Dangote: Global Best Practice as Positioning Tool

Raheem Akingbolu reviews the Dangote brand and links its back to back clinching of the Africa’s Most Admired Brand award to the global best practice approach of the brand’s promoters.

In positioning and management, Dangote Industries Limited (DIL), has always made a brand statement that espouses its essence. Being a proactive brand with rich heritage, Dangote and its promoters have continued to ride on innovation and global best practice, to give patrons unique customer experience. This has, in return, reflected on its market acceptability and penetration. Like every good brand that understands the core message of positioning, Dangote truly understands the market and works daily on its competitive advantage.

All these were confirmed recently when the leading African brand was again recognised as the most Admired Brand in Africa for the year 2022. With it, the Dangote brand thus hit another milestone, by dint of hard work and an enviable, unceasing quest for excellence across its operations. This latest, historic triumph showcases what the brand is, what it’s all about, and underlines an unerring focus of a primus inter pares (first among equals) in business in Africa.

Basking in the admiration of many well-wishers, the Pan-African conglomerate has again emerged as the most Admired Brand in Africa for the year 2022, for its leadership position in driving quality brands across the continent.

In an unprecedented move, Dangote won awards in 8 different categories at the recent award presentation organised by Brand Africa, a renowned organisation, in Lagos. The other awards include: Most Admired Nigerian Brand, West Africa’s Most Admired Brand that symbolises African Pride; West Africa’s Most Admired African Brand, and Most Admired Nigerian Brand in Africa, among others.

To win a single award signifies quality of production; but to sweep eight awards at a go portrays a winning mentality of the organisation’s workforce and an enduring acceptance of its products and services by consumers, customers and even peers, to the chagrin of known and imagined rivals. All thanks to its top-notch personnel, who have scaled challenges and rode headwinds to make this success a reality.

Continental Status

In a recent issue of the Brand Africa 100: Africa’s Best Brands rankings, Dangote retained its status as the most admired African brand recalled spontaneously.

Group Chief Commercial Officer, Dangote Industries Limited, Rabiu Umar, who received the awards, commended Brand Africa for the initiative of building and promoting African brands. He expressed appreciation to the organisers and urged them not to relent in their efforts to see that brands from Africa compete favorably with foreign ones.

Umar said that Dangote has risen a notch higher as a global brand with the export of Dangote Fertiliser to many countries of the world. “People now identify with the brand and in all the countries where we operate, Dangote Cement has become a reference point,” he added.

Umar said, “To the management of DIL, the ranking was not unexpected, because the company has a long-standing reputation for quality, relevance, compliance and social stewardship. Our mission and vision engage and inspire us; and by extension connects us to both our internal and external stakeholders.

“We fervently believe that only Africans can develop Africa, and this gives us a stronger sense of relevance in all the countries where we have our operations. We are touching lives by providing their basic needs and empowering Africans more than ever before, creating jobs, reducing capital flight, and helping the government to conserve foreign exchange drain by supporting different industrial and infrastructural projects of African governments.”

External Accolades

Founder and Chairman of Brand Africa, Thebe Ikalafeng, stated that Dangote has remained a stalwart global African brand and symbolises African pride. He added that Dangote has also moved up a rank in the Top 100 most admired brands and retains its #1 Made-in-Nigeria brand rank.

Ikalafeng, giving an insight into the process of selecting the winners, said the rankings are based on a pan-African survey covering over 25 countries, which collectively account for an estimated over 85% of Africa’s population and 85 per cent of the continent’s GDP. 

According to him, “the research is conducted by GeoPoll, the world’s leading mobile surveying platform, with strategic analyses, insights and ranking conducted by Kantar, the world’s leading data, insights and consulting company and Brand Leadership Group, Africa’s foremost branding, strategic communications and intellectual property advisory firm.”

Enduring Ranking

Established in 2011, the Brand Africa 100: Africa’s Best Brands rankings are the most authoritative survey and analysis on brands and underlying businesses in Africa, based on a study by Geopoll across 29 countries spanning all the five economic regions. An analysis of the data over the past 10 years, has established that on average, slightly over 20% of the brands admired by Africans are made in Africa.

Brand Africa is an inter-generational movement to inspire a brand-led African renaissance to drive Africa’s competitiveness, connect Africa and create a positive image of the continent.

Recognising that while the rebound in African brands is notable, the results will not be sustainable without committed and inspirational leadership. In 2022, Brand Africa recognised those leaders who are the catalyst for growth for Made in Africa brands both in corporate and in those who have championed and supported the development of great local brands in supporting industries.

“As we emerge out of the pandemic and Africa seeks to assert itself, the results are very inspiring and bode well of an African renaissance led by competitive world class African brands,” says Thebe Ikalafeng, Founder and Chairman of Brand Africa and Brand Leadership.

“With increased number of countries and greater sample size this year, more than ever, and especially so during the pandemic, mobile proved to be the effective tool for us to reach and access respondents across the continent,” said Bernard Okasi, Director of Research, GeoPoll, which has been the lead data collection partner since 2015.

Karin Du Chenne, Chief Growth Officer Africa Middle East for Kantar, which has been the insight lead for Brand Africa since inception in 2010 says, “Despite volumes of brands analysed as a results of increased sample size in terms of respondents and countries, the survey continues to yield a very consistent picture of brands and trends that are transforming the continent.”

Now in its 12th year, every year on or around Africa Day, 25 May, Brand Africa releases the results of the survey on the most admired brands in Africa based on a survey across 29 countries that represent as much as 85% of the continent’s GDP and population. The 2022 survey was conducted between March and April 2022 and yielded over 80,000 brand mentions and over 3,500 unique brands.

The Brand Africa 100 results will be published in the June issue African Business magazine which is on sale globally in June 2022 and will be available online to subscribers.

The 2022 Brand Africa 100: Africa’s Best Brands were organised by Brand Africa partners in Nigeria, AT3 Resources and Open Squares Africa, and supported by the Central Bank of Nigeria, South African Tourism and NQR, Africa Media Agency and BCW Africa.

Sustainable Trend

The historic haul of the eight Brand Africa awards is worth celebrating in every sense of the word, and every staff of the Dangote Group should have a feeling of pride and a proper sense of belonging regarding this historic achievement.

These awards were won through the collective efforts of the Dangote staff across all levels, and they have set the tone for a sustainable tenure at the top in all the sectors where we play. With the renowned winning mentality of the President/CE and the can-do attitude of every internal stakeholder, this is surely not the last award for this Group. As this particular accolade recedes, other landmarks loom on the horizon. The record is not over yet.