Tonto Dike, a Nollywood actress turned musician is generally percieved by Nigerians as arrogant and annoying. It seems Nigerians will have to add influential and smart to their list of adjectives to describe her due to her recent brilliant publicity stunt. In the last 48 hours, since the release of her single "hi" from her album titled "itz Ova" on Wednesday 17th October, she's been the hot trending topic on various Social Media platforms and for good reason too. Jokes and insults about the song have been exchanged from descriptions of her song sounding like the "screen muncher" blackberry application to listners begging for therapy and even death. Despite these strong reactions, there's no doubt that Tonto Dike is about to make some serious cash. Here are a few reasons why I think Tonto Dike is a PR genius;
Tonto Dike is smart enough to know that there is a market for music that is on the terrible and humorous side. Afterall she is not the first Nigerian artist to market 'wack' music – Vic O who incidentally is Tonto's friend and mentor - is a veteran when it comes to releasing wack music and making easy money from it. Vic O paved the way for Tonto Dike to turn a potentially terrible music venture into a money spinner.
The song itself is a masterpiece when it comes to the hall of 'utter rubbish' fame. The lyrics are disgraceful, the melody is very poor and the vocals are horrible. Obviously, Tonto Dike doesn't give a hoot what people say or think of it. Why should she? When she knows most people are having a good laugh. No she understands her game with the cold rationale of a gambler.
Before releasing her collection of 'wack' songs, Tonto had about 92,000 followers on Twitter. Guess what happened in less than 48 hours? She now has over 98,000 followers and more are joining her.
Before releasing her music Tonto would spit fire for fire to anyone who insulted her on Twitter. Now she gladly re-tweets every insult or mention directed at her Twitter handle @Tontolet. So what does this mean for Tonto's career? Will she be smiling to the bank with her now bankable Twitter following or is she just living out her five minutes of fame that will soon fade?
The answers to these questions can only be revealed in time. But what is certain is the more people talk about her on Twitter, the more her handle is seen and the more people will follow, mention and favorite things about her. Tonto Dike is simply a Twitter demi-god in the making and a potential mega brand ambassador. Being an 'influencer' on Twitter is very lucrative as big brands are willing to pay you money to tweet promotional stuff about them. Ask our very own Japheth Omojuwa, a popular political blogger who charges N10,000 per tweet because of his 40,000 strong following.
Celebrities court controversy for different reasons. In this case, it seems the reason is to grow a strong and influential brand name that can create an income. Despite the controversy and insults towards this young lady, one things for sure, she is hot right now.
Source: http://www.abujafood.com/lifestyle/music-a-entertainment/962-tonto-dikes-money-spinning-publicity-stunt-.html
