Most Organisations Not Getting It Right when It Comes to Branding — Demola Akinbola

Serial author, brand specialist and communication expert, Demola Akinbola, in this interface with AKIN ADEWAKUN, highlights the importance of branding to business success, among other issues, expressing the regrets that many Nigerian businesses are not leveraging this game-changing tool enough to enhance their fortunes. Excerpts:

As a brand specialist and a communication expert, what exactly is the essence of branding, and who needs it?

The essence of branding is for individuals and organisations to project their unique and differentiating attributes.

It’s about showing how much impact and value you can deliver to your stakeholders.

Branding is a sustained process of communicating your values, principles, and the benefits you, your product or service can offer people.

Everyone needs branding, except if you have no vision or ambition for your career or business. God did not create any useless human being; it behoves us to identify our unique attributes, develop them, and leverage them to build a strong reputation and brand equity. Branding is about the unique experience that a brand has to offer. A product or service has to be well differentiated for it to be a brand in the real sense of it.

Otherwise, it becomes a commodity that is not in any way different from other products and services in the market.

While brands thrive and compete based on their essence and the unique benefits they are able to offer, commodities compete based on pricing, location and other basic, elementary level parameters.

Therefore, branding is about differentiation and value creation while commoditization is about being available everywhere at any cost, with little or no emphasis on value creation.

The essence of branding is to create good, strong, and winning brands. A strong or winning brand is the one that passes the two major tests of differentiation and value creation.

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Brands (whether individual, corporate or nation brands) are rated in terms of their strengths and their ability to create competitive advantage in the crowded market place.

How well do you think corporate organisations, in Nigeria, leverage this to enhance the fortunes of their brands and improve their bottom-line?

Unfortunately, most organisations are not getting it right when it comes to branding. I developed a typology of organisations in relation to their awareness and commitment to branding. There are three types of organisations. First, those organisations, totally in the dark when it comes to branding. They know next to nothing about it. Such organisations are too focused on profit maximisation and believe that making money is the only purpose of an enterprise.

The second type are organisations that know about branding but adopt a haphazard and half-hearted approach to it. They do not go the whole hog and end up not getting the desired results from their branding activities.

Such organisations substitute packaging and publicity for branding. While packaging and publicity are elements of branding, they are means to achieving an end in brand building. Branding is deeper and more serious than packaging.

The third type are the archetypal organisations that know about branding and are doing it right. They focus on the essential things that build a brand, such as internal communication, employee engagement, corporate governance practices, quality products/services, stakeholder engagement, strategic communication, media positioning, reputation management, advertising, and marketing.

Most organisations are not maximising the benefits of branding. This is due partly to the focus on the immediate. Nigerian companies are short-term in their thinking and approach to business management. You cannot build a strong brand overnight; it takes years of consistent and focused work. I hold this view, even though it is not a popular one in this part of the world, that the primary purpose of an enterprise is not profit maximisation. The main essence of a business is to deliver value-added products and services. In the process of doing this conscientiously and consistently, you will make good money and experience enduring growth.

Some have heaped the country’s image woes on the refusal of governments, national and sub-national, to hire professionals to handle their communications; and the reluctance, too, of such pros to be actively involved in the public sector’s activities. What’s your take on this? For example, why is that culture of perception management not as strong in the public sector as it is in the private sector? How do we address this?

Perception management is a very important aspect of Public Relations and Brand Management. As long as we continue to politicise appointments into strategic positions such as information management, stakeholder engagement, and perception management, we will continue to be buffeted by image and reputation crises.

Governments at the federal and state levels should cultivate the habit of appointing knowledgeable and experienced professionals. Successive governments have had to battle reputation issues because we don’t have the right people handling perception management.

The culture of perception management is not strong in the public sector because, as a nation, we have never taken our reputation seriously. Nigeria does not have a national strategic communication and reputation management policy. There is no brand development and management policy or manual. We have, unfortunately, become a nation of anything goes. It is one day, one crisis, and we have failed to realise that successful destination branding or nation branding is what attracts tourism and foreign direct investment. We lack the culture of being proactive and committed to reputation management. We often fail to realise that our actions as a nation, not just our words, are what build the national brand. What did we get from the “Heart of Africa” and “Good People, Great Nation” image-sprucing campaigns? Nothing, because our actions do not always match our words.

Besides, we do not have the culture of putting square pegs in square holes. We have never allowed our best eleven to govern us or manage our affairs in line with best practices.

Professionals in government are not expected to be overly involved in politics or partisan, as that can cloud their judgment. Agreed, they should and must be very knowledgeable and conversant with the operations of government. However, they remain apolitical professionals appointed based on their competence, and not their political affiliations.

As a communication professional, what are you doing in your own sphere of influence to address it?

I write books, organise webinars, write articles, and generally educate and sensitise people about this. My 7th book explicitly dwells on the role of strategic communications in business and national development.

Talking about the new book: “Communication to Win in Career and Business: Essential Tips for Effective Communication”, what exactly is the thematic thrust, and what do you intend to achieve with the book?

Thank you. Communication is one of the essential life skills that we all need to acquire, develop, and perfect. Communication can be the deal-breaker for a sloppy career professional or entrepreneur; it can also be the game-changer for the one who is deliberate and consistent about making an impact and adding value in every office or business situation. In every sphere of human endeavour, one difference between the successful and the not-so-successful is the ability to conceive, develop, and deliver impactful communication messages that produce desired results.

The book, therefore, seeks to empower the reader to communicate effectively in all aspects of life, from a place of supreme confidence, to achieve the desired career or business success. It is intended to be a practical guide and a roadmap for the discerning career professional and ambitious entrepreneur who is committed to connecting with their defined target audience through measured, well-conceptualised communication messages that project their brand essence and attributes.

It explores various themes around the concept of effective communication, such as: Definition and Scope of Communication; Strategic objectives of Communication; Theories of Communication; Types and Styles of Communication; Principles of Effective Communication; Digital Communication; Integrated Marketing Communication; Guiding principles for Effective Communication; Communication as a tool for personal branding, and using Communication skills to negotiate successfully.

The main themes of the book focus on understanding the essential principles of effective communication and using them to build goodwill, garner influence, advance careers, build personal/corporate brands, and change attitudes/behaviour. The overarching objective of the book is to strengthen your personal and business brands through effective communication.

This book also examines the various issues that have redefined the importance of strategic communication, marketing, branding and reputation management as necessary steps towards winning. It explores various perspectives on building a winning organisation.

One major challenge of book publishing, especially in Nigeria, could be logistics. For instance, getting the published works out to the target audience. How do you intend to address it?

You are right. However, over the years, I have developed a marketing and distribution strategy that leverages book presentation events, direct/interpersonal marketing, and webinars to build awareness and drive sales. I also drop copies at some frontline bookshops. It has been working. Nigerians do not deliberately walk into bookshops to buy books; hence you cannot rely on book sales outlets to drive purchases.

You recently launched a Brand Academy. Since its launch, how has the public response been? What makes the Academy different from other ones that predated it?

Yes, the Nigerian Brand Academy (NBA) started in 2025, but it was formally launched on June 26, 2025.The NBA is a free online learning platform, focused on the personal and professional development of current and future business policy/decision makers with a view to supporting them to build winning personal and business brands that compete favourably in the global market place.

Entrepreneurs and business managers are also supported, in their quest to build competitive, world-class brands that thrive on value creation.