The chief executive of Agile Communications and former President, Association of Advertising Agencies of Nigeria, Rufai Ladipo, has started a campaign that will seek to situate Small and Medium Enterprises (SMEs) to grow seamlessly in Nigeria.
At a press conference in Lagos to unveil the 2017 SMEs Brands and Conference, he said to a recent research, SME employees account for around 85 per cent of the total workforce in the country, which is a wide margin compared to the obtainable rate in other parts of the world.
While noting that there is hardly any economy in the world that can prosper without healthy, competitive and flourishing small and medium-sized enterprises, Ladipo urged both the public and private sectors to channel their resources to educating and facilitating the ventures to realise their full potential to the benefit of the entire population.
On why the theme is ‘Unlocking business growth through branding’, Ladipo argued further that “SMEs form the foundation on which a lot of world economies are built and currently generate a significant percentage of Nigeria’s Gross Domestic Product.”
According to him, the 2017 edition of the SME Brands Conference and Expo would focus on exploring and leveraging the various techniques of strategic business communication and establishing a distinct brand identity, and exploiting the media to achieve the desired positioning.
Ladipo added that “The subject of branding has been identified as a key factor in determining the viability of SMEs, as countless surveys and analysis give credence to the speculations that the rapid collapse of many ventures can be attributed to the consistent disregard for brand building; this is also while acknowledging other contributory factors such as budget and capacity”.
During the period, conferees will evaluate the various factors and identify best practices and combined measures towards rapid improvement on SMEs that will attend the conference.
Speaking also, Managing Director of Purple Pearl Consulting and one of the organisers of the event, Mrs. Bolajoko Bayo-Ajayi, said “For the SMEs to effectively fulfil their role in the economy, branding is an idea that they need to embrace.
Other business leaders positioned to make presentations include the Chief Executive Officer/Chief Operating Officer, X3M Ideas, Steve Babaeko; Managing Director/CEO, Brandzone Consulting LLC, Chizor Malize; Chief Marketing Officer, Interswitch Group, Cherry Eromosele; and MD/CCO of Noah’s Ark Communications, Lanre Adisa, and others.
