The outlook for the media and brand management appears dull if the widespread fraud in the media monitoring space goes unchecked.
This is coming in the heels of an estimated loss of N13.4 billion revenue, representing 54 per cent of total media advertising spend in 2016, which were neither completed at all nor carried out on time as agreed between the media and the advertisers.
According to Mr John Ajayi, Publisher of MARKETING EDGE, a leading marketing and advertising publication, whose investigation revealed this fraud, the media and brand management faces a shaky future if the sharp practice continues.
He told Thisage in interview that the revenue loss would impact the sectors in three ways.
He said; “The first negative effect on brand management is that advertising budget lack the requisite value that would have helped to build brand equity in the market place. Secondly, the media is loosing revenue because of the tripartite conspiracy of those involved in the racketing. Thirdly, owners of brand are becoming wary of investing in the media because they cannot see value being delivered.”
He restated his earlier recent remark that an estimated N13.4bn of media advertising, which would have been paid for, was either misplaced (i.e. advert not carried as planned and ordered) or unaccounted for (i.e. advert not monitored to be sure it was carried in the first place).
He said the situation is compounded by allegations that some media monitoring service providers may have been conniving with some radio and television stations as well as media agency employees to issue questionable, even fraudulent media compliance report over the years.
For instance, according to an investigation conducted by Marketing Edge, a radio station in the North claimed 100 per cent compliance in the month of January 2017 but was proved wrong after back checks by a leading media monitoring service provider.
In another instance, the magazine gathered that one of the three media monitoring service providers had given a zero compliance on a media campaign that none of the advert spots earlier booked by an advertiser was carried at all or on time as planned and ordered.
“Findings further revealed that the dispute involving a media agency, a broadcast station and a media monitoring service agency was finally resolved in February 2017 through the hiring of another media monitoring service provider who used its audio-playback facility. This no doubt confirmed earlier fears of a tripartite conspiracy in the Nigerian media market.
“It was gathered that some broadcast stations were in the habit of doctoring advert logs. There is another case of an Ibadan based TV station whose dispute with an advertiser was resolved only after the station’s logs for that particular month were backed with air-side-audio files from a media monitoring service provider.
“The lack of standards in the media monitoring space and the abuse and fraud is not limited to some media monitoring service firms and broadcast organizations and their employees.”
Ajayi said: “At a time when businesses are under profit pressures from the economic recession and the advertisers need to invest even more in media advertising to cope with keen competition in the marketplace, it remains a mystery that business leaders seem to look the other way when it comes to due process and accountability on the media advertising front.
“Why they would expend so much time and effort in ensuring raw materials and other inputs are delivered as per quality prescription, on time and within budget but lower the bar when it comes to media advertising deliveries?”
Commenting on this issue, a seasoned statistician and media specialist, Mr. Taiwo Olowokere said, ‘companies and corporations will continue to spend huge billions of naira on media advertising without gaining requisite value for money as long as the Chief Executive Officers of these corporations fail to show more than a passing interest in the yearly media budget and how it was spent’.
