Marketers always have jobs to do, even at trying economic times —Agenmonmen

The Immediate Past President of the National Institute of Marketing of Nigeria (NIMN), Tony Agenmonmen, in this chat with Akin Adewakun, believes marketing should not be seen as only the rosy economic times, insisting the deplorable state of the nation’s economy, today, makes marketers more relevant to prevent many brands from going under. Excerpts:

What do you think marketers should be doing to have access to the dwindling  Nigerian consumer pockets?

It’s not about dwindling pockets, the pockets are actually empty. We celebrated minimum wage of N70,000 few months back. Since then, till now, what has happened? Prices of fuel have gone up again, same with electricity prices. Now we are going to have telecoms tariffs go up. So, all these have brought down their purchasing power, especially people with fixed incomes. So, even if you put hands in their pockets, what are you going to get? So the disposable income of consumers is depressed.  They now have to really rationalize what…