic Media on Omo Project Wonder show, Best Outstanding PR Campaign on Close-up Brush day/night Campaign, Best PR Agency and personally I was nominated as the Most Outstanding PR Practitioner (male). It’s a great honour clinching two awards eventually.

You said it came as a shock when Marketing Mix was mentioned as the winner, does that mean you don’t think your company worths the award
We won’t assume that we are the best among others or the most intelligent but our USP stands us out. We know that we are the best because we deliver to all our clients. We have multinational brands as part of our clients and that does not make us arrogant. The truth is we don’t work for too many agencies, we don’t rate ourselves on the basis of the number of clients we handle, but the qualities of the works we do speak for us. If am not surprised that means I have assumed that Marketing Mix is the best.

What’s your next step after the awards
I won’t tell you there is anything on ground as we speak, but I’ll tell you that a fool at 40 is a fool forever, we are now 11 years old in the business and we are conscious of the fact that we are not young anymore, which means that the reality of the economy down scale has compelled us to go beyond bothers in rendering cutting edge services. If you look at the kind of business we do and the people we work for, you will agree with me that we have to keep moving. We are now with the mission to carry out an overhaul of our image, our representations. A lot of people still don’t understand our services; people we’ve worked for in the area of PR and event ideation and activations can really explain what we do.
There are lots of agencies that are into events in this country and what they really do is to activate your event. We refer to ourselves as event ideation outfit. Event ideation is coming up with an idea that is a solution which will be applicable to all set of people. That means you need a good idea before you can activate.
If you don’t have a big client, then you should come up with a big idea that will stand you out. One of the great ideas we’ve come out with is the idea to mend the relationship within the Nigerian Police and the public. It’s one of our campaigns that stood us out as PR goes beyond your capacity to push stories and photography in the media, PR is building relationship. Very soon, we are coming with the idea to storm government schools with the intention of providing free education. What that means is that we are going to provide teachers for schools that lack teachers in any subject. Though it’s a capital intensive project, it will tell the world that really we are moving from boys to men.

You are championing a new movement in the PR industry, what is the secret
A lot of people don’t understand what public relations is all about. Public relations is very wide and we all need to educate ourselves on it. The Insight Communications and Rosabel Advertising of this world see the need to set up a public relations section of their advertising outfit which means you cannot do without PR. Event organizers can only get the rave of the moment artistes, good decorations, big chest bouncers, but as an event ideation person, ‘am going to infuse something that will sell your brand more into the event. A PR outfit will engage in strategic thinking, tactical thinking to satisfy clients while an event outfit will just get carried away with the excitement of the event. What ‘am championing is the truth that clients must realize that there is more to PR than media. A country like South Africa offers the 360 degree of public relations.

Your awards came from the Lagos chapter of NIPR, what is the credibility
Well, the truth is that Lagos is the seat of public relations practitioners in West Africa. Except for people who do PR for legislators or some government officials, who are based in Abuja, everybody in terms of PR is here in Lagos. You cannot claim to be practicing without being a member of NIPR, people who are guided by rules, and ethics of the profession.
This is a credible award. Don’t forget it was well attended by top practitioners and government officials of this state, so how credible do you want it to be?

What’s the strength of Marketing Mix and your vision for it in few years to come
Marketing Mix is the only agency in Nigeria to me. There is no other consultant, either advertising or PR that has a content development department like us. This is the reason none cannot compete with Marketing Mix, ‘am talking of more than 15 people who only sit and write ideas alone. It’s a huge investment, but its our USP that is taking us forward always, it’s a fundamental strategy. That’s how we started and it’s been working well for us. So, that is how we got to where we are. We also have dedicated staff structure, who needs little or no brief to deliver excellent services.
I want to see a Marketing Mix that is able to impact positively in obvious ways in the Nigerian economy. We value education and promote good reading culture; those things are very close to our heart.

No comments:

Post a Comment