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Trading places: an in-depth analysis of entertainment public relations practices within different socio-economic contexts
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Dieyi | ! 1
Trading Places: An In-Depth Analysis of Entertainment Public Relations
Practices Within Different Socio-Economic Contexts.
by
Cynthia C. Dieyi
A White Paper Presented to the
FACULTY OF THE USC GRADUATE SCHOOL
UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA
In partial fulfillment of the
Requirements for the Degree
MASTER OF ARTS
(STRATEGIC PUBLIC RELATIONS)
June 2015
Copyright 2015 Cynthia C. Dieyi
Dieyi | ! 2
Acknowledgements
This thesis would not have been possible without the support of my formidable advisory
committee. I would like to thank my committee chair, Jennifer Floto, as well as my other
advisors, Fritz Friedman, Jerry Swerling and Steve Elzer.
Many thanks to my mentors, Paula Askanas and Fritz Friedman, for honoring me with
their time, attention and encouragement as I continuously sought their tutelage during the
thesis-writing process and beyond.
To Dr. Paul Nwulu, I am eternally grateful for your unwavering support and invaluable
contribution to my professional career over the years.
Finally, I would like to thank my other interviewees, Paschal Tambe, Kazeem Abdul-
Raheem, and Marc Graser for lending their valuable time and experience to this project.
Dieyi | ! 3
Abstract
The public relations discipline is one that is difficult to narrowly define. Through the
years, professional associations and individual experts alike have proposed and continue
to modify its meaning, tweaking it to align with progressive contexts. This rings even
more true when the function of the discipline is considered within different political,
socio-economic environments. While public relations in the United States has come a
long way, it falls short in the implementation of established standards and best practices
in third world countries.
Using the United States and Nigeria as case studies, this paper will analyze the public
relations practice and its nuances within specific political and socio-economic contexts.
To relay a coherent narrative, it will draw examples from the entertainment industry as a
very visible and attention-holding territory in which the discipline is practiced.
Interjecting secondary research analysis with insights from in-depth interviews from
industry professionals, the paper will examine the development of the public relations
discipline historically, to explore industry milestones and the external forces that fostered
them.
Finally, the paper will suggest methods for public relations practitioners in developing
countries such as Nigeria, to key into standards and best practices for the growth and
development of the trade worldwide.
Dieyi | ! 4
Table of Contents
Chapter I | INTRODUCTION
Defining the Discipline ………….……………………………………………… 7
Nascent Developments ……………………………………………………… 10
Elsewhere in the World ……………………………………………………..… 18
The Question Is ………………………………………………………………… 23
Chapter II | PR OVER TIME: UNITED STATES
Back in the Day ……………………………………………………………….. 24
Pioneers of the Trade ………………………………………………………… 24
A Public Relations Man ………………………………………………………. 28
The Forces That Were …………………………………………………………. 30
Chapter III | PR OVER TIME: NIGERIA
Hacking the Initial Codes …………………………………………………….. 33
Chapter IV | ENTERTAINMENT PR IN AMERICA
State of Public Relations Today ……………………………………………… 37
The Shockwave From the Digital Meteor ………………………………….. 41
Chapter V | ENTERTAINMENT PR IN NIGERIA
In Today’s Public Relations …………………………………………………… 46
Demystifying the Green Landscape ……………………………………….. 50
Chapter VI | THE SYMBIOSIS BETWEEN JOURNALISTS AND PUBLICISTS
It Takes two …………………………………………………………………….. 61
A Tale of two Trade Publications ……………………………………………. 62
Chapter VII | STANDARDIZING THE PRACTICE IN NIGERIA
Going the Distance …………………………………………………………… 68
Dieyi | ! 5
The “Oga at the top” Phenomenon ……………………………………….. 68
Enter New Media in Shining Armor …………………………………………. 71
Chapter VII | CONCLUSION
Approaching the Tunnel’s end ……………………………………………… 75
Works Cited …………………………………………………………………………. 77
Dieyi | ! 6
List of Exhibits
Exhibit A Headline from Nigerian Entertainment Today……………………. 64
Exhibit B Headline from The Hollywood Reporter …………………………… 65
Exhibit C Lead of news story from Nigerian Entertainment Today ……….. 66
Exhibit D Lead of news story from The Hollywood Reporter ………………. 66
Exhibit E Paragraph from Nigerian Entertainment Today …………………. 67
Exhibit F Paragraph from The Hollywood Reporter ………………………… 67
Exhibit G Nigerian Civil Defense Official Meme ……………………………… 70
List of Appendices
Appendix A-1 Kazeem Abdul-Raheem Interview Transcription ……….… 88
Appendix A-2 Paschal Tambe Interview Transcription ……………………. 92
Appendix A-3 Fritz Friedman Interview Transcription ………………………. 97
Appendix A-4 Paula Askanas Interview Transcription ……………………. 102
Appendix A-5 Marc Graser Interview Transcription ………………………. 106
Appendix A-6 Dr. Paul Nwulu Interview Transcription ……………………. 108
Dieyi | ! 7
Chapter I | INTRODUCTION
Defining the Discipline
Nothing relays the difficulty in consolidating a single definition for public relations better
than the 2011 initiative, “Public Relations Defined,” wherein the industry’s leading
professional association – The Public Relations Society of America (PRSA) – developed
what it saw as a more appropriate interpretation for the practice within a 21st century
environment. And nothing illustrates the multifaceted nature of the discipline better than
the comment, “Like beauty, the definition of ‘public relations’ is in the eye of the
beholder,” from Mr. Gerard Corbett, the chairman and chief executive of San Bruno
based public relations firm, Redphlag, in response to cynicism and snide commentary
regarding the PRSA anchored initiative (Elliot, “Public Relations Defined: After an
Energetic Public Discussion”).
After crowdsourcing over 900 different interpretations of modern-day public relations
from professionals, academics, students as well as the public, PRSA nominated three
finalists for a vote. Out of 1,447 votes, “Public relations is a strategic communication
process that builds mutually beneficial relationships between organizations and their
publics” received 671 and emerged winner. This currently stands as the most recent
PRSA endorsed definition of the practice.
Yes, there is a shiny, new definition for public relations. Yet, there is nothing shiny or
new about the debate regarding its meaning. Rewind to 2007 when attempts at redefining
it fell short, or 2003 where the initiative initially went kaput, attesting in itself to the
Dieyi | ! 8
complexity of the discipline. Retreat even further back to 1982, the last time the Public
Relations Society of America successfully updated its definition of the practice (Elliot,
“Redefining Public Relations in the Age of Social Media”).
At the time, industry pioneer Rex Harlow collected 500 different definitions, identified
numerous relevant elements and eventually provided perhaps one of the longest
definitions of the discipline to ever have been developed, capturing the intricacy of the
public relations practice in 88 words:
“Public relations is the distinctive management function which helps establish and
maintain mutual lines of communication, understanding, acceptance and
cooperation between an organization and its public; involves the management of
problems or issues; helps management to keep informed on and responsive to
public opinion; define and emphasize the responsibility of management to serve
the public interests; helps management to keep abreast of and effectively utilize
change, serving as an early warning system to help anticipate trends; and uses
research and sound and ethical communication as its principal tools.”
Good luck trying to effectively describe what you do to a nonprofessional using the
definition above.
This may be why individual experts still shun results of the monumental task that is
defining public relations, finding it necessary to develop their own specific narratives:
Dieyi | ! 9
• “Public Relations involves information, activities and policies by which
corporations and other organizations seek to create attitudes favorable to
themselves and their work and to counter adverse attitudes.” - Joseph Turow,
Media Today.
• “Public Relations is the management function that establishes and maintains
mutually beneficial relationships between an organization and the publics on
whom its success or failure depends.” Glen M. Broom & Bey-Ling Sha,
Cutlip & Center’s Effective Public Relations.
• “Public Relations communicates the news, influences the news, receives the
news and responds to the news for a brand via the media. It’s the art and
science of talking to the right audience in the right voice. PR is the
communication hub of an organization. It influences and shapes a company’s
image, reputation, brand perception and culture. PR connects a brand and its
public via direct messages or editorial media including print, broadcast, radio,
digital, video or social media. Before social media, a company had one voice;
now social media encompasses an orchestra of voices that contribute to a
company’s image, reputation, brand perception and its public community.” -
Lisa Buyer, The Buyer Group.
Nonetheless, trade groups like the Public Relations Society of America and communities
of PR professionals like the Chartered Institute of Public Relations are highly regarded
Dieyi | ! 10
for progressively encouraging best practices by emphasizing the value of research,
measurement and evaluation as a crucial aspect of the discipline.
Nascent Developments
“A best practice is a technique, a method, a process, or an
activity that is more effective at delivering a particular
outcome than any other technique, method, process or
activity.” – Stacks and Michaelson
Don W. Stack and David Michaelson succinctly describe three methods that are essential
parts of best practices in research, measurement and evaluation of public relations
outcomes:
1. Setting clear and well-defined research objectives;
2. Applying rigorous research design that meets the highest standards of research
methods and ensures reliable results and;
3. Providing detailed supporting documentation with full transparency.
They dissect the three methods further and provide the following nine PR research best
practices:
1. Clear and well-defined research objectives
Dieyi | ! 11
2. Rigorous research design
3. Detailed supporting documentation
4. Demonstrating effectiveness
5. Link outputs (tactics) to outcomes
6. Develop better communications programs
7. Demonstrate impact on business outcomes
8. Demonstrate cost-effectiveness
9. Applicable to a broad range of activities
The first three components of the set can be broadly classified as setting clear and well-
defined research objectives, while the succeeding six constitute the application of
measures that examine both the quality and the substance of public relations activities
(Stacks & Michaelson, 161-174). Ultimately, scholastic dedication to the development of
these and similar guidelines over the past few years is indicative of efforts to standardize
the field.
Today’s public relations professionals are beginning to operate within an environment
where the outlined research best practices not only help to evaluate outcomes, but also
serve as a foundation for establishing standardized sets of measures for public relations
strategies. Global public relations firms such as Ketchum, dedicate entire departments to
research and analytics. Even niche organizations like entertainment public relations
Dieyi | ! 12
agency PMK●BNC, display a commitment to systematic research by constantly investing
in its Insights & Analytics department. For the past two years, PMK●BNC’s headquarters
in Los Angeles has been sponsoring a “Think Tank” program, in which graduate students
are hired to embark on targeted research projects that will provide insight on the
characteristics of different generations and eventually bolster the company’s Insights &
Analytics database.
If there were one single, comprehensible take-away from the complex elements described
above, it would be the fact that public relations has come a very long way since the times
of Rex Harlow. Nevertheless, recent challenges such as the ruckus surrounding the
“Public Relations Defined” initiative illustrate that the process of establishing it as a
professional discipline is still far from complete. Making this process even more difficult
is the fact that public relations professional associations can only offer counsel but are
unable to administer sanctions or punishments on erring practitioners (PRSA, “About
Enforcement”). Thus, the practice is still rife with spin-doctoring and “lazy” tactics. On
top of that, there are numerous forms of the public relations function across different
sectors of the economy, making it tougher to manage.
“Cutlip and Center’s Effective Public Relations” purports that the concept and practice of
public relations includes the following activities:
• Internal relations: The specialized part of public relations that builds and
maintains a mutually beneficial relationship between managers and the
employees on whom an organization’s success depends.
Dieyi | ! 13
• Advertising: Information placed in the media by an identified sponsor that
pays for the time or space. It is a controlled method of placing messages in the
media.
• Press Agentry: Creating newsworthy stories and events to attract media
attention in order to gain public notice.
• Public Affairs: The specialized part of public relations that builds and
maintains organizational relationships with governmental agencies and
community stakeholder groups to influence public policy.
• Lobbying: The specialized part of public relations that builds and maintains
relations with government, primarily to influence legislation and regulation.
• Issues Management: The process of anticipating, identifying, evaluating, and
responding to issues and trends that potentially affect an organization’s
relationships with its various constituencies.
• Crisis Management: The public relations specialty that helps organizations
strategically respond to negative situations and to dialogue with stakeholders
affected by perceived and actual consequences of crises.
• Investor Relations: The specialized part of corporate public relations that
builds and maintains mutually beneficial relationships with shareholders and
others in the financial community to maximize market value.
Dieyi | ! 14
• Development: The specialized part of public relations in nonprofit
organizations that builds and maintains relationships with donors, volunteers,
and members to secure financial and volunteer support.
• Publicity: Information provided by an outside source that is used by media
because the information has news value. This is an uncontrolled method of
placing messages in the media because the source does not pay media outlets
for placement (Broom and Sha 6 – 18).
As the most visible aspect of public relations, publicity is often erroneously considered
the poster child for the entire industry and by itself epitomizes the challenges within the
practice most vividly. Combined with a prevailing public notion that anyone can be a
successful publicist – with or without professional training – it is no surprise that the
industry is tainted with eyebrow-raising practices that become magnified in the absence
of more precise regulations or structures of accountability. This lends legitimacy to the
opinions of critics of the profession who associate it with all things unethical, including
lying and even espionage on the political level. The cynical notion that the concept of
“ethical” public relations constitutes an oxymoron is very common among observers of
the industry (Bowen 1).
Pivot to relatively recent industry scandals involving leading public relations agencies
and the negative sentiments toward the discipline make even more sense (Borchers,
“Public Relations Has a PR Problem”). In 1992, news broke of Hill & Knowlton’s
Kuwaiti government-sponsored involvement in the Gulf War. The “Citizens for a Free
Dieyi | ! 15
Kuwait” group that was constructed to sway American public opinion and convince the
US to get involved in the Gulf War was the brainchild of H & K. Critics charged that the
agency’s tactics were unethical and as a leading public relations agency at the time, they
basically represented the profession. “We’d represent Satan if he paid,” an unnamed Hill
& Knowlton executive reportedly stated in response to the controversy, plunging
sentiments toward the profession even further.
These fiendish perceptions regarding public relations practitioners even extend to popular
culture with television shows like “Scandal,” in which the lead character is a lawyer-
turned scheming “fixer,” who functions as crisis manager to the White House. Olivia
Pope – who is currently perceived in popular culture as an epitome of the public relations
practice within a political context – is also having an affair with the show’s very married
president of the United States. Miss Pope regularly resorts to questionable tactics such as
blackmail to achieve her professional goals. Even before “Scandal,” films like the movie
adaptation of Christopher Buckley’s bestseller, “Thank You For Smoking,” stoked the
fires of distrust. It follows Nick Taylor, a smooth-talking lead character who plays the
proverbial devil’s advocate. He is seen reporting results of questionable research on the
link between tobacco smoking and lung cancer as a tactic for dispelling the supposed
“myth” that tobacco-smoking precipitates cancer, while advancing Big Tobacco’s agenda.
Taylor attempts to validate Big Tobacco’s activities to counter activism against smoking
and its harmful effects, especially among teenagers and young adults. In a more recent
movie “Promised Land,” actor Matt Damon plays Steve Butler, a corporate representative
who is on a mission to close a key rural town to foster his company’s expansion plans.
Dieyi | ! 16
Butler’s undertaking inadvertently pits him against a respected schoolteacher who is
backed by a grassroots campaign. Such portrayals of publicists and public relations
practitioners in general do very little to improve the industry’s public image.
Nonetheless, the public relations field is developing rapidly worldwide with the United
States leading the race, at least in terms of shaping the practice within its own unique
socio-economic environment. According to a 2014 report, four of the top-five public
relations agencies in the world are headquartered in America. (Holmes Report, “Edelman,
Weber Shandwick, Then Daylight”). It also houses the world’s most vocal public
relations trade association, the Public Relations Society of America.
At its relatively developed stage in the United States, public relations’ most visible form,
publicity is generally equated with earned media as opposed to paid media.
• “Publicity involves supplying information that is factual, interesting and
newsworthy to media not controlled by you, such as radio, television,
magazines, newspapers, and trade journals.” - David R. Yale.
• “Information designed to appear in any medium of communication for the
purpose of keeping the name of the person or company before the public or of
creating public interest in their activities.” - Jay N. Nisberg.
• “Publicity is the collective efforts of an organization’s communicators to
attract attention for an organizational initiative, product or service.” - Linda E.
Swayne.
Dieyi | ! 17
A common denominator is the fact that publicity is basically achieved when media outlets
publish content that is tactically pitched by public relations practitioners based on the
extent to which, and the manner in which, it is newsworthy. While its ultimate goal to
positively affect bottomline is similar to advertising, the core distinction between the two
is that advertising is paid for and more controlled while publicity is earned based on its
relevance to the media.
Pete Williams purports:
“Advertising is when you pay for space or time to promote your product or
service. You can do this in newspapers and magazines, on television, radio,
billboard, on the side of a bus, in a cinema, on the side of a building – the
possibilities are just about endless (and people are coming up with new ways and
places to advertise all the time). You create your own advertising message, pay to
have the ad created and then pay for the advertising space. Even a basic
advertising campaign can cost thousands of dollars and some larger corporations
spend millions of dollars on ad campaigns each year.”
A 2014 report by eMarketer.com depicts that annual cumulative advertising spending
runs up to billions of dollars in the United States. The major movie studios for instance
spend hundreds of millions. A typical studio will release 12 to 15 movies a year and each
advertising campaign will usually cost $40 million to $60 million in paid media,
aggregating to at least $600 million to $700 million in advertising only. With that
established, consider how much beverage companies like Budweiser spend to market
Dieyi | ! 18
beer, or auto companies like Honda spend to sell cars and ad spending will add up to
billions of dollars.
On publicity, Pete Williams states:
“Publicity on the other hand, is when you send out a media release, stage an event
or do anything that attracts the media’s attention. The aim is to have the media
draw attention to your business for you. So what’s the biggest difference
compared with advertising? Cost! Generating publicity can be done for next to
nothing.” (Williams 118).
In this context, the description sounds self-explanatory but there is a fine line between
advertising and publicity in some socio-economic climates outside the United States. A
perfect example is the Nigerian market.
Elsewhere in the World
In Nigeria for instance, publicity wears a different face and the line that separates it from
advertising is further blurred:
• “Being a publicist in Nigeria is tough. I once sent a talent pitch to a journalist
at a print publication that I would rather not disclose and he simply responded
with a detailed quote describing layout sizes and their corresponding prices.”
– Anonymous.
Dieyi | ! 19
• “Simply having good newsworthy content is not enough in Nigeria. I think
abroad, that is enough. Sometimes you don’t even have a good video but you
have a good song abroad and before you know it everybody is listening to it.
But in Nigeria it’s not like that. In fact the guys that get popular nowadays are
the guys that are not even talented. Whereas artists that are really good and
have quality content remain unpopular because they don’t have money to
push. No matter how good their material is, nobody [media] cares” - Kazim
Abdulraheem, Entertainment Publicist and CEO of Master of the Art Design
Studios.
• “With publicity in Nigeria, something has to give. You’re paying for some
service and that’s how they see it. They think they have the platform and you
have the content. It’s usually supposed to be like ‘my platform needs a certain
content and as long as it is good, we’re good with it.’ But over here, to an
extent whether it is good or not, once cash exchanges hands and they say this
is what is required as payment to publish your content, then they really don’t
care about the quality of the content.” – Paschal Tambe, Entertainment
Publicist and CEO of Thatnaijatrack.com.
The preceding statements from publicists operating in Nigeria explicitly convey the level
of disconnect from the established public relations best practices that is prevailing in the
Nigerian communications industry at the moment. The statements are also indicative of
an environment where socio-economic and political forces do very little for the
profession. In the absence of functional regulatory bodies for the media or structures that
Dieyi | ! 20
measure accountability in the Nigerian communications industry, combined with a
proliferation of corrupt practices within the general socio-economic system, publicists in
Nigeria find themselves in a position where they continuously have to pay for media to
publish their content, regardless of the newsworthiness of their pitch angles.
Entertainment publicist Mr. Abdul-Raheem adds, “Sometimes you visit TV stations like
Sound City and you see tapes that they have abandoned. People probably submitted their
videos thinking that the quality was enough to attract airplay. But the TV stations simply
abandon them if you don’t ‘do the right thing.’ After a while, they trash them.” Note that
a similar practice, “payola” – the illegal practice of payment by record companies for the
broadcast of recordings on music radio – rocked the American music industry in the
1950s (Neira, “Payola Scandal Rocks ‘50s Radio”). However, from all prevailing
indications, the less-than-standard relations between publicists and the media system that
exists in Nigeria is so common that they have come to be acceptable, or they at least go
unquestioned.
“Envelope-sharing” – distributing money to mobilize operations within professional
environments for personal purposes – is also a common practice that authorities turn a
blind eye to in countries like Nigeria. When people seek services within the public sector,
they often opt or are compelled to pay more than required government-approved fees to
ensure that the services they seek are rendered properly and in a timely fashion –
protocols can be tedious and people would rather pay to advance to the front of the line.
Regardless of their reasons, such concepts nurture unethical practices within the public
sector and bolster a sense of misplaced entitlement within the workforce. This attitude
Dieyi | ! 21
naturally extends to the communications industry (Boladale, “Nigerian Press: A Den Of
Corruption”).
On a cultural level, there is an acceptable attitude toward gift-giving that stems from
societal roots founded in collectivism. In a paper titled “Cultural Issues About Doing
Business in Nigeria,” Chidiebere Ogbonna explains Nigeria’s collectivistic culture,
asserting the importance of the communal identity over individual identity among the
country’s people (11). Essentially described as the bestowing of tangible or intangible
benefits voluntarily and usually without the expectation of anything in return (Triandis &
Gelfand 4), gift-giving correlates with attitudes in collectivistic societies in which people
from birth onwards are integrated into strong and cohesive in-groups and are
continuously protected throughout their lives in exchange for unquestioned loyalty.
However, collectivistic values contradict universal standards that govern professional
environments, automatically placing professionals within collectivistic cultures on the
defensive.
Consequently, the ethics of PR are blurry and there seems to be an institutionalized
corruption of pay-for-play. This is problematic for the practice because when public
relations becomes similar to advertising, the idea of third-party commentary and
endorsement that exists at its core is blatantly undermined, especially with the
unsuspecting public who should be informed if any monetary transaction occurs.
Since these practices defy the crucial distinction between publicity and advertising,
publicity within the Nigerian context implores its own unique definition. When prompted
Dieyi | ! 22
to describe it in their own words, publicists Kazeem Abdul-Raheem and Paschal Tambe
provided the following responses respectively:
• Publicity in Nigeria boils down to getting on the major media, television,
Internet and radio, no matter the cost. It comes at a price but the tips we pay
do not go back to the revenue of the publication.
• Publicity as earned media only has relevance in Nigeria depending on who is
in charge but in my general experience, to get your material out there, you
have to drop mobilization funds.
Based on the prevailing dynamics, it cannot be called advertising because the funds do
not usually translate back into the outlet’s revenue. In view of the facts, publicity in
Nigeria can only be defined as:
Activities that create an illusion of objectivity and importance about a product as
presented to target audiences by the media but are in fact motivated by clandestine
financial transactions between the product representatives and reporters,
producers etc.
Dieyi | ! 23
The Question Is
This entire scenario begs the following questions:
• Is it possible for publicity to adopt unique meanings or can publicists within
socio-economic climates such as Nigeria’s begin to shift toward globally
accepted best practices?
• If so, what tools and methods can help ignite these shifts?
• How can globalization, academia, literacy and digital media contribute toward
driving standardization?
Before anyone can begin to respond to these questions, it is necessary to critically
analyze the development of publicity in the United States where best practices are
currently thriving, juxtaposed against Nigeria where the industry seems to be lagging.
Dieyi | ! 24
Chapter II | PR OVER TIME: UNITED STATES
Back In the day
Cutlip & Center’s Effective Public Relations states:
“Studying how public relations evolved provides insight into its functions, its
strengths, and its weaknesses. Unfortunately, many practitioners do not have a
sense of their calling’s history and do not fully understand its place and purpose in
the society. Nor do they realize how history and the development of public
relations are intertwined.”
Indeed, the next few chapters will explore how history is affecting the current practice of
public relations. With ancient beginnings that are founded on the concept of persuasion,
the earliest forms of the discipline can be traced back to as early as the 1800s. From
Greek theorists to English royalty, ancient civilizations suggested the importance of
public will and acknowledged the need for a third party to foster understanding between
the government and the people (74 -75). In the United States, forms of public relations
surfaced during the American Revolution. However, the modern-day version of the
practice will be best appreciated only through the vision of the 20
th
century founders that
laid its professional groundwork.
Pioneers of the Trade
Ivy Lee is considered the first-ever professional public relations practitioner, as he
launched his practice during the early 20th Century. He moved from journalism to
Dieyi | ! 25
handling press relations for Standard Oil and Railroad Companies, creating the modern
press release and playing a pivotal role in ushering in the two-way communication
approach. Lee notably provided publicity counsel to John D. Rockefeller, founder of the
Rockefeller Empire (Fletcher 8).
It would also be sacrilegious to analyze public relations in any historical context without
mentioning Edward Bernays. Hailed by many historians as the most important figure in
the history of what is now known as public relations, Bernays was a driving force behind
many industry firsts, including popularizing the use of a major tool of the trade, the press
release (Fletcher 3). He made such indelible marks on the industry that after his demise
his obituary touted him as “the father of public relations” (New York Times, “Edward
Bernays, ‘Father of Public Relations’ And Leader in Opinion Making, Dies at 103”). With
philosophies that were based on the concept of herd instinct and crowd mentality,
Bernays was a proponent for the deliberate manipulation of publics, arguing that it was a
necessary part of democracy in his impactful albeit controversial book
“Propaganda” (Bernays 9). In defining the discipline, he said “public relations is the
attempt, by information, persuasion and adjustment, to engineer public support for an
activity, cause, movement, or institution. Professionally, its activities are planned and
executed by trained practitioners in accordance with scientific principles based on the
findings of social sciences. The dispassionate approach and methods may be likened to
those of the engineering professionals which stem from the physical sciences” (Heath
68). He also famously and succinctly stated, “the three main components of public
relations are practically as old as society: informing people, persuading people or
integrating people with people.”
Dieyi | ! 26
As far back as World War I, Edward Bernays understood the value of what we now refer
to as influencer and/or tastemaker marketing in pleading a client's cause. Back then he
referred to them as “third party authorities.” With philosophies that may be considered
radical in today’s climate, Bernays pulled off some of the most iconic public relations
campaigns in history, including the Lucky Strikes cigarettes campaign of the 1920s (Lee,
“Big Tobacco’s Spin on Women’s Liberation”). By associating the product with the
burgeoning Women’s Suffrage Movement and leading clothing designers, Bernays
literally made it fashionable for women to smoke cigarettes – Lucky Strikes, of course.
Around the same time Edward Bernays was establishing precedents in the
communications industry, one of the people to whom he provided public relations
counsel was contributing toward shaping today’s industry. Henry Ford, founder of Ford
Motor Company, wielded an extraordinary amount of influence on the American scene,
displaying the value of sustaining a favorable public image (Lewis 295). He extensively
applied public relations concepts in the 1900s and was the public persona of his company,
while his counselor Earl Newsom worked within a planning capacity (Lewis 427). In
today’s industry, Newsom would be considered a publicist.
According to David L. Lewis, Henry Ford was at the forefront of some revolutionary
public relations activities including what was touted as “the most aggressive sales
campaign” and “the greatest marketing drive” by the automotive trade press in 1933, after
he held one of the best publicized new model press preview events in the history of the
automobile industry. Ford tactically infused an element of controversy in the press
preview event. He included alcohol on the menu – while prohibition still raged – when
Dieyi | ! 27
other industrialists typically and vehemently objected to it, creating a sensation that drew
even more public attention to the business (295).
This strategy is absolutely reminiscent of many modern-day public relations tactics.
Consider Chris Brown’s well-documented transition from boy-next-door to angry, young
man. Or the more recent Kim Kardashian internet-breaking stunt, in which she authorized
the creation and distribution of images that graphically displayed her exposed derriere.
Unlike these modern contemporaries however, Henry Ford strategically prioritized the
revenue for his brand over random sensationalism, combining controversy with charm
and more evidently converting his tactics into return on investment. In “The Public Image
of Henry Ford: An American Folk and His Company,” David L. Lewis documents
Advertising Age’ s reporting on Ford’s press preview event. The trade publication noted,
“He appeared as interested in the new model demonstrations as any of his visitors,” and
BusinessWeek Report added, “he chatted with pretty nearly every guest one time or
another.” Ford obviously understood back then some critical lessons that today’s
publicists should heed: there is value in courting reporters.
If viewed through a modern-day lens, some contemporaries of Ford, particularly Edward
Bernays employed some rather controversial ideologies that translated into their approach
toward public relations. Within this context, another key figure in the evolution of
modern PR was Henry Rogers. Here was a man who went from fabricating news stories,
to co-founding a public relations firm, to advocating for an increase in ethical standards
within entertainment publicity. What compelled him over such an expansive arch within
the span of his career? What factors led to the drastic changes in his approach to
Dieyi | ! 28
publicity? The responses to this question may shed light and provide evidence of how
publicists in socio-economic climates like Nigeria can begin to shift towards public
relations best practices.
A Public Relations Man
“Everything I told Gene Herrick was a lie.” – Henry Rogers
In his autobiography “Walking the Tightrope: The Private Confessions of a Public
Relations Man,” Rogers chronicles the watershed moments in his career, noting that it
was by boosting Rita Hayworth to stardom as her publicist in 1939 that he also achieved
his first major breakthrough. In what is now a Hollywood legend, Rogers admittedly lied
to Gene Herrick – the West Coast editor of Look Magazine at the time – about the
grandeur of Hayworth’s wardrobe, stating that she spends the entirety of her $15,000 per
year earnings on clothes alone. Herrick went with the idea and hired his top photographer
to shoot Hayworth in the wardrobe Rogers had fabricated. Henry Rogers and Eddie
Judson – Hayworth’s husband – resorted to borrowing clothes from Hollywood designers,
department stores and specialty shops to create the wardrobe he had promised, securing
Hayworth a spot on the cover of Look and eventually creating a Hollywood sensation
(Rogers 36 - 37).
While his work with Hayworth is arguably his most well-known, the trailblazer of
entertainment public relations cannot be fully appreciated without alluding to his work
with another Hollywood star, Joan Crawford. He masterminded what is now touted as the
Dieyi | ! 29
first true Oscars campaign in 1945. Henry Rogers had an understanding: “human beings
being what we are – that is, too lazy to decide for ourselves about anything – our attitudes
and thinking are determined every day not by ourselves, but by influence wielders and
opinion makers, whether we want to admit it or not.” Putting this cynical point of view
into action, he circulated the false rumor that Las Vegas bookmakers had made Crawford
the odds-on in favorite to win the Oscar for Best Actress (Thomas, Henry Rogers, 82,
Press Agent Who Built Hollywood Stars). To cut a lengthy story short, propelled by
Rogers’s tactical long-range campaign, Joan Crawford went on to win the coveted Best
Actress Academy award for her role in “Mildred Pierce” (Rogers 61 - 70).
Before moving forward, it is important to note that this method of generating publicity by
fabricating reality is currently common and unchallenged practice in Nigeria. It will be
explored more thoroughly shortly.
The words from Roger’s autobiography that stand out the most in the context of this
paper are: “Taking into the consideration the times (1939), my age (twenty-five), my
experience (four years), and the quality of press agentry that was practiced in Hollywood
at the time, I would, given a second chance have done exactly the same! But I wouldn’t
do that today, even if I were twenty-five years old, and only had four years’ experience in
the business. We live in a different world. All our standards are different, some better,
some worse, but certainly different. The standards of journalism are different as are the
standards of press agentry. We live in a more sophisticated world, and both the journalist
and the press agent are more sophisticated” (37).
Dieyi | ! 30
Rogers suggests that the elements that altered his methods were far from internal. He did
not harbor a lie-induced guilty conscience that steered him toward self-redemption. He
did not simply wake up in cold sweat in the middle of the night, haunted by the resulting
nightmares of his dishonesty. The factors that led to his 180-degree twirl from spinner to
public relations professional were external. It was the fact that communication industry
standards changed between the time he pulled off his first major – albeit questionable –
stunt in 1939, to 1980 when his autobiography was published. To fully comprehend the
transition, it is necessary to glance through relevant industry milestones that occurred
within that time period.
The Forces That Were
“Media/impact: An Introduction to Mass Media, Enhanced” notes that the question of
ethics in public relations emerged in discourse when a railroad company hired a
prominent public relations agency at the time, Byoir & Associates to counteract the
expansion of trucking. In the course of fulfilling its professional obligations to its client,
Byoir & Associates was accused of creating pretend organizations to speak out against
the trucking industry (Biagi 236). The agency was eventually discharged and acquitted in
court, but the incident had ignited a fire beneath the issue of dishonesty in public relations
and left it to simmer.
It began to boil over as the Public Relations Society of America established its first code
of ethics in 1954 with the hope of obliterating practices that tainted the profession’s
reputation, expanding it with a Declaration of Principles in 1959 (Biagi 236). This was
Dieyi | ! 31
the first time that public relations practitioners were presented with any form of a moral
compass for weighing industry practices and for the first time, they had a model to place
against individual approaches to the practice.
A significant and fresh wave of consumer movements also took root in 1960s United
States, which according to Diya Berger aligned with John F. Kennedy’s message to
Congress in the spring of 1962 where he “enumerated what he termed the Consumer Bill
of Rights: the right to safety, the right to be informed, the right to choose, and the right to
be heard in government-decision-making.” It was also largely fostered by “(President)
Lyndon Johnson’s Great Society programs,” as described in the article “A Tale of Two
Movements: Consumer Protection in the U.S. from 1969 to 2010.” Included in Johnson’s
pivotal role in fostering the consumer movements was the creation of the White House
post for Special Assistant for Consumer Affairs, which was dedicated to consumer
protection (Berger 20 - 21). From all indications, as the public realized its consumer
power, it inadvertently began to demand higher levels of accountability from both the
government and businesses.
Also in the ‘60s, John W. Hill emerged as an ethical counsel to management. Hill
displayed a convincing grasp on issues management, and the “far-reaching effects of
corporate policy” that set him apart from his counterparts in a favorable manner (Bowen
2). Citing Grunig and Hunt’s “Managing Public Relations,” Shannon A. Bowen notes
that by the mid-sixties, the function of issues management began to advise executives on
ethically responsible policy decisions and symmetrical public relations – a two-way
communication model involving negotiation, conflict resolution, mutual understanding,
Dieyi | ! 32
and respect between an organization and its stakeholders – in her article titled “Ethics
and Public Relations.”
Lenore V . Tracey additionally recognizes the sixties as “a decade of change” in a 1999
journal entry, citing advancements in technology as a major catalyst for the turbulent
changes within the communications industry at the time. “By 1967, there were
approximately 200 Million telephones in operation around the world, half of which were
in the United States” (Tracey, “30 Years: A Brief History of the Communications
Industry”). A few decades later, the Internet began.
The Internet opened a window for rapid changes from then forward, causing major
disruptions that have shaken the communications industry and left its professionals
scurrying to recover from each new shock and resulting aftershock. These rumblings are
largely accountable for the state of the public relations discipline today and will be
explored in more detail in chapter IV . First, cast attention back to the West African
country at the midsection of the globe, Nigeria.
Dieyi | ! 33
Chapter III | PR OVER TIME: NIGERIA
Hacking the Initial Codes
Elsewhere in the world, things were developing differently. The fact that there is very
little, properly chronicled documentation on the history of public relations in Nigeria may
be symbolic to the current state of development of the discipline in the country. There are
many textbooks on global public relations but most of them curiously omit information
on Nigeria. There is nothing on early methods or tricks of the trade. No documentation of
exploits by fathers or pioneers of public relations in Nigeria. This situation may also be
tied to the colonial history of the country and the fact that the practice may have emerged
at a time when the region was still under British governance. But what is more relevant to
this thesis is the 2008 paper, “150 Years of Modern Public Relations Practices in
Nigeria,” by Dr. Olutayo Otubanjo and Olusanmi Amujo.
The paper attempts to prove that despite the telling vacuum left by its absence in western
literature, Nigeria is miles ahead of a number of advanced, industrialized countries like
the UK as well as many European and Asian countries when it comes to the
“professionalisation” of public relations. While it makes a good argument, the foundation
of the hypothesis is debatable.
“Modern public relations practices began in Abeokuta, Nigeria on December 3, 1859,
when the Christian Missionary Society (CMS) published the “Iwe Irohin” (meaning
news journal), Nigeria’s first newspaper. The trigger for the creation of this
newspaper is grounded in the desire by church missioners to inform parishioners of
weekly Christian activities within the church.”
Dieyi | ! 34
Pulled from Otubanjo and Amujo’s article, the statement above suggests that the primary
function of public relations is to provide information. The paper forges ahead with its
argument by stating, “this newspaper performed the first public relations function by
providing up-to-date information concerning missionary activities as well as socio-
economic and political activities affecting Anglican parishioners, Abeokuta indigenes, the
settlers (Creoles) and Europeans at large” (Otubanjo & Amujo 17). It is also at this point
that the logic begins to go awry. The paper further claims Don Bates as a collaborator on
its theory, citing that he traced the history of modern public relations to “use of oratory,
newspapers, meetings, committees, pamphlets, and correspondence by rebelling
American colonies against England to win people to their cause.” Obviously, there was a
misinterpretation at some point because Bates emphasizes the function of persuasion in
his theory rather than mere provision of information.
The paper further states that “Iwe Iroyin laid the foundation of modern classified
publicity, public advocacy and public announcements on births and deaths in Nigeria,”
again constructing the foundation of early public relations and publicity in Nigeria on an
assumption that is not necessarily true. It associates the discipline with some other
general communications functions that don’t align with public relations’ essence. For one
thing, the communication flow under this assumption is one-way. Iwe Iroyin simply
throws hard information at its readers without necessarily weighing or expecting
feedback. It was more of a general religious marketing vehicle than public relations. This
is not an uncommon miscalculation as one can tell from the introductory section of this
paper. Deciphering public relations is no easy feat.
Dieyi | ! 35
Otubanjo and Amujo go on to quote Amin Alhassan’s journal entry – “Market
Polarization in Broadcasting Policy in Ghana: Abandoning the quest for Media
Democratization,” from Media Culture & Society – from the viewpoint of the
neighboring West African country:
“In 1932 the British government chartered the Radio Distribution Services in
England to relay specific British Broadcasting Corporation (BBC) programs to
Nigerians (see Blankson and Murphy, 2007) through the Radio Diffusion System
(RDS) to counter growing anti-European sentiments, launder the battered image
of the British imperialist government and promote the British cause.”
Alhassan’s sentence indicates that the ideal concept of public relations has not been
entirely alien to the African region in theory, but it somehow gets lost in translation in the
process of converting it to practice. Alhassan contributes to the supposition that the first
appearances of public relations in Nigeria surfaced with activism against the colonial
government in the early 1900s rather than mid 1800s as Otubanjo’s article asserts.
According to another Nigerian scholar, Toyin Falola in “Colonialism and Violence in
Nigeria,” circa 1940, one of Nigeria’s fore-running anti-European activists Nnamdi
Azikiwe developed a social movement for his cause that was largely publicized via his
self-owned newspapers. The fact that he disseminated his messages through his own
newspaper suggests that the British government he was campaigning against owned – or
at least heavily influenced – most of the existing publications at the time.
Nigeria gained independence in 1960 and three years later, the Nigerian institute of
Public Relations (NIPR) was established. By Federal law, NIPR derived the power to
Dieyi | ! 36
register members and regulate PR practice within the country. It was also given the
mandate to oversee the development of the profession and monitor professional conduct,
a function that was to be aided by establishing a Code of Ethics and Professional Conduct
regime – a lot like the Public Relations Society of America’s Code of Ethics. In addition,
NIPR has the power to persecute any individual or organization that practices public
relations in Nigeria outside of its membership. Yet there is still a lot of mystery
surrounding the profession in Nigeria. The prevailing professional landscape suggests
that the organization has not done much to the effect of its mandate. As of January 10
2015, the “newsletters” and “blog” pages on the www.nipr.com.ng were suspiciously
devoid of content.
At the risk of stating the obvious, one clear conclusion is that the jumbled elements at the
foundation of public relations in Nigeria set the tone for effects that have lingered until
today. More specifically, is it possible that the current challenges within public relations
practice in Nigeria stem from the apparent challenges associated with comprehending its
basic origin, purposes and underlying theory? Or do the socio-economic forces of the
country steer it on the path that it treads? Or could it be a combination of the two
preceding points? Also, how prominently do the historical origins still persist?
Dieyi | ! 37
Chapter IV | ENTERTAINMENT PR IN AMERICA
State of Public Relations Today
“But there is another difference today. Even the experienced
press agent would cover his tracks. He would never put himself
in a position of being caught in an apparent lie. He would not
try to make up news, concoct it, dream it up and invent it out
of pure imagination. Instead, he would actually go out and
make the news.” – Henry Rogers
Henry Rogers emphasizes that press agents had transitioned from fabricating reality to
creating actual circumstances that attract media attention. He also summarizes a trend
that has trickled down to publicists today and transformed into a pattern that is popular in
today’s entertainment public relations, in an even upgraded form. Since then, publicity
and entertainment public relations has been gradually but steadily heading toward
professionalism.
Executive Vice President of Worldwide Communications at Sony Pictures Television,
Paula Askanas, corroborates the prognosis that Henry Rogers indirectly made back then,
stating that “PR over the last generation has gained more respect. There has been more of
an acknowledgement of PR being important to help careers and position businesses in
particular. It’s now being seen as part of the executive team as opposed to being someone
who only throws parties.”
Dieyi | ! 38
Clearly, public relations has developed over the years and has become a highly regarded
professional field and a crucial function of many organizations. By nature of how the
entertainment industry operates – the high propensity for fiery tongues and abundance of
scandals – public relations is even more crucial to the entertainment function. As the
practice became increasingly refined and professional, a number of elements functioned
toward driving it to where it is today:
1. A lot more individuals began to penetrate and expand the playing space
offering to connect organizations to audiences:
Particularly in entertainment public relations, practitioners went from mere
press agentry to 360-degree communications. There are now communicators
like Paula Askanas, operating in the executive suite and overseeing the
corporate image of reputable corporations like Sony Pictures Television. There
are numerous departments distributed around the company, dedicated to
various forms of publicity – talent publicity, product publicity etc. In-house
publicity teams have the authority as well as the budget to hire and work
hand-in-hand with public relations agencies that have the manpower to
execute elaborate strategies. Even in the public relations agency space, there
are numerous specialists for clients to choose from – marketing agencies,
boutique entertainment agencies and the most recent sprouts, digital agencies.
Dieyi | ! 39
2. With technology, there is an increase in the channels and outlets that must
be included in outreach strategies:
As mentioned earlier, the industry is largely driven by the proliferation of
technology, particularly social media. One year, it was Myspace, the next year
Facebook became the buzz and then YouTube changed the appearance of
content publishing. Twitter emerged with micro-blogging and today, marketers
are looking toward anonymous messaging like YikYak and Whisper as the
next big thing (Shearman, “Anonymous Messaging Apps: Should Brands
Approach with Caution?”). But while the Internet seem to some like Pandora’s
box, it is truly a treasure chest to public relations practitioners. With it came a
wider selection of tools for executing strategies.
3. Because of the digital revolution and social media, one can now have one-
on-one dialogues with literally millions of people at once:
The digital revolution also enhances the functionality of the two-way
communication model. Individuals now own the world’s rapidly expanding
communications outlets – Instagram, Vine, YouTube – and the masses now
own the news. With an abundance of platforms, people no longer hesitate to
vocalize their thoughts and at the same time, public relations practitioners
have become strategically placed to watch and respond to them. They are now
able to have one-on-one conversations with millions of people at once. The
same platforms have also opened communication channels between publicists
and journalists. Whereas in the past publicists could not access reporters
Dieyi | ! 40
without a preexisting connection, they can now pitch a story in 140-
characters.
4. Preparation has become even more crucial with crisis situations, as
information goes viral quickly:
Spates of entertainment industry scandals are splashed across websites and
social media platforms at significantly increased rates these days,
demonstrating the speed at which news travels in the internet age. Reports of
philandering lovers can now reach the ears, or eyes of the jilted before they
meet face-to-face like in the case of former “Twilight Saga” onscreen-turned-
real-life “it” couple, Kristen Stewart and Robert Pattinson (Chaney, “Kristen
Stewart Cheats on Robert Pattinson: The Internet Reacts”). Or like the more
recent case of Uber Senior Vice President, Emil Michael, who misspoke at a
media meet-and-greet dinner event (Smith, “Uber Executive Suggests Digging
up Dirt on Journalists”). Thanks to technology and Buzzfeed, the public got
wind of the conversation made at the “Kings’ table.” Society’s big shots can
now be held accountable for the things they say. Consequently, said big shots
now need public relations practitioners more than ever, and it is now more
crucial than ever for practitioners to be able to think on their feet.
Paula Askanas also attributes the prevalence of the previous point to a general change in
popular culture and attitudes:
“I think there was a time in Hollywood when everybody turned a blind eye. I
think the press in general was more respectful about what personal, potentially
Dieyi | ! 41
embarrassing situations they thought needed to be examined. They allowed
for some privacy, but now, the press thinks that everything is relevant and free
to talk about and as a result, you see PR also taking a different role.”
The Shockwave from the Digital Meteor
“Certainly years ago PR was practiced in a very different way in
which spin could be more acceptable – depending on the
story of course – and people would believe it. However, I think
the big difference today is that digital innovation and digital
technology has now made consumers journalists. If they read a
story and something smells funny, social media is going to
lambast that journalist. So you have many more watchdogs
with opinion-makers watching a story and now they not only
have opinions, they have as effective a set of tools to distribute
their opinions as that of any traditional journalist.” – Fritz
Friedman, Former Senior Vice President of Worldwide Publicity,
Sony Pictures Entertainment.
The digital revolution is a double-edged sword for public relations practitioners because,
while it provides a wider assortment of tools to harness, there are now also more eyes and
Dieyi | ! 42
much more scrutiny than ever before on how the practice is approached. Everyone now
has a voice and any suspicion of unethical behavior associated with the discipline is
magnified and inadvertently has a ripple effect. Benedict Cumberbatch’s race-related
tongue-slip is a superb example. The public mercilessly hacked and sensationalized what
was obviously a misuse of language – he had been speaking as a proponent for racial
diversity within the movie business in the first place. Where in the past, public figures
would get away with slipshod excuses for apologies, it is no longer that facile as the
public will go ahead to take it apart as it did with Cumberbatch. Fortunately for him,
Cumberbatch obviously has a thorough PR team backing him up because he delivered an
apology that was accepted and generally applauded (Goodman, “Benedict Cumberbatch
Apologizes for Race Comments”). His established strong, positive personal brand also
aided his case.
There is also a broader selection of media channels, increasing the demand for public
relations practitioners to be innovative with their methods, as the target audiences are
developing increasingly shorter attention spans. Lionsgate’s expansive marketing
campaign for the most recent installment of its award-winning, book-to-movie adaptation
“The Hunger Games” is an excellent example. The movie studio collaborated with
Google’s “Art, Copy & Code” to create “District V oices,” a five-part YouTube series in
which YouTubers speak to viewers as citizens of Panem, The Hunger Game’ s fictional,
dystopian nation. The movie went on to top the box office, earning $123M on a weekend
with other movies like Disney’s Big Hero 6 and Paramount Pictures’ Interstellar on the
opening slate (Bacle, “Box Office Report: ‘The Hunger Games’ wins the Weekend and
the Year”).
Dieyi | ! 43
The audience that public relations practitioners now have to deal with is also more
sophisticated. According to William Leiss, “Young audiences, raised in a media and
marketing-rich culture, are particularly cynical toward messages, and along with the
educated elite are leading a rebellion calling for more diverse and authentic mode of
addresses” (419 - 420). Years of subliminally persuasive media bombardment has
educated audiences as well as made them more cynical and skeptical to the messages they
receive. Recall Miley Cyrus’s well-chronicled ride from the set of “Hannah Montana” to
the top of a wrecking ball. While she has definitely gained extensive media coverage for
every new twerk and display of bare skin, cynics understand it as a bunch of publicity
stunts in poor taste, as opposed to a natural transition process. Case in point: she lost her
job on the “Hotel Transylvania” movie, reportedly as a result of her exploits and the fear
that she was becoming too risqué for the film’s target audience (Kapsch and Schillaci,
“Miley Cyrus and Manager Split; Replaced by Selena Gomez in Sony’s ‘Hotel
Transylvania’”). These days, at the slightest suspicion that a brand’s strategies are
dishonest, audiences automatically kick into deflection mode and begin to shut out its
messages.
This brings the author to another point. The internet has brought about higher levels of
information bombardment than ever before. As such, there is an increased resistance to
big corporations and over-commercialization of brands. Wide spread access to
information in the digital age has created points of contact for, and is leading to a
heightened preference for the proverbial “underdogs.” The public has channeled its
enthusiasm from big brand names to the more relatable. Contemporary audiences have
developed an appreciation for the grass-to-grace narrative and now tend to lean more
Dieyi | ! 44
toward “self-made” brands like Justin Bieber and Kendrick Lamar, who were both
discovered on YouTube, as well as Ed Sheeran who single handedly self-published his
debut EP on iTunes and climbed to the top of the charts. There is a new thrill and a sense
of camaraderie attached to observing a products’ journey from when it launches until it
rises to prominence.
As a side note, this same phenomenon likely accounts for the prevailing popularity of
Reality TV . As Paula Askanas succinctly put it:
“In entertainment I think there was a big shift between press and PR people
working together to create these images for people. I think that’s what the
audience wanted. Then the public socially took this turn where people wanted
to know everything about these celebrities and they felt like they were public
property and they had a right to know. And then you had the advent of Reality
TV where everybody thought that they too could be a celebrity and which
now leads to the whole ecosystem between public relations and ‘celebrity
journalism.”
In a similar thread, there is a rumbling wave of preference for content generated by users
who are doing what they can to make a personal brand on the Internet. As the popularity
of user-generated content increases, the public is becoming less receptive of
overproduced, excessively branded material. A PR anchored product placement feature
like the 2014 Emmy and Audi YouTube video, “Barely Legal Pawn” with Bryan Cranston
and Aaron Paul, the fan-favorite duo from hit TV series “Breaking Bad” can easily gather
more views than a more directly commercial State Farm ad (Champagne, “Behind the
Dieyi | ! 45
web hit ‘Barely Legal Pawn,’ Starring Bryan Cranston, Aaron Paul, Julia Louis-Dreyfus,
and Audi”). The same way the Dove Real Beauty Sketches PR video campaign that
flaunted real women gathered more views than the more evident Cover Girl advert that
exhibit celebrities. Consequently, corporations require public relations – weighed against
adverts – now more than ever.
The disruptive changes that communications technology has been driving within the
industry since the 1900s show no sign of slowing down soon and while public relations
practitioners seem to be adopting the new tools adeptly, there is a lot of room for
improvement, and it would seem more so within regions like Nigeria.
Dieyi | ! 46
Chapter V | ENTERTAINMENT PR IN NIGERIA
In Today’s Public Relations
“Everybody spins stories and it proves very effective. It’s like
graphics design for instance. If you lay out five CDs, the most
well branded one or the most appealing to your eye is the one
you will first be interested in. It’s the same way you will read a
garnished artist’s profile or a story. Even if it’s not true, it is more
interesting and draws people to want to explore it further. It’s a
trend that has been successful in the past and it works very
well.” – Kazeem Abdul-Raheem
Nollywood – /nŏlʹ′ē-wo ͝odʹ′/: Nigeria’ s film industry.
Mr. Abdul-Raheem refers to an extreme form of spinning as a prevailing method of
publicity in Nigeria and one that – from all accounts so far – used to be acceptable PR
practice in the United States as well. Guided by an assumed (but unconfirmed) standards
of celebrity, some Nigerian publicists disseminate a fabricated and illusional image of the
talent that they manage, with hopes that the public will eventually come to celebrate
those people.
Initiate a Google search operation using the keywords “Nigerian artists lie” and the index
will deliver a robust combination of blog posts, magazine interviews, television
Dieyi | ! 47
interviews and even contributing newspaper articles written by other Nigerian celebrities,
with headlines that range from, “Nigerian Artists Lead Fake Lives” to “10 Shocking Lies
Nigerian Celebrities Have Told Their Fans.” Some articles attack the celebrities for their
lies, some criticize the journalists that foster the dishonesty and some attempt to neutrally
analyze the phenomenon.
On the attacking end, Nigerian film director Charles Novia is perhaps even more famous
for his analytical perspective and often scathing commentary on Nollywood than for his
movies. In his blog post “Flaunting it, Faking it,” he applauds the humility of 2Face
Idibia – the first African artist to win the MTV Best African Act award – while he
condemns Nigerian celebrities who publicize an illusion of wealth that they don’t own in
a bid to foster what he refers to as the “hype” culture (Novia, “Flaunting it, Faking it”).
On the critical end, Joey Akan from Pulseng.com takes a stab at analyzing the practice,
dismissing the artists’ dishonesty as a mere response to the “inhuman” expectations that
fans place on them, while dramatically declaring “we journalists have lost our
souls” (Akan, “This is why Nigerian Celebrities lie to us …”). Several articles appear in
Nigeria’s leading newspaper Punch, featuring editorials by or interviews from celebrities,
the former typically functioning as exposés from an insider’s perspective and the latter
referencing the strife to maintain a false lifestyle.
However, no piece dissects the practice better than Eromo Egbejule’s in Ynaija.com’s
“The more you look the more you see: Why Nigerian Celebrities are not as rich as They
seem,” in which he digs into the nitty-gritty of the practice while maintaining a neutral
perspective. Egbejule starts off by shedding more light on Novia’s “hype” culture using
Dieyi | ! 48
an anecdote. He describes how a budding Nollywood actress who was assigned to the
economy class section on a flight, entreated a flight attendant to let her take a picture in
first class. According to Egbejule, that image was undoubtedly headed for social media to
impress fans with illusions of grandeur and “affirm” her celebrity status.
One glimpse at the social media accounts of some Nigerian celebrities will confirm
Egbejule’s theory. Acclaimed twin crooners Peter and Paul Okoye have been integral to
the rapid maturity of the Nigerian music industry for several years now. They have been
consistent on the music scene over the past decade, and a constant dose of collaborations
with popular American musicians like Akon, T.I. and Rick Ross is indicative of the level
of international acclaim they have amassed. Yet, even at the peaks of their careers, “P
Square” – as the duo is referred – still depicts a need to prove their clout to fans in what is
currently the typical Nigerian celebrity manner. In a recent incident, Peter, one half of P
Square who is very active on social media posted images of himself in a private jet on
Instagram, complete with the hash tag #PrivateJetting, leading his followers to believe
that him and his twin brother own the aircraft and prompting prominent news outlets like
the Nigerian Vanguard to publish stories about their supposed new acquisition (Akintayo
& Aina, “P Square Acquires Private Jet”). Egbejule’s piece clarifies that the aircraft
belongs to a Togolese footballer and close friend of the singing duo while acknowledging
that the pair never explicitly referred to the aircraft as theirs. Yet, they created the illusion
that it was.
Another Nigerian artist “Duncan Mighty” has also been seen employing this tactic. He
once publicized images of himself posing beside a rented prop – a car – to draw similar
Dieyi | ! 49
reactions from his fans. He also acknowledged in an interview, “A lot of Nigerian artists
lead fake lives. They claim to be what they are not just because they want to meet up their
peers and fellow artists.”
It is also important to note that while celebrities in the United States have reached a point
where they now seek refuge from uncoordinated media meddling, tabloid coverage and
the paparazzi, Nigerian celebrities embrace them and are less hesitant to publicize the
more private aspects of their lives.
Eromo Ebgejule also touches on the fact that these fabricated realities are costly and that
some upcoming artists run themselves into bankruptcy in trying to maintain an image.
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem concurs with Ebgejule on this. Abdul-Raheem admits, “The
business is difficult and it is not as easy as they make it seem. Most of us accept it at face
value and just copy what some of these artists do, hoping the same thing will work for
us.” While this suggests that most of the tactics are based on quick conclusions and little
research, it also confirms the suspicion that the approach to publicity may effectively
generate “hype” but it does not necessarily translate to an increase in revenue or an
improvement in the bottomline. As such, it fails to satisfy the driving purpose of any
marketing effort. Makes one wonder why publicists in Nigeria are not yet exploring other
methods.
Paschal Tambe on the other hand, disagrees with the notion that publicity aimed at
creating illusions is sustainable in the long run. In his opinion, these methods are
unoriginal and have become redundant. According to him, “It might be a good idea to
come up with an antic. But like almost every marketing effort in Nigeria, it is overused.
Dieyi | ! 50
For example, someone comes up with something, and then another person will try to pick
it up without weighing their own unique situation, thinking it will work for them as it
worked for the first person. It may work for the first 10 people that do it, but after that, it
just becomes a nuisance to the public.” But from all indications, Tambe represents a small
percentage of Nigerian publicists.
The preceding facts beg certain questions about the Nigerian public relations industry in
reverberating chorus:
• Why hasn’t the face of public relations in Nigeria matured in almost 100
years of its activities within the country?
• Are industry experts investing enough attention into nurturing the field?
• Is there any public relations value to businesses in the Nigerian
environment?
Demystifying the Green Landscape
“Until we are able to report success, it will never really rise.” – Dr.
Paul Nwulu
Professor of Communications and Managing Director of TriCom Productions – a video
production company in Nigeria – Dr. Paul Uzo Nwulu, urges that in analyzing the
communications landscape in Nigeria, one should also consider the conditions under
which members of the press as well as public relations practitioners have to work. “They
probably have one of the worst working conditions, poor salaries and they are hardly ever
Dieyi | ! 51
paid. So really a lot of public relations and the way they currently practice it allows them
to make ends meet.” Dr. Nwulu emphasizes his point with reference to prominent
Nigerian news publication, This Day, where staff remain unpaid and reporters are
mandated by management to earn their own salaries. “This now obviously affects how
they will deal with someone trying to secure publicity for a client because in that type of
environment nothing is earned, everything becomes paid.” This fact may be central to the
reason why the growth of the public relations field in Nigeria seems stunted. But first,
what are the socio-economic factors that permit this situation?
An obvious culprit is the lack of enforcement of labor force regulations. According to the
website of the Nigerian Labor Congress (NLC), the organization’s mission includes; to
“organize, unionize and educate all categories of Nigerian workers; defend and advance
the political, economic, social and cultural rights of Nigerian workers; emancipate and
unite Nigeria and people from all forms of exploitation and discrimination; achieve
gender justice in the workplace and in NLC; strengthen and deepen the ties and
connections between Nigerian workers and the mutual/natural allies in and outside
Nigeria and; lead the struggle for the transformation of Nigeria into a just, humane and
democratic society.” Indeed, the organization has been audible and at the forefront of
protests against issues that affect Nigerian citizens, most recently spearheading
nationwide strikes after the Nigerian government pulled subsidies – something Nigerians
generally considered the only benefit they enjoyed as nationals of a crude oil producing
country – from the price of natural gas. Yet, it would seem that its activities have not
extended toward protecting the workforce in the communications industry.
Dieyi | ! 52
This exposes for scrutiny, the regulatory body directly in charge of overseeing the
communication industry, the Nigerian Communications Commission. From the
description on its website, it seems like the organization pays more attention to the
telecommunications industry specifically, as opposed to communications in general.
Consequently, the Telecom sector continues to experience the fastest growth rates in
Nigeria and even on the African continent at large. (Odinuwe, “Nigeria’s Mobile Market
to Generate $10b, Users to 182M Before 2020-Ventures Africa”).
However, the Nigerian Communications Commission is only a parastatal of an
overarching Federal Ministry of Communications that was created by the administration
of President Goodluck Ebele Jonathan less than five years ago. The relative nascence of
the governing body is a possible explanation for the lull in the communications industry
that in turn affects the public relations field. Also note that the there are four other
parastatal organizations under the overseeing governance of the Federal Ministry of
Communication Technology namely, the National Information Technology Development
Agency (NITDA), the Nigerian Postal Service (NIPOST), the Nigerian Communications
Satellite (NIGCOMSAT) and Galaxy Backbone. The list of ministry parastatal
organizations excludes the National Institute of Public Relations (NIPR).
This brings the spotlight back on NIPR, which in addition to the mandates mentioned in
chapter III, also has the federal right to prosecute individuals who practice public
relations in Nigeria outside of its membership. Yet, the gaping space created by the
absence of best practices and the endurance of factors that cripple the Nigerian public
Dieyi | ! 53
relations industry is telling. One out of the two Nigerian publicists interviewed for this
paper has heard about NIPR, and none of them are registered members.
As it appears, NIPR could use some improvement with its own image. One may quickly
attribute this to negligence on the path of the industry experts that run NIPR and are at
the helm of the discipline in general. But where it relates to the PR function to Nigerian
businesses, Dr. Nwulu purports that the blame game is too simplistic. According to him,
the problem stems from the demand rather than supply end of the public relations
spectrum in Nigeria. “We have some very wonderful PR firms in Nigeria that advise
businesses on the importance of public relations. The problem is that those businesses do
not see that importance and how investment in it will help them as a company.” For a
field based on molding perceptions, there seems to be a core persuasive handicap within
public relations in the Nigerian context.
Dr. Nwulu goes further to explain that the value of public relations has not been
established in Nigeria because many people do not understand the results. In terms of
professional training, he says that most of the higher institutions and Universities in
Nigeria do not offer specific public relations programs. The ones that exist are usually
offshoots of journalism programs or general communication programs. Even the
American University of Nigeria – a leading University which in 2012 famously attracted
Google Inc.’s attention for using up to 35% of total Google search engine capacity within
the country – does not have a dedicated public relations program (Rodolico, “’55 percent’
of Google’s Nigerian Traffic Happens here”). There is hardly ever any dedicated training
institution for people in public relations. It consequently comes as no surprise when Dr.
Dieyi | ! 54
Nwulu confirms that individuals who also double as journalists do most of the public
relations work in the country.
This may ring similar to the trend in the United States where journalists harness the
media skills acquired from reporting to become efficient publicists or media managers.
However, the difference is that rather than make the full transition, Nigerian journalists
function as publicists even while they remain journalists.
Furthermore, journalists as PR people in Nigeria simply become the mouthpiece of an
organization, while neglecting the strategic public relations and image management
implications of the function. Bottom line, professionally trained public relations
practitioners are largely missing from this picture.
Dr. Nwulu also alludes to corporate unwillingness to shed the more traditional forms of
marketing. Using FrieslandCampina – the company behind Nigeria’s popular dairy brand
“Peak Milk” – as an example, he states that companies of this caliber have a marketing
budget of about 100 Million Naira (about $500,000) every year. “However, no matter
what you do, go in there and make any pitch you want to make to them, it comes down to
‘if we spend a hundred million, how do we know what we are getting in return?’ And
there is usually no way of calculating that. So they would rather spend the allocated funds
on road shows and brand ambassadors as the tried and true ways of generating popularity
for the product instead of targeted public relations campaigns.”
This corporate resistance to change is a worldwide phenomenon, probably only witnessed
on a more extreme level in Nigeria within the space of this paper. The attitude is similar
to an existing struggle within the American movie business. In an interview with
Dieyi | ! 55
Bloomberg, media and entertainment analyst Brett Hariss suggests that the current
“Golden Age of Television” is a result of the industry’s efficiency in harnessing new
technologies, a phenomenon that hasn’t translated to the film industry. An example of this
resistance occurred recently when a chain of theaters banded together to boycott the
movie, “Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon,” after Netflix secured the rights to release it on
the video streaming platform in tandem with the theatrical release (Linshi, “AMC
Theaters Refuses to show Netflix’s Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon Sequel).
Nonetheless, the resistant attitude to changing marketing models in Nigeria brings the
responsibility of clarifying result-oriented public relations processes to bear on PR
professionals in the country. So far, it seems like the professionals in Nigeria are yet to
prove the benefits of public relations efforts to businesses. Dr. Nwulu expands further on
the issue saying “I think the growth of PR in Nigeria is slow because people don’t see the
value. We use the word public relations but what impact does it have on the bottom line
of companies in Nigeria?” He leaves this as a rhetorical question but what it illustrates is
the unavailability of metrics and technologies for measuring the success of public
relations campaigns. Since many metrics have long become available and are
increasingly becoming reliable systems of measures in the United States however, it is
safe to assert that this void exists specifically within the Nigerian context. It is also
important to note that systematic, benchmark-setting research fosters the development of
technologies and metrics for measuring public relations success in the United States, and
this is evidently an aspect of the public relations practice that seems currently absent on
the Nigerian scene.
Dieyi | ! 56
Another point to consider is the difference in value systems and attitudes of the target
audiences within the two countries. On one hand, freedom of speech is a vehemently
defended value in the United States. Actions that may be considered atrocious in other
societies are justified here under the first amendment right. Take the debacle with Sony
Pictures Entertainment’s “The Interview,” a movie about the assassination of the living
president of North Korea for instance. When it seemed like the company was bowing
under pressure to cancel the movie release, individuals began to speak out against
terrorist attempts to stifle freedom of speech. Even the president of the United States,
Barack Obama chimed in on the issue, declaring that Sony’s decision to pull the movie at
the time was a mistake (Italiano, “Obama: Sony ‘made a mistake’ by Yielding to North
Korea’s hack”).
On this issue, Dr. Nwulu makes another insightful point. While freedom of speech is
strongly acknowledged, there is a fundamental difference in the way the Nigerian
audience generally handles situations. Again, take the 2012 Nigerian fuel subsidy
removal debacle for example. While there was the grave-faced faction that spearheaded
the “Occupy Nigeria” campaign, the public generally handled the situation in a light-
hearted manner that has come to be known as typically Nigerian. It’s an attitude that the
late Nigerian musician and activist, Fela Anikulapo Kuti refers to in one of his iconic
songs, “Suffering and Smiling,” and one that has come to find a form of scientific
affirmation within the past few years. In a 2003 survey, United Kingdom’s New Scientist
Magazine found the country’s citizens topping a list of the happiest people in the world.
In 2007, a Gallup poll also concluded that Nigerians have the highest world rates of
optimism. “There is a value system that exists around the concept of accountability in the
Dieyi | ! 57
US more strongly than in Nigeria and PR people there have their hands full, quickly
trying to correct wrongs,” Dr. Nwulu adds. This relatively laid-back, typical Nigerian
demeanor creates an atmosphere that public relations practitioners within the country
tend to perceive as uncritical. But it is deceptive and potentially dangerous to the entities
that PR professionals represent because, while it may take longer for Nigerians to build
up to a noticeable movement, it does not necessarily mean that the public is desensitized
to issues.
Recall that Paula Askanas mentioned there was a time in the United States when certain
issues were considered taboo and sacred by both press and the public. The Nigerian
society seems to exist in a similar space at the moment. According to Dr. Nwulu, “So
many PR people seem irrelevant because if the chairman of the Nigerian National
Petroleum Corporation for example is caught having an extra-marital affair, he or she will
not lose his job here because the public won’t make a fuss about it and the company
won’t care as long as he can still do his job effectively.” But as the author will explore
more thoroughly later, this does not mean that public relations practitioners cannot find
relevance in this environment. There are always ways to forestall negative attitudes and
harness situations to nurture favorable public images for businesses. One can never tell
when it would be needed.
One more issue to consider in this section is Nigeria’s socialist economy as opposed to
America’s capitalist one. Consumers in the United States often have multiple options for
goods and services whereas in Nigeria there is not as much range. For instance, there is a
loud monopoly in the movie exhibition business. There is one major exhibitor, The
Dieyi | ! 58
Silverbird Cinemas, and a few mushroom ones struggling underneath (V ourlias,
“Exhibitors Filmhouse and Silverbird Flex their Muscles in Nigeria”). This pattern
extends to the telecom business in a less severe form, where there are only a handful of
companies providing cellular services (Or at least it did a few years back). The bottom
line is that the Nigerian audience is only just beginning to get accustomed to the
availability of multiple choices for goods and services and that fact creates a window of
opportunity for the public relations practice.
For a complete comparative picture on public relations between both countries, other
questions to address within the Nigerian context are:
1. Are a lot more individuals beginning to penetrate and expand the playing
space offering to connect products to consumers?
Much like in the United States, the answer to this prompt within the Nigerian
context is yes, so much so that PR top players like America’s Edelman are
beginning to take notice. Grassroots Nigerian PR agency, Sesema PR became
the first Nigerian affiliate to Edelman in 2007 (Sesema.com). Sesema PR is
one among a handful of home grown public relations agencies that are
beginning to achieve prominence on the Nigerian scene. While the lines
between the different forms of public relations – in-house versus agency for
instance – remain blurred, many entrepreneurial PR practitioners are
appearing on the scene offering one-stop services to publicity and promotional
needs.
Dieyi | ! 59
2. With technology, is there an increase in the channels and outlets that
must be included in outreach strategies?
Indeed, there is an increase in outlets that must be included in outreach
strategies. While they are commonly underused in a strategic sense, there is
also the occasional flash of innovative utilization of new media outlets. Yet,
mainstream social media platforms – Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, YouTube
– remain the order of the day. On another hand, blogs have become a popular
platform for reaching niche audiences. Yet, because of the tendency for
smaller blogs to simply copy and paste stories from the more popular ones, the
process of tracking and monitoring is more difficult. An endless selection of
blogs has also made strategic placement more crucial.
3. Because of the digital revolution and social media, can practitioners now
have one-on-one dialogues with literally millions of people at once?
The efficiency of the two-way communication model has improved in
unprecedented ways over the past few years. The availability of methods for
PR practitioners to directly connect has made audiences increasingly vocal
about their thoughts, thereby increasing the need for accountability among
businesses. Yet, this hasn’t necessarily translated to the relationship between
journalist and publicists in Nigeria, largely because of the scarcity of true
earned media. Publicists still have to “negotiate” with journalists in a more
traditional sense and provide financial mobilization for the spread of their
messages.
Dieyi | ! 60
4. Is the prevailing viral nature of information making preparation even
more crucial in crisis situations?
Globally, the trend is to prepare for crises and Nigeria is tapping into that
trend. Professor Nwulu buttresses this statement saying, “For example, in the
Nigerian telecom industry five years ago, your network will go off for a whole
weekend and there would be no explanation from the service provider. Today,
it doesn’t happen again. If the network needs to go off, they will send a
message and warn customers that there will be maintenance and that they
should bear with them.” There is now that ability to directly communicate
more to the audience in case of such situations. Consequently, when
unprecedented incidences affect a company’s customers, there is now a need
to explain.
An incident that illustrates the current viral nature of information even within the
Nigerian context will be examined in chapter VII, but first examine the journalist/
publicist relationship and the specifics of their coexistence within each country.
Dieyi | ! 61
Chapter VI | THE SYMBIOSIS BETWEEN JOURNALISTS AND PUBLICISTS
It Takes Two
The relationship between journalists and publicists can generally be likened to that
between an old, married couple. The bickering occurs when publicist function within the
gatekeeper capacity and journalists require information. On the other side, publicists
pitch stories to journalists and they hesitate to cover them. But the bottom line is that they
both have to work together and if nurtured properly, the relationship could be lasting and
mutually beneficial.
In the United States, the differentiating line between the functions of a publicist as
opposed to a journalist is pretty well defined. One party, the publicist serves its brand
either by creating events with news value or determining newsworthy angles from what
exists and finally handing these messages to the other party, the journalist. The journalist
serves his/her purpose by first determining whether or not the item has any news value,
and then if it does, delivering the story to the target audiences in an (ideally) objective
way. The more streamlined and relevant the initial message from the publicist is to the
capacity of the journalist, the better its chances of being disseminated. Yet, both perform
their objectives within this context in a complementary manner, with one supporting the
other. There is a symbiotic relationship between the two parties.
In Nigeria however, there is not only a symbiosis between the two functions but often an
absolute crossover and the lines between them are relatively blurred. You will recall that
Nnamdi Azikiwe, the Nigerian activist that was a front runner for movements against
colonial rule in the 1900s, disseminated his messages through his own newspaper. It
Dieyi | ! 62
seems like that history has rolled down unchanged to the country’s present. As mentioned
earlier, a lot of journalists begin to double as publicists. As a result of the financial
requirements involved in dealing with journalists, publicists launch their own websites
via which they perform the function of journalists as well as promote the content of their
clients. One example of this practice is the Chief Operating Officer of
www.spellsmusic.com – a music blog – who is also a public relations strategist. What is
missing from this picture is strategy because as mentioned in Chapter I, the purpose of
publicity diminishes when the promotion comes directly from the publicist rather than
through a third-party.
Nonetheless, there is still value in relationship building within both contexts. On the
American side, it’s built on mutual trust that makes a journalist available in case there is a
story that requires breaking. It also makes a publicist information-ready when there is a
story that begs further investigation.
A Tale of Two Trade Publications
A possible reason for the strength of the value system that exists around the concept of
accountability in the United States is the press’s commitment to its watchdog function.
Before concluding on this however, the paper will proceed to juxtapose the websites of
two entertainment trade publications, Nigeria’s www.thenet.ng and the United States’s
www.thr.com.
Dieyi | ! 63
Nigerian Entertainment Today (NET) on www.thenet.ng is Nigeria’s first entertainment
news publication and was first launched online in 2009, followed by a print edition in
2010. It is Nigeria’s most popular entertainment news, youth lifestyle, fashion and urbane
culture publication.
Having come a longer way, the Hollywood Reporter does not require a lot of introduction
for anyone with a remote interest in the entertainment industry. It was founded in 1930
and is a reputable source for all things professional in Hollywood.
At first glance, both websites may seem pretty similar, as they are both red-themed with a
tab for latest news hovering above the home page. On further exploration, one critical
feature is missing from Nigerian Entertainment Today: TV ratings and Box Office
records. This may be indicative of the general unstructured nature of Nollywood at the
moment – piracy, direct-to-home movie releases – or it may be as a result of an absence
of measurement frameworks that have been mentioned before. One thing the
unavailability of ratings and box-office records to the public definitely does however, is
undermine the necessity of entertainment marketing efforts.
In the American TV business – perhaps second only to reviews – strong opening ratings
are a feature that places a show in the media spotlight. As a qualification that lends
publicity points to a TV show, it is every publicists dream. And when that type of
information is readily available to the public, it can serve as a motivating factor for more
of them to watch the show even after the pilot. The absence of that grading structure –
especially for a show’s pilot episode – undermines any publicity effort and eventually
subtracts from its perceived effect.
Dieyi | ! 64
Similar circumstances apply to the movie business. First of all, note that there tends to be
a significant disconnect between movie critic and audience tastes as is explained by
theater reviewer Catherine Rampell as well as many other industry experts (Rampell,
“Reviewing the Movies: Audiences vs. Critics”). So even more than movie reviews in the
business, opening weekend box office numbers can be a significant determinant of a
movie’s success down the line if harnessed efficiently. It automatically situates the movie
in the media and it gives publicity a message positioning to utilize. In traditional
Hollywood fashion, it motivates the studio behind the movie to increase marketing
investment that in turn could further increase revenue by drawing audiences to the
cinemas. Following this line of thought, the absence of this system in the Nigerian movie
industry removes the potency of the publicity function with Nollywood movies. Without
box office numbers or a similar structure in the Nigerian trade media, there is no standard
for validation.
Narrowing down this analysis to the content of both websites, this paper will now
examine the coverage of Apple CEO Tim Cook’s coming-out announcement as reported
by both publications.
1. HEADLINES
Nigerian Entertainment Today
Dieyi | ! 65
Exhibit A
The Hollywood Reporter
Exhibit B
The headline on Nigerian Entertainment Today’s website reads “Being Gay Is One of
God’s Greatest Gift – Tim Cook, Apple CEO,” while on the Hollywood Reporter it
reads “Apple CEO Tim Cook: I’m proud to be Gay.” The latter is pretty much stating
a fact with the public figure’s name preceding the quote. With the former however,
one gets a sense that a topic of colossal proportions is to be discussed, as the quote
appears before the name of the quoted. It almost has an ominous vibe to it with a hint
of excitement bubbling under the surface. It is the same type of undertone that is used
in the tabloids as click bait.
This may be indicative of the issue of transparency in the Nigerian entertainment
industry where access to hard news is sparse so alternatively, journalists opt for
sensationalized material. It is also an evidence of the fact that public relations
practitioners are not situated to provide hard trade information to reporters. Also, it
may be indicative of a lack of public relations involvement in the news constructing
process in Nigeria altogether.
Dieyi | ! 66
2. LEADS
Nigerian Entertainment Today
Exhibit C
The Hollywood Reporter
Exhibit D
With the story leads, the Hollywood Reporter provides attribution for the story right
off the bat while Nigerian Entertainment Today holds off until the next paragraph,
alluding to more stringent “fair use” ethics among journalists in the United States.
3. CONCLUDING PARAGRAGH
Nigerian Entertainment Today
Exhibit E
Dieyi | ! 67
The Hollywood Reporter
Exhibit F
Nigerian Entertainment Today uses the standard boilerplate-style conclusion, culling
from information that explains Tim Cook’s person and function at Apple Inc. This
suggests a need for that information within Nigeria. Perhaps people are not as familiar
with Tim Cook. On the other hand, The Hollywood Reporter maintains its analytical
tone to the last word of the story.
Dieyi | ! 68
Chapter VII | STANDARDIZING THE PRACTICE IN NIGERIA
Going the Distance
In spite of the socio-economic forces that work against it, public relations practitioners in
Nigeria can begin to lean toward best practices. But it will be a monumental task that will
require an inside-out approach, beginning with public relations experts who will push for
more significant intellectual investment from the Nigerian Institute of Public Relations.
The Nigerian Institute of Public Relations will in turn draw the attention of the
overarching government agencies such as the Nigerian Communications Commission.
The Nigerian Communications Commission will in-turn direct more investment toward
developing the general public information system.
The “Oga at the top” Phenomenon
O•g•a – /’ɒgä/: A Nigerian creole term that is used as a substitute for boss.
In March 2013, a top-ranking Nigerian official, the civil defense commandant of the
Nigerian Security and Civil Defense Corps (NSCDC) became the unfortunate epitome of
what to avoid in an investigative interview. In an in-depth discussion with Nigerian
independent television station Channels TV , Mr. Obafaiye Shem was unable to respond to
an inquiry on the web address of his ministry. A transcript of a portion of the conversation
is necessary to fully comprehend the context:
“Channels TV Staff 1: What is the website of the NSCDC?
Dieyi | ! 69
Mr. Obafaiye Shem: The website of NS … NSCDC yes would be … You
know … be … the … I cannot categorically tell you one now because the one
that …
Channels TV Staff I: (cuts in) you have multiple websites?
Mr Obafaiye Shem: Wait, wait the one we are going to make use of am not the
one that is going to create it.
Channels TV Staff 1: See the question is, what is your website?
Mr. Obafaiye Shem: Wait! The one that we are going to make use of is … is
going to be made known by … by my oga at the top yes, I can’t … I can’t
announce one now and my oga says is another one.”
Posted on Channels TV’s YouTube channel, the video of Mr. Shem’s blunder instantly
picked up steam and began to spread over social media with the hashtag “OgaAtTheTop.”
It was downloaded from Channels TV’s YouTube channel and reposted on other YouTube
accounts, gathering over two million views combined. Nigerian YouTubers created
comedy sketches around the phrase “My Oga at the Top.” Some created collaborative
pieces between Mr. Shem’s responses and another Nigerian official’s, – famous for
incoherently using grandiose grammar in his public speeches – juxtaposing the two
against one another. Not to be left out of the action, Nigerian musicians released songs
using the phrase, hoping to latch onto the wave that Mr. Shem’s faux pas created.
The incident transcended into a full transmedia blowout. T-shirts with the same hashtag,
“OgaAtTheTop,” and digitally imprinted images of Mr. Shem surfaced for sale and were
marketed via social media. Even Nigerian gaming startup company Kuluya launched a
Dieyi | ! 70
Video Game titled “Oga at the Top,” a first person gaming program in which players pick
up points from the letters NSCDC by controlling the main character, Mr. Shem (Okezie,
“Kuluya Releases New Game Called ‘My Oga At The Top’ Featuring NSCDC’s Obafaiye
Shem”). Of all different media interpretations, multiple variations of “Oga at the top”
meme art were the most voluminous.
Exhibit G
Dieyi | ! 71
Enter New Media in Shining Armor
The “Oga at the top” incident brings up a few other points about the Nigerian public
relations system.
1. Lack of Public-Speaking Preparedness:
Disregarding his apparent lack of concern for the communication function
within NSCDC organization, Mr. Obafaiye Shem’s mistake may have been
avoided with a little preemptive tactic known as “media coaching” from a
public relations practitioner. Often described as a “subtler” role of public
relations professionals, it is usually taken for granted. But it is a function that
is certainly necessary from the prevailing indications. The Nigerian Vanguard
reported that Mr. Shem was later replaced in his role as civil defense
commandant. Although there is no evidence to prove that his replacement was
directly related to the “Oga at the top” incident, it is a viable assumption
considering the level of embarrassment he obviously caused the organization.
2. Debunks a myth:
In the same thread, the incident also debunks an assumption that public
relations is not a required communication function within the Nigerian
context. Here was a top official in the Nigerian government making a laughing
stock out of the country’s defense ministry in a blunder that could have been
easily avoided.
Dieyi | ! 72
But the most important thing it suggests within the context of this paper is the potential
that new media holds for public relations practitioners. The experts interviewed for this
paper agree:
•
“I think traditional is always going to be around. But now even traditional is
becoming New Media and that line is increasingly blurring.” – Marc Graser,
Reporter at Variety
•
“Instagram for instance has become a really big marketing tool for artists,
retailers and so on. YouTube for artists is also a very strong publicity tool. A
year or two back, YouTube was a no-go area for Nigerians but now with better,
faster broadband services and cheaper data, people now prefer to stream than
download.” – Kazeem Abdul-Raheem
•
“Most of the things that trend a lot in Nigeria are magnified because of social
media. Visuals thrive well, so TV potentially has more longevity than other
forms of traditional media. But even TV is now fusing with digital to make
new and emerging media. Most TV stations now have YouTube channels or
direct platforms on their websites. And nowadays you even have smart TV sets
where you can directly access the Internet.” – Paschal Tambe
•
“I think new media will definitely revolutionize the industry. With social
media for instance you have a more direct access to the people you are trying
to influence with your public relations. In the past, if you were to execute a PR
plan, you would have to gather journalists and give them brown envelopes.
Basically, there was an intermediary between the person implementing the
Dieyi | ! 73
plan and the target audience. Technology has helped us to be able to remove
that intermediary.” – Paul Nwulu
Clearly the Nigerian technological proliferation is not yet being harnessed to its full
potential in the public relations field.
Combined with these opinions on the power of digital media, the ever-increasing
technological penetration in Nigeria represents a glimmer of hope for public relations
practitioners operating within the country. According to telecommunications research site
Budde, “Nigeria is Africa’s largest mobile market with more than 125 million subscribers
and a market penetration of around 75% in early 2014.” A 2014 PEW global report on
emerging nations also illustrates that 78% of the country’s over 150 million population
own a smartphone (Pew Research Center, “Emerging Nations Embrace Internet, Mobile
Technology 2014”). And Biztech Africa reported that as of 2013, Nigeria was the largest
mobile market in both Africa and the Middle East combined. Even more encouraging is
the fact that the country has a rapidly increasing youth population with over 50% aged 25
and below (“Nigeria Rising: Inside Africa’s Cradle of Innovation”).
New Media also has the potential to iron out some core wrinkles in the Nigerian
entertainment industry that affect the efficacy of the public relations practice and
publicity. As Internet service providers continue to increase the speed of their services, it
dissuades the need for downloads that are a spurring element of piracy. With services like
IrokoTV , – Nigeria’s Netflix for Nollywood movies – movie makers now have an
alternative and relatively pirate-proof method for distributing their films (Oladipo,
“‘Nigeria’s Netflix’ takes Nollywood to a Global Audience”).
Dieyi | ! 74
Some schools of thought recommend caution in approaching digital media however,
purporting that it won’t ultimately present an alternative for traditional media as we know
it for quite a while. Paula Askanas points out that until there is a significant shift in the
way advertising spending is distributed between traditional forms and digital media, the
latter cannot begin to offer the same level of exposure as the former. Yet, no one can deny
that its prospects are promising considering all the facts.
Dieyi | ! 75
Chapter VIII | CONCLUSION
Approaching the Tunnel’s End
More than ever, public relations is a crucial communications function within any
organization. As the economy becomes more global, an absence of public relations as a
communication function and publicity as a marketing form within an organization or
business, places it at a disadvantage. Nigeria cannot survive as a silo so it needs to begin
to shift toward globally established best practices.
Before that can happen, there has to be a lot of internal intervention by public relations
experts in the country. Dr. Paul Nwulu iterates, “I think industry professionals are trying
to come up with ways to begin to calculate the value of PR but as I said, it’s not just
about the supply, it is about the demand. So no matter how much they try or what
innovations they introduce, until we can have very solid reports and results that say
‘doing this campaign affected the bottomline in a positive way,’ it will never work.”
Basically, communications experts within the country need to dedicate time to developing
tools that can measure the effectiveness of the public relations function, in a way that will
satisfy Nigerian businesses.
The government also has a pivotal role to play. Fritz Friedman states, “There are ethical
and moral regulations that govern how public relations and publicity practitioners
exercise their responsibilities. Legally, as long as you’re telling the truth, in this country
[America] it’s free speech and you’re able to write whatever you want. But the reality is
that there are external political, economic and social pressures that can modify either the
interpretation of the story or whether the story goes out at all.” The government’s role in
Dieyi | ! 76
establishing protective regulation is vital. But the responsibility of calling its mind to the
issues still remains on the public relations expert.
It looks like it is already headed in the right direction. With the introduction of Geopoll, a
real-time survey platform that will offer overnight daily TV ratings in Nigeria, there is
now a reliable tool for determining ad rates and for the first time public relations experts
can now extrapolate the effectiveness of their campaigns (AE, “Geopoll Unveils First
Ever Overnight TV Ratings in African Markets in Time for World Cup”).
In an industry where spaghetti-throwing is currently the order of the day, It will be a long
and arduous journey to standardization but experts remain optimistic. As Dr. Paul Nwulu
says, “With the trajectory we’re establishing, driven by technology, PR will continue to
grow. It has experienced some ‘growing pains’ along the way but it will definitely mature
significantly in the near future.” The author could not agree more.
Dieyi | ! 77
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Appendix A-1
Interviewer: Cynthia Dieyi
Interviewee: Kazeem Abdul-Raheem, Freelance Publicist and CEO of MOTA Design
Studios.
Date of Interview: January 9, 2015
Location: Abuja, NIGERIA.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: With the way is it practiced currently in Nigeria, how would
you define publicity?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: Publicity in Nigeria is actually very simple in my
opinion. It boils down to the major media which are TV , Web and Radio. I would say
print media as well but people don’t gain as much recognition with newspapers in
Nigeria. You can’t confidently say that someone will be become popular because they’ve
been seen in a newspaper or magazine. So basically TV , which is at the top right now – at
some point it was the Internet but right now it’s TV . Because Internet publicity has been
ruined by unqualified bloggers.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How do you mean it has been ruined by bloggers?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: In the sense that – if I can recall correctly to a year or
two back, publicity on the Internet was very good in the sense that every artist that wants
to release a new product has to make it online and no matter how much of a small artist
you are, you get some attention. But now, you have so many blogs and a lot of them are
owned by immature minds and they go around posting terrible content. They basically
don’t carry quality content so it affects artists’ reputations. For instance, you release a
new song and it’s good but because the blogs keep posting bad content, no now visits
them or they immediately assume that the content is the usual rubbish. A year or two
back, it was not like that. We had some very good blogs. It’s not like there are currently
Dieyi | ! 89
no reasonable blogs but you also have a lot of upcoming blogs that have ruined the entire
Internet publicity platform.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: In the Nigerian context, is there any difference between paid
and earned media?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: In Nigeria generally, good, newsworthy content is not
enough to earn you publicity – I think it does abroad but not here. Over there [abroad]
sometimes you don’t even have a good video, you just have a good song and before you
know it, everyone is playing it. But in Nigeria it’s not like that. In fact, artists that become
popular here are not even talented. While the ones that are actually talented and have
good content are not because they don’t have money. Even if you go to a station and they
rave about how good your music is, if you’re unable to make some payment for
promotion, they’ll abandon it.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Let’s talk about newspapers. Do you send press releases to
newspapers?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: Yes. And for newspapers, press releases are enough for
them to cover stories because nowadays they are on the lookout for content. And the
same goes for bloggers, they are also looking for content. If bloggers stumble on good
content, they post for free. But that applies to stories alone. It doesn’t apply to videos or
other multimedia. If the story is very interesting or if it’s something that will draw
readership to their publications, they’ll cover it.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Let’s explore stories a little more. What kinds of stories do they
usually pick up?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: Mostly if something happens to an artist of public
figure. And another trend I’ve noticed is that ridiculous stories turn up in blogs as well.
Newspapers on the other hand are quite careful because they can’t just spread anything.
So the story has to be interesting or has to be pertaining to a public figure that people
would be interested in reading about rather than just random people. It has to be related to
a popular figure in most cases.
Dieyi | ! 90
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Let’s talk radio. What kinds of stories are they most receptive
to?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: Radio is similar except that radio is gets more
attention. I’ll speak for radio stations in Abuja and radio stations in Lagos because I know
those two very well. There is very high radio traffic and listenership in Lagos. All the
times I have visited Lagos, we always listen to the radio whenever we are in traffic.
People get tired of the songs on their phone and fall back on radio. Radio is also where
people currently have the opportunity to listen to new material.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Do you still have to mobilize radio personnel?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: Yes you have to. It’s a two-way thing. Sometimes, if
you have a good rapport with someone at the station. The truth is that, they are actually
not meant to collect money for these things because the money doesn’t go back to the
stations revenues. It ends up in individual pockets. But the on-air personalities making
extra cash off the practice. Like in Beat FM for instance, they announce that people
shouldn’t pay their on-air personalities. But when you go to Lagos and you don’t have up
to about N150,000 [about $1000] to share, you can’t get your material on the radio
stations.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Do you think that Digital Media provides a viable alternative
for artists to promote themselves or for publicists to help promote their artists?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: Let’s use Instagram for instance. It has become a really
big marketing tool for both artists and business people. Facebook isn’t as popular as it
used to be. It probably still has an impact abroad but here in Nigeria, people barely still
use Facebook. Most people want to get on Instagram nowadays. I have a friend who sells
wears and she’s making a lot from her Instagram sales. She tags people, orders stuff from
Amazon and sends it to them. Her main marketing tool is Instagram. She’s not paying for
ads or whatever. So I believe in Instagram. I also believe in YouTube for artists. A year or
so back, YouTube was a no-go area in Nigeria because data plans were inefficient and
Dieyi | ! 91
expensive. But data is cheap and people increasingly prefer to stream online rather than
download. It [Digital Media] will keep making progress over time.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Do you think that a time will come in Nigeria where publicists
will have enough power in their hands to do their jobs without having to compensate
journalists financially?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: It will be difficult. In my opinion, there is a mindset
that you have to pay something. Journalists are always considering how they will service
their platform and pay their bills. It’s not always corrupt but some people go the extra
mile to demand ridiculously high rates for posting content. I don’t see the shift happening
anytime soon, where journalists won’t require money for posting material. In fact I see it
getting worse because nowadays they tell you as an artist that if you don’t have money or
financial backing, forget it. It keeps getting worse. The only other way to establish best
practices is if the government sets up regulatory bodies to establish terms and
qualifications. Otherwise, radio on-air personalities will always demand money. TV is
even worse. I remember when we went to submit Zinny’s video, the TV personnel we
saw there showed us many flash drives filled with videos that they had dumped: one
section was because they were not up to standard and the other section was because the
people didn’t pay. As soon as the artists live, they dump the work.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: As a publicist, has there been anytime when you “spun” a
story?
Kazeem Abdul-Raheem: Answer: Everybody does it and it’s always very effective. It’s
like graphics design for instance, if you put five CDs, the most attractively created one is
the one that people will be drawn to. It’s the same way you fabricate an image around an
artist, the constructions and extra story you add to them – even if it’s not true – will make
them more interesting and draw attention.
Dieyi | ! 92
Appendix A-2
Interviewer: Cynthia Dieyi
Interviewee: Paschal Tambe, Freelance Publicist and CEO of ThatNaijaTrack.com.
Date of Interview: January 13, 2015
Location: Abuja, NIGERIA.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How would you define publicity with the way you’ve been
doing it in Nigeria so far?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: With publicity in Nigeria, something has to give. It’s like you’re
paying for a service, that’s how they see it. You think they have a platform and you have
the content. it’s usually supposed to be an exchange of non-monetary value – my
platform needs content and you have good material. But over here to an extent whether
it’s good or not, once cash exchanges hands and they state what is required as payment
for your content to be on their platform, then they don’t care about the quality of the
content. And if you don’t come through with the stated amount of payment, most of the
time, they won’t publicize it.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Does the difference between earned and paid media have any
relevance in the Nigerian context?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: It does but only to a few platforms and even within those
platforms, it depends on who you contact. Ethically you’re supposed to go there with
your content, like music for instance and a radio station needs music, you’re doing them a
favor by providing them content. In Nigeria it doesn’t work that way, they think they are
doing you the favor by playing your songs for the public. So in that aspect, some
presenters/DJs take advantage of that fact and demand to be paid. These days, they even
have packages. They tell you they’ll air your songs a certain number of times a day at a
certain time slot for a specific amount of money. Or they say if you want more plays per
day, you pay a higher fee. Most of them have come up with their own systems for
Dieyi | ! 93
compensating themselves. It’s not supposed to be so but because there is no standard,
everyone comes up with their own individual terms. While there might be other on-air
personalities in the same radio station that cares less about the money but more about the
content. If you go to them, they listen to it and determine that it’s nice, they’ll air it. But
the problem is, those people are very few. So it really makes publicity in Nigeria a
monetary affair.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: So would you say that this practice is reflective of the largest
socio-economic dynamic in the country?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: Definitely. Because corruption will thrive where there is no rule
of law. If a radio station sticks to the broadcasting rules and standards and put certain
punishments for people that break those rules, it will curb it. If someone breaks a rule and
there is no punishment, they will definitely do it again. So it’s because of the general lack
of a rule of law in the economy that corruption thrives. And it naturally affects the world
of public relations.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How do you feel about blogs here right now and how effective
are they at getting your content to the target audience?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: In my opinion, there are only a few blogs that can effectively get
your content out because most of them are mushroom sites and not properly managed.
There is a lot of plagiarism, content theft and bad grammar. If someone comes up with
something that they feel is a hot topic, they copy and paste onto their blogs without
giving credit. So the audience can’t determine credibility. But there are a few out there
that take their time to review, research and put original opinion on the material. To a large
extent, those ones are effective as evidenced by the amount of traffic they get. I’ll say
about %60 of blogs in Nigeria right now are fake. But blogging and social networking
has grown in Nigeria over the past few years. And Nigerians who are either in business or
entertainment have seen the importance of blogs and online platforms. It will really help
the growth if the mushroom blogs will put in the effort to create their own quality content
or stick to a certain standard and ethics. But at the moment, it’s a disorganized arena.
Dieyi | ! 94
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Do you think there might be a regulatory body for blogs since
they seem to be so popular in Nigeria?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: There should be. There’s a body regulating the registration of
websites already under the Ministry of Information and Communication. But for now all
they do is monitor registration to ensure that they are genuine but they don’t explore
content that the blogs post. And it will be a tricky bill to pass though because they will
have to consider freedom of speech and expression. But a roundabout way they can
control those things is by controlling plagiarism because if they do that, the bloggers will
be forced to write their own content and it will reduce the number of bloggers. So for
instance, if a blogger plagiarizes another website’s content and they report, they can be
asked to shut down. I think that will really help.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Speaking of Digital Media in general, do you think it has the
potential to empower publicists? or do you think it represents a viable alternative for
getting your content out while bypassing traditional media?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: It does. Because most of the things that trend a lot in Nigeria are
generated online. For example the “oga at the top” saga became viral because of social
media. Another example is when either new artists are coming out or established ones are
releasing new content, they tend to come up with competitions that are mostly promoted
online rather than traditional media platforms. Facebook and twitter helps a lot because
that’s where youth are these days. So if the content it good and/or catchy, it will succeed
online.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What’s your opinion on publicity stunts in Nigeria?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: It’s a good idea to come up with stunts. But like almost
everything in Nigeria, it becomes tedious and overused. If someone comes up with a
stunt, the next meeting every other person is trying to do the same thing thinking it will
work for them as it worked for the first person. It might work for the first ten people that
do it first but after that it just becomes a nuisance to the public. So in as much as people
Dieyi | ! 95
do stunts, they should understand that if it is overused, the public begins to feel taken for
granted and they shut them out. It kills the publicity effort.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Speaking of radio, do you think it is as effective as digital in
getting the word out to target audiences?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: Yeah but not in the same magnitude as before. I’ll use an
analogy: Radio is like a compact disk while digital is like mp3. When mp3 was invented,
there was a drastic drop in the sales of CDs because people became able to download the
content. But that doesn’t make CDs absolutely obsolete. That’s how radio is. Because
most of the time, content is released online before they go on radio and so the digital
platform has a larger audience than radio does. People still listen to radio stations but for
example if a popular artists releases a new song and tweets about it, the message instantly
reaches millions of people in different parts of the world. The followers can in-turn
retweet or talk about the material, it has a ripple effect, spreading the message even
farther. Whereas radio stations are restricted to certain demographics, areas and people
don’t listen to the radio all the time so they may miss the material. But on social media,
the message is always there. So radio is still relevant but not as much as it used to be.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Do the same dynamics apply to TV?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: No. TV is a lot better than radio because it is visual. We still
have MTV Base, Sound City and those music broadcasting channels no matter how
crappy they may seem. Visuals help a lot and that is also why online and digital media is
thriving because even if is it audio, you are seeing something. You’re seeing the wave
form play if you’re streaming, and you’re seeing the song art and you’re sense are drawn
to it. Visuals pull your attention and draws you in and that is the same quality that TV
has. At the same time, it’s a double-edged sword when it comes to quality because if
you’re seeing something that you don’t like, sometimes it may discourage you from even
listening to the audio. But if it’s nice, you’ll turn up the volume or go closer to get a
better listen. That’s what TV has over radio and so it will still maintain its audience for
sometime. Also, what is happening right now is a fusion of TV and new media. There is a
synergy between them. For instance, there are some TV shows that if you are unable to
Dieyi | ! 96
catch it when it airs, you can watch on their YouTube channels. Likewise, you have smart
TV sets where you can directly get Internet content from.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How about Newspapers?
Paschal Tambe: Answer: Newspapers are suffering from the same phenomenon radio is
suffering from. Like I said, visuals help but the visuals on newspapers are not
compelling. Instead people would rather use their tablets and their phones where they can
see photos or GIFs in full color. Subconsciously, people respond to the images on the
web. It’s also faster. As opposed to buying newspapers and storing them around the
house. Web is environmentally more sustainable. I am very optimistic about digital
media.
Dieyi | ! 97
Appendix A-3
Interviewer: Cynthia Dieyi
Interviewee: Fritz Friedman, Former SVP of Worldwide Publicity for Sony Pictures
Entertainment.
Date of Interview: November 21, 2014
Location: Los Angeles, CALIFORNIA-Phone Interview.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What would you say were some socio-economic dynamics that
prevailed in the days of publicists like Henry Rogers?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: In the United States, my opinion is that certainly years ago PR
was practiced in a different way in which spin could be more acceptable – depending on
the story of course – and people would believe it. Whereas today there is digital space
and digital technologies that have now made consumers journalists. So if they read a
story and something smells funny, social media is going to lambast the journalist behind
it. So you much more watchdogs with opinions. And now they not only have opinions,
but they also have a cost free and effective tool for distributing them. Whereas in the past,
it was a one way street and of course people would believe whatever the journalist writes,
because they had no reason to think otherwise. People were not as sophisticated about
receiving news at a time and people were more gullible. Today, certainly because of
socio-economic factors but more importantly the ability for the reader, the consumer, the
general public to also be a journalist in his or her own right negates or minimizes the
extent to which publicists can spin a story.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Generally speaking, how do you think public relations has
evolved over time?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: What has changed is digital. For example, there was a huge time
factor with the way you strategizes having a story break in the news in retrospect. So if
you want to have the news break the next day, you had to send it to the journalist by three
Dieyi | ! 98
in the afternoon the day before because their presses close for the day at about eight
o’clock. However today, it is so immediate and as soon as it happens, it is already out
there. And there has been a rise of very important digital publications like for example
Deadline Hollywood in the entertainment business or The Wrap. And even Variety as
well as the New York Times or The Hollywood Reporter as all now online and as soon as
something happens, it’s out there one minute later. So one way it has changed is the
creation of strategy to break the news. News is generally now harder to control and even
“exclusives” are not so exclusive anymore. And this is also the point where relationships
with journalists become very important because if they can trust you, they’ll be more
willing to work with you and hold the story for as long as you may need. In the past also,
there were morning editions and there were evening editions but that doesn’t exist
anymore. Even newspapers are going away now because you wake up in the morning and
you read the New York Times online. And you also have these notifications from
publications that you subscribe to. In the past radio or television were the quickest ways
you could get breaking news and then you would have to wait for an in-depth story much
later. All that has changed. The biggest change is distribution and now the average person
consumes news and media content.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: In your experience as a publicist and public relations expert,
could you paint a picture of how your strategies now differ from a few years back when
you didn’t have to consider the digital space?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: There are steps to it strategy and tactics. On strategy, we had the
luxury of more time in the past to get the news out there and the luxury of privacy. We
controlled the news and no one was usually chasing after us as quickly. News travelled
slower. Obviously that changed the way we would sit back and strategize news
placements. The luxury of time is now gone and it now becomes an even more critical
factor in creating a strategy and how you keep information close to you. Where tactics are
concerned, it’s more efficient now because if I want to get information out there, it is
immediately out there. That’s the reason why publications like the Hollywood Reporter
went from a daily to a weekly. People now get most of the information online. And that’s
why publications like News Week shut down, Time is now really mostly essays on
Dieyi | ! 99
current affairs, whereas at one time it was an interpretation of daily news. So that is how
it has changed the tactics. It has made it much more efficient and sometimes even too
efficient. Also with digital, you can better target a specific audience whereas in the past, if
I wanted to get a group of women, I would still have to put it in the LA Times or Variety
because there was no way for me to segment that market. Now today, I can go online,
search for “publications for women,” and send them my information, knowing that it’s
like a laser targeted to the particular audience for whom the release is appropriate. It’s
much more sophisticated and requires much more savvy with regard to time management
and generally the benefits help balance the liabilities.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Over the course of your career, have there been any regulations
that have affected the way you do your work?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: There are generally ethical and moral regulations that govern the
way good public relations practitioners exercise their responsibilities. Legally, as long as
you’re telling the truth and there is no slandering, there is free speech in this country so
you’re able to write whatever you want. But the reality is that there are external political,
economic and social pressures that can modify either the interpretation of the story to
whether the story goes out at all as a practical matter. We can write whatever we want but
there is a responsibility that every PR person has to make sure that it is appropriate to
distribute certain information. Though some people think that the public should know
absolutely everything, others feel that there are somethings that only belong in a specific
sector and should just stay there. In principle, there were never any legal contingencies.
That’s why if someone sends press releases, especially in large corporations, you pass
them through legal affairs first. It’s about being accurate and determining if you are
legally allowed to say certain things and also if you should be strategically saying what
you want to say at the specific time or whether it might be better left said later on within
another context. So those are the pressures that would modify the initial PR strategic
plan. But there is nothing specifically in the law that restricts freedom of speech except
where it comes to slander or personal assassination.
Dieyi | ! 100
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Do you think digital offers an opportunity to totally obliterate
traditional media in the foreseeable future?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: The thing is that its fast becoming the option of a lot of people
that newspapers are archaic, they are “dirty.” And from an ecological and “green”
standpoint, people are beginning to lean more toward paperless sources. What’s
becoming interesting is the digital divide between those who use digital and those who
don’t. You have older people who are not comfortable with getting their information
digitally, or from a nostalgic standpoint prefer to read hard magazine and there are going
to continue to do that for a while. But as print publications become thinner and begin to
disappear, they are going to have to start seeking their information online whether they
like it or not. Younger people on the other hand probably think that physical media is
amusing because it seems so archaic. The young people prefer digital because its
efficient, its clean, its fast and they don’t have to deal with the physical burden of
newspapers. And what that ultimates is that over time, you’ll have less and less traditional
media. So yes, my personal opinion is that over time, physical is going to go away.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How does digital media put power in the hands of the publicist?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: Because social media has now given everyone who has access
to the computer, the power to be a journalist. Companies and personalities have been
brought down because of social media; it can impact stock prices, it can impact the
success or failure of a film. Word-of-mouth used to be the best way to get information out
for a film for instance and now that function is more powerful with social media. It has
really, really empowered the consumer and has made every single person a potential
journalist.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What do you think of cultures where pay-for-play still exists in
journalist/publicist relationships?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: It’s usually about money. And people in those cultures really
need the money. From a pragmatic perspective, third world countries have a very unique
economic dynamic and they are willing to bend the rules so they can feed their families.
Dieyi | ! 101
Ethically, there is a convergent market in which the public relations function and
advertising are coming together in the digital space. You can actually pay certain sites to
participate in certain events. The economic dynamic of things are changing. In the states,
digital has really helped shave off expenses in advertising and publicity. But it has
always been the case in third world countries where they are more flexible with their
rules because they have to make a living. Also, consumers in third world countries are not
necessarily as sophisticated as consumers here. So their perception on pay-for-play will
vary. My opinion is that a luxury exists in advanced countries to really stick to the rules
of journalism and advertising. But publicists in such countries can maximize digital
media.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What do you think is the hardest part about being a publicist in
the entertainment business today?
Fritz Friedman: Answer: It is not for the faint of heart. Because you are dealing with
personalities and people who have demands that may not make sense to you but you have
to fulfill them. And so you have to be smart enough to think on your feet, you have to
develop nerves of steel. All good publicists need to know the tools, be smart, don’t easily
get hysterical and is savvy enough to have good relationships.
Dieyi | ! 102
Appendix A-4
Interviewer: Cynthia Dieyi
Interviewee: Paula Askanas, EVP of Worldwide Corporate Communications for Sony
Pictures Television.
Date of Interview: November 17, 2014
Location: Culver City, CALIFORNIA.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What would you say has changed in PR over the years, in terms
of ethics?
Paula Askanas: Answer: I can’t say I’m aware of a significant change in terms of ethics,
What I think is that PR over the last generation has gained more respect and there has
been more of an acknowledgement of its importance to help people’s career and to
position business. And now it is being seeing as a function of the executive team as
opposed to being someone who throw parties in a host role.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Would you say that’s a function of the discipline in the sense
that experts have worked hard to elevate PR or is it a change that took place from an
organizations point of view?
Paula Askanas: Answer: I think it has happened more organically within different
organizations. And then because it’s PR it plays out publicly and other organizations
follow suit. As a group, entertainment public relations is a defined subset or public
relations and you would get a different answer if you were talking to someone in
consumer public relations for instance. I think that there was also a time in Hollywood
where everybody turned in blind eye and even the press turned a blind eye. You had
everything from President Kennedy allegedly having these affairs and nobody showed it
in a bad light. We had another president who had polio – FTR – and the press didn't focus
on that whereas today I think you would see a lot of coverage on that kind of thing. So
the press in general was just more respectful about what they thought needed to be
Dieyi | ! 103
examined. And I think now the press thinks that everything is relevant and free to talk
about and as a result, you see PR taking a different role.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: In your experience, have there been any unconventional
practices between journalists and public relations practitioners?
Paula Askanas: Answer: In entertainment particularly, there has been a big shift between
press and PR people working together to create these images for people. And I think
that’s what the audience wanted. And we sort of socially took this turn where people
wanted to know everything about these celebrities and where they felt like the celebrities
are public property, and that they have a right to know. You also had the advent of reality
TV where everybody thought they too can be a celebrity. And so, now the ecosystem
between PR people and journalists where journalists need to sell papers and PR people
need to get their talents out. So everyone has got a stake in it.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Has the core of journalism which ultimates that stories that gain
coverage are stories with news value has change?
Paula Askanas: Answer: I think if an idea or a project was truly innovative, it will
definitely get coverage. But also, there are some topics that are not necessarily innovative
but with a strong name attached to it, that ensures coverage. It’s more interesting to
readers to hear that Tom Cruise is doing something that might be considered stupid as
opposed to a less known talent.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How would you say PR strategies have changed over time?
Paula Askanas: Answer: The biggest thing that has changed is digital and social media
because of course it has made things go much faster. Because of the volume of outlets, it
has also made things very difficult to monitor things that are wrong and things that are
being reported incorrectly. It also turns what might start out as a small story into a big
story because the general public jumps on board.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Over the course of your career, what regulations have affected
the way PR works?
Dieyi | ! 104
Paula Askanas: Answer: I can’t really think of anything in terms of the way PR works. I
think that there are related topics in entertainment that may affect us. For instance, things
like trying to control piracy, controlling the internet that ultimately trickle down to us.
But not necessarily affecting the way we do public relations.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What are some ways you have adjusted your practice to adapt
to digital media?
Paula Askanas: Answer: We have certainly used it to get our message out, both targeted
and to a broad audience. We have become even more careful about things being accurate,
not that we weren’t careful in the past but now we scrutinize things to see if there is a
potential for misinterpretation. We’ve used it as a way to engage people on the outside
with what we are talking about. We can now talk to them directly rather than through the
filter of a middle man.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How do you think digital media offers an opportunity to totally
obliterate traditional media?
Paula Askanas: Answer: At present? it doesn’t. I think the biggest problem right now is
that there isn’t as much investment. Imagine the kind of money traditional media puts in
marketing; it’s that marketing that makes those things interesting to people down the line.
There are a handful of shows that have originated on the digital platform where there
have put a lot of marketing like “Orange is the new Black.” But you would not be going
to Netflix to look for the Black List or not be going to Amazon to look for “How I met
Your Mother” or whatever it is had it not had a preexisting presence that was established
through traditional media. So until you see a shift in the spending, I don’t think you will
see that drastic shift to digital media.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How does digital media put power in the hands of a publicist?
Paula Askanas: Answer: There are certain things like social media where you can speak
directly to the audience without a third-party editing it for you. That certainly can be a
powerful tool. Again, it becomes very similar to taking out advertising because the one
thing about PR is that you have to have a third party basically validating you. And so
Dieyi | ! 105
when you talk directly, it becomes similar to advertising, only cheaper. But it lacks the
third-party validation function. So digital media is very helpful but it’s not the ultimate
and won’t solve everyone’s problems.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: In a situation where digital media seems to be the only way that
publicists can get their stories out without having to pay, how would you recommend
they go about it?
Paula Askanas: Answer: In that situation, it boils down to being able to show innovation.
I think those are the primary ways. Regardless of if you have a gatekeeper, if you can
make your own noise and allow people to sample for themselves. But again, you have to
have something with news value, that’s the dilemma. Stunts are also good. Not
everything lends itself to a stunt but sometimes it does and you have to be prepared to
take advantage of that. If it’s well done, it would be enough to pique someone’s interest to
patronize it. They also have to go about people in a non-traditional way.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How do you feel about publicists launching their own
platforms?
Paula Askanas: Answer: I think they can do that but there have to be on one side of fence
or the other. If you’re going to be on the publicist side, people are going to know that you
are publicizing them for a reason and not necessarily because they are worthy. If you had
a friend however and you assist them by giving them to the tools, you could then create
an outlet that could be very useful to you.
Dieyi | ! 106
Appendix A-5
Interviewer: Cynthia Dieyi
Interviewee: Marc Graser, Reporter for Variety.
Date of Interview: December 16, 2014
Location: Los Angeles, CALIFORNIA-Phone Interview.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What are some factors that have effected changes in public
relations practice from the days of Henry Rogers to now where there is this
undocumented “no lie” rule?
Marc Graser: Answer: As a journalist you don’t want to run anything that isn’t true and
every story now has to be vetted. You can’t just go off one press release, you now have to
talk to other people and make sure that what you’re being pitched is accurate. That
communication process to verify news stories is now easier.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How do you think PR/journalist interactions have changed over
the years?
Marc Graser: Answer: It’s really just the platform. You used to get pitches via fax
machines and now it’s more email, and online wire services. Journalist now access
pitches in different ways. Nobody sends faxes anymore. Sometimes you get text
messages. Another thing to consider is social media. A lot of company publicists will
post things via twitter with a link to a website for the rest of the information.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Looking back over your career, what has been the most
conventional way that a publicist has tried to get you to cover a story?
Marc Graser: Answer: Mainly on twitter. But when they do it via twitter, it’s usually like
a blanket release to make sure it gets out there at once. It is usually effective only if it’s a
popular property like Star Wars and on a twitter feed that a lot of people follow. If it’s a
movie that no one cares about, then no one will see it and the message will get lost in the
Dieyi | ! 107
clutter. Marvel has also released press material via their twitter feed as well and because
it is largely followed, it’s successful.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What are some government regulations that have affected the
way you interact with publicists?
Marc Graser: Answer: There haven’t been any.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How are you adapting to digital media as a journalist?
Marc Graser: Answer: You have to adapt by monitoring everything: twitter, some
Facebook account and constantly check your emails. It’s not 9-to-5 anymore, it’s now 24
hours.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: Do you think digital media offers an opportunity to become an
alternative for traditional media?
Marc Graser: Answer: I think traditional is always going to be around. But now even
traditional is becoming new media and the line between the two is blurring.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How does digital media empower journalists?
Marc Graser: Answer: It serves as a platform to get your stories out there to more people.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What do you think of cultures where pay-for-play system exists
between journalist and public relations practitioners?
Marc Graser: Answer: I don’t approve of it. And you can’t really trust the news stories if
that’s the case. It becomes more advertising than actual journalism. Because really there
is no difference between that and a marketing campaign.
Cynthia Dieyi: What is the hardest part about being a journalist in the entertainment
world today?
Marc Graser: It just never stops. You’re always on Deadline and you’re always posting
something. The internet ha changed the business.
Dieyi | ! 108
Appendix A-6
Interviewer: Cynthia Dieyi
Interviewee: Dr Paul Nwulu, Professor of Communications and Managing Director of
TriCom Productions.
Date of Interview: February 12, 2014
Location: Los Angeles, CALIFORNIA-Phone Interview.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What are the socio-economic dynamics that are affecting public
relations practitioners in Nigeria?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: You have to look at the working conditions for many people –
whether press or PR – they probably have one of the worst working conditions with poor
salaries that are hardly ever paid. So really a lot of the PR and how they practice is allows
them to make ends meet. For example, I know that This Day Newspaper doesn’t pay their
staff. Most of their reporters are given the mandate to earn their own salaries. So that
obviously affects how they will deal with someone trying to execute PR for a company
because in that environment, nothing is earned. Everything becomes paid.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What your general thoughts on the PR discipline in Nigeria?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: I believe that the value of PR work has not been established in
Nigeria, because many people do not see the results. If you even go into training, many
schools here do not have a particular public relations program. Instead, it is often an off-
shoot of a journalism program or a communications program. There is hardly ever any
dedicated training institutions or institutes for people in public relations. So obviously
when you have that, you have a group of people that are not trained professionally in the
field of public relations. A lot of the PR that is done here is executed by journalists. If you
look at many companies that have PR officers, they often get them form the journalist
field. Also, PR people in that context become the mouthpiece of the organization, talking
Dieyi | ! 109
about the organization but not necessarily executing public relations as an image
management function as it is done in the US.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: In your opinion, what is the connection between the sanctity of
freedom of speech in the US and the need for PR?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: I think it’s less about freedom of speech and more about possibly
repercussions. For example, if a CEO in American makes a wrong statement, the
company suffers. Whereas in Nigeria, nobody cares. So it’s more of a difference in value
systems. For example Brian Williams has just been suspended for misrepresenting
something that happened in Iraq about two decades ago. So there is a value system that
exists around the concept of integrity in the US, more than in Nigeria. So many PR
people are suffering because if the Chairman of NNPC for example is caught having an
extramarital affair or is caught making offensive statements, he or she will probably not
lose their jobs in Nigeria and the company doesn’t care because they are still returning.
Whereas in the US and other countries where you have a different value system that
punishes people for those kinds of issues, you find that PR people are music busier trying
to correct those wrongs.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How does the level of sophistication of the audience affect this
value system?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: I think it does affect it to an extent. Somewhere in there, there is a
difference in how we see things. I also think you need to look at the capitalist system.
Maybe people often have options for goods and services in the US as opposed to Nigeria.
That is why if you have a phone in Nigeria today and the service is poor, you still don’t
have an option. Whereas in the US, there is a significant difference in the quality of
service that each of the companies will provide. Another point to consider is the absence
of regulatory policies we have in this region. Because of regulatory policies, companies
try more in the US to actually keep customers happy. If the customer is not happy, he or
she can go to the FCC for instance that will do something about it. So it’s a combination
of the availability of multiple sources for goods and services, strong regulatory policies
as well as a level of sophistication of masses in both areas.
Dieyi | ! 110
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What are some possible reasons for the lull in the growth of PR
in Nigeria?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: I think it’s because people don’t see the value. We use the word PR
but what impact does it have on the bottomline of companies in Nigeria? In the US, it
does because when you are a company that has a very positive public face, it brings you
more business. But here, it doesn’t necessarily affect the bottomline. So I think until you
can start noticeably affecting the bottomline it will never really become something that
people cherish and will want to invest money in.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: At what developmental phase would you that PR in Nigeria
exists?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: I think there is a chance is will grow. If we look at the impact of
technology that is growing more and more now and the fact that you can engage your
audience a little bit more is helping it grow more and more. The fact the audience is
becoming more and more responsive through social media will also help. I think
eventually, with the trajectory we are going, it will continue to grow. I wouldn’t say it’s at
its infancy because it has been around since the early 1900s. It has experience some
growing pains along the way but I do think that it will definitely change significantly.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What are your thoughts on the relationship between an inability
to relay the effects of PR on bottomline and PR professional’s inabilities to efficiently
advice businesses on the value of their companies?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: We have some very wonderful home grown PR firms in Nigeria
that advice businesses on the importance of PR. The problem is that those businesses do
not understand that importance. They do not see how the investment in PR would help
them as a company. So it’s more of a demand and not a supply problem because there are
a good number of experts that understand the importance of PR and are willing to put a
solid PR plan in place for a company. However, when you get to the company they do not
appreciate the value. For example, if you look at most of the companies that do
advertising in Nigeria today like the people that make Peak Milk, they have almost a
Dieyi | ! 111
hundred million Naira advertising/PR budget every year. However, no matter what you
do, you make pitches for them, it always comes down to, if we spend a hundred million,
how do we know what we are getting in return? And there is no way we can measure that.
So instead, that hundred million will be spent in doing roadshows, concerts which are not
necessarily PR activities but they create popularity for the products. There are not metrics
for measuring the impact of PR within the Nigerian context.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: How much effort would you say industry experts are putting
into developing models by which we can calculate the value of PR in Nigeria?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: I think industry professionals are trying. But again it’s not just
about the supply but about the demand. So no matter how much they try or what
innovations they develop, until we can have very solid reports and results then it will
never work. Look at the elections for instance. Everyone is out there doing all these
campaigns but who knows whether that will have an impact on who wins the election of
not? If you can definitively tell me that having a good media campaign for Buhari or
Jonathan will help him win the elections then yes. But most of us think that the result will
be determined by who manipulates the process best. So until we are able to show success
in this area, it will never really rise.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: As a communications expert, what have been some of your
experiences with executing PR campaigns?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: We haven’t executed what I would call a PR campaign but we have
done some components of publicity work because that is not really what we do and it’s
not our expertise. But how do we as a company manage public relations? Generally what
we call PR is that at the end of the month you give gift hampers to your client. We also do
literature and try to do social media but again that doesn’t bring a lot mileage for now. In
TriCom for example, every year when we do out end-of-year cash analysis, we have a
line item tagged “Public Relations,” which is usually the money we return to people to
maintain relationships.
Dieyi | ! 112
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: In promoting some of your company’s original material, how
have you gone about publicity?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: Social media primarily and sometimes flyers. We’ve also done text
message blast but we haven’t gotten too much back with regard to that. If you look at
bigger companies, part of publicity efforts include text message blasts. And this is not
necessarily PR, it’s more on the publicity side.
Cynthia Dieyi: Question: What are you thoughts on the potential of digital media and
new technologies in building and helping to develop the PR industry in Nigeria?
Paul Nwulu: Answer: I think social media will definitely revolutionize the industry. I say
this because with social media, you have a more direct access to the people you are trying
to impress with your public relations. In the past, if you were to execute a PR plan, you
may have to invite journalists and give them “brown envelopes.” There was an
intermediary between the person implementing the PR plan and the people the
beneficiaries. Technology is helping us to be able to remove that intermediary. Now you
can pitch your new products directly to your clientele. There are currently a lot of people
in the PR playing space offering to connect people with their audiences. Technology has
also opened more outlets that must now be included in strategic plans. Many global
companies now need to be prepared for crises and Nigeria is tapping into that trend. Look
at the telecoms industry for instance. Five years ago, your network would be out for the
whole weekend and they’ll be no explanation. Today however, if a telecoms service
provider needs to go off, they would alert their customers first or at least explain. There is
a higher need now to communicate to the audience.
Abstract (if available)
Abstract
The public relations discipline is one that is difficult to narrowly define. Through the years, professional associations and individual experts alike have proposed and continue to modify its meaning, tweaking it to align with progressive contexts. This rings even more true when the function of the discipline is considered within different political, socio-economic environments. While public relations in the United States has come a long way, it falls short in the implementation of established standards and best practices in third world countries. ❧ Using the United States and Nigeria as case studies, this paper will analyze the public relations practice and its nuances within specific political and socio-economic contexts. To relay a coherent narrative, it will draw examples from the entertainment industry as a very visible and attention-holding territory in which the discipline is practiced. ❧ Interjecting secondary research analysis with insights from in-depth interviews from industry professionals, the paper will examine the development of the public relations discipline historically, to explore industry milestones and the external forces that fostered them. ❧ Finally, the paper will suggest methods for public relations practitioners in developing countries such as Nigeria, to key into standards and best practices for the growth and development of the trade worldwide.
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Asset Metadata
Creator
Dieyi, Cynthia C.
(author)
Core Title
Trading places: an in-depth analysis of entertainment public relations practices within different socio-economic contexts
School
Annenberg School for Communication
Degree
Master of Arts
Degree Program
Strategic Public Relations
Publication Date
08/05/2015
Defense Date
08/05/2015
Publisher
University of Southern California
(original),
University of Southern California. Libraries
(digital)
Tag
best practices,digital media,Entertainment,Marketing,new media,Nigeria,North America,OAI-PMH Harvest,Public Relations,public relations best practices,Third World countries
Format
application/pdf
(imt)
Language
English
Contributor
Electronically uploaded by the author
(provenance)
Advisor
Floto, Jennifer D. (
committee chair
), Elzer, Steve (
committee member
), Friedman, Fritz (
committee member
), Swerling, Jerry (
committee member
)
Creator Email
cynthia.dieyi@gmail.com,dieyi@usc.edu
Permanent Link (DOI)
https://doi.org/10.25549/usctheses-c3-626579
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UC11306787
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etd-DieyiCynth-3807.pdf (filename),usctheses-c3-626579 (legacy record id)
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etd-DieyiCynth-3807.pdf
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626579
Document Type
Thesis
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Dieyi, Cynthia C.
Type
texts
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University of Southern California
(contributing entity),
University of Southern California Dissertations and Theses
(collection)
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The author retains rights to his/her dissertation, thesis or other graduate work according to U.S. copyright law. Electronic access is being provided by the USC Libraries in agreement with the a...
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Repository Location
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Tags
best practices
digital media
new media
public relations best practices
Third World countries