Experts warn on rash of adverts by PFAs

Category: Pensions


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Experts warn on rash of adverts by PFAsThe Nigerian advertising scene is always full of excitement. This is because government economic policies like the just- ended banking consolidation, ensure that the industry has its hands perennially full with business. In the past weeks, the fad has been the pension reforms and pages of newspapers and airwaves have been awash with various advertisements. This followed the registration of 12 Pension Fund Administrators, four Pension Fund Custodians and one Closed Fund Administrator and the issuance of licenses by President Olusegun Obasanjo at an elaborate ceremony in Abuja on Monday, February 20, 2006. The implication is that every employee must choose one PFA out of the 12, which, are now private driven, hence must be accountable. The PFAs are expected to open and maintain retirement saving account for all employees under their banner, invest and manage pension fund assets, provide customer support service including accessing customer account balances and statements on demand. But even before the companies got their licenses; in fact, immediately they got registered, many of them began to run advertisements announcing their birth. They have seen wooing employees and promising mouth watering benefits for those who would sign up with them. But experts say much as these companies have started getting attention, their advertisements have been largely off the mark, making it difficult to achieve the expected impact. The Managing Director of Mediacom, a media independent agency, Dr Ken Onyali Ikpe, faulted the approach the organisations have adopted in running their advertisements. He expressed surprise that these companies that are just commencing operations are promising benefits. According to him, there is poor awareness of the pension reform policy among the populace, noting that the companies ought to have started by educating the people about the policy and what they stand to gain. He opined that this is important because the Nigerian pensioner has been battered for years during the regime of the former pension scheme and the average employer has no hope that his fate would be any better when he retires. This according to him, will make the acceptance and impact of the message difficult. He added that PFAs should make efforts to sell their names, logo and what they are set out to do. “People should know whether the company is an insurance company or a pensions company before you begin to make promises,” he said. Ikpe blamed the self-styled brand consultants for the mistakes the PFAs are making, noting that the PFAs are being misadvised. Brand consultants are a new breed of marketing communications companies that decline being described as ad agencies. They claim to be specialists in strategies creation for brands; yet they don’t stop at creating strategy but also conceptualise and place advertisements in the media. Ikpe argued that if the companies had taken their briefs to conventional advertising agencies, they would have been properly guided on how to run their advertising campaigns so as to generate the required awareness. He cited the non-involvement of any renowned agency in the campaigns being run by the PFAs as a pointer to the fact that the ads were poor in strategy. Speaking in the same vein, the Managing Director of SO&U Saatchi and Saatchi, Mr. Udeme Ufot, criticised the strategy of the ads. Said he, “Most of those ads are targeted at the high profile members of the society. Even when you listen to the jingles played on radio which is the medium for the man on the street, you discover that the tone of the messages is high.” He regretted that many pension administrators have been unleashed at the market at the same time and they are all struggling to attract attention, with little success. According to him, “The challenge of any ad agency working for any PFAs is to decide that, while every other person is on the street shouting ‘look at me,’ it should think out how it can differentiate its client from the crowd.” He said that presently, the marketplace was inundated by a lot of claims, with members of the target market unable to decipher any difference. “Everybody has hit the streets playing drums. Yes, they are playing different tunes, but I cannot hear anyone. Somebody has to say, why don’t I get a flute and make a difference,” he said. The experts believe that the PFAs would need to change the strategy of their adverts if they want to galvanise the market and take advantage of the sector, which has been liberalised. But who should be the target of the ads, employees or employers? According to the pension Act, employees should choose any PFA that appeals to them and should not be directed by their employers. An advertising practitioner, Benson Uche said that the ads should talk to the employee, since he is the man with the choice. The reality however, is that many organisations would decide the particular PFAs their staff would use. They may consider it unwieldy relating with more than one or two PFAs. “Should that be the case, then the companies would also need to target directors of companies through above the line advertisements and direct marketing. Such advertisements would need to be packaged differently from the one meant for the staff. So far, this has not been the case,” Uche said. Already some PFAs have begun lobbying the management of organisations. Lola Akande of Media Rights Agenda, however, warns that some of the PFAs may collapse in no time, so employees must not be carried away by the promises being made by the PFAs in their advertisements while making their choices. Rather, they should study them closely and go with the ones that have sound structures and have staff who are competent to manage their funds,” she said. - punch

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