Charles Imuzeze shares experiences as Permutation Media clocks 3
Mr. Charles Imuzeze, media marketing communication practitioner and CEO of Permutation Media Concepts Limited, has stated that the experience he has had in the last three years of being entrepreneur has been that of learning, relearning and unlearning.
He spoke exclusively to The Industry on the occasion of his agency, Permutation Media clocking 3 this month.
Charles said, “The experience is worth having so that one can really understand where employers of labour are situated. The experience has been more of learning and unlearning in diverse ways. In all, it is a venture worth taking. I put it this way “no retreat, no surrender”
According to him, “I love the concept of you personally responsible for the rise and fall of the business. So you take responsibility first for that without trying to push the ball to someone else.”
Highlighting some key accomplishments by the agency in 3 years, the media marketing communication practitioner stated that “When we started three years ago, we had focused on one thing, to grow bottom – up. We will not chase after the big clients but we will go to the silent ones and market ourselves to them,” he said.
In the very first year, he continued, “We achieved that. That was our entry mantra. We never went to the big corporations. Infact, it was a waste to us because we don’t have the muscle to carry them and we were not in highest to announce that we have arrived. We actually didn’t need to impress anybody. Just do the business, make the money and move on.
That perhaps was our key accomplishment, which we have actually sustained the company through the bottom-up strategy and also we were careful of carrying overheads that we make us to depend on others. So we were strategic in our location, in our entry and in our offering.”
On how the agency got its first brief and the client that first trusted him a brief, Charles said, “You know some people who know your capability will actually wish you are managing your own business. So, before I took my leave from my former agency, I had met with some people I regarded as my mentors. Therefore, when I left, my very first brief came from BERVIDSON GROUP -a leading retail and brand consulting, training & development group.”
They are the organizers of the annual Retail Leaders Conference. So, we managed all their media and we still do. Infact, our first cheque was from Bervidson and it was intentional. The CEO wanted to make history as the first person to give me a cheque in my new business. It works because I told him, I will always say it.
Then it followed by VIDORA, a luxury lifestyle brand. We were opportune to work for some agencies without a media arm,” he revealed.
On how the agency cope during pandemic, the CEO Permutation Media recalled, when the pandemic came, it really slowed them our speed of growth. Then we couldn’t go everywhere we wanted to be. People were reaching out to us and making enquiry on how we were struggling to stay afloat. However, I never panic because I was using a bottom-up model in my business.
The employees could manage with the little we had. Infact, the favour we had was that one of our big clients just made total payment on a campaign and so, we had to make sure we pay the media houses and manage what we have as ours. And we did.
So, the pressure of the pandemic affected our market drive but never was there the option if I have not made a wrong decision.
Charles described 2021 business year as the year of waking up. The business environment was getting over the noise of covid and was now able to adjust to it and still conduct its business. However, for us at Permutation Media Network, we ended the year better than we did in 2020.
When he was asked to forecast the 2022 in terms of imc spend and earn, he said,” Covid has made nonsense of forecast. I just work as I go and see where I am at every month. But 2022 will definitely be better than 2021 because it is pre-election year, and that will increase political activities in the media. The politicians will look for every opportunity to be heard, read and seen and that’s where we come in.
We will continue our bottom-up strategy, look for the low hanging fruits and move, he concluded.
