By Malika Bouayad, Group Account Director, Public Relations & Strategic Communications, APO Group (https://APO-opa.com)

Online press conferences – or OPCs — have become routine across Africa. Governments, multinationals, DFIs, and listed companies use them to deliver speed, access and reach across markets.

What has changed is not their prevalence but their function.

Today, an OPC is less a platform for information-sharing than a live test of institutional confidence – conducted in public, under pressure, and judged less on what is said than on how an organisation behaves when control loosens.

What journalists are really watching

Journalists don't join OPCs simply to hear prepared remarks. They attend to observe how an organisation responds when questioning escalates.

They notice hesitation.
They track how follow-ups are handled or deferred.
They assess whether responses feel coordinated or internally negotiated.

These signals shape how reporting unfolds long after the session ends. Organisations that appear coherent and assured are treated differently from those that appear cautious, fragmented or defensive.

This scrutiny is particularly pronounced in multi-market African contexts, where regulatory pressure, political sensitivity and uneven access to information intersect. A question that appears technical may carry implications across jurisdictions. A pause intended to be responsible can be read as evasion.

Once the OPC begins, there’s no private margin for error.

Why OPCs expose more than messaging

Most OPC failures are not technical. The platform works. The speakers arrive. The agenda is followed. What falters is decision confidence.

OPCs surface assumptions organisations often make about access, responsibility and escalation – assumptions that may hold internally but unravel in live environments.

Who’s authorised to answer follow-up questions if new information emerges?
Who decides whether a line of questioning should be closed or pursued?
Who has the mandate to intervene if legal, reputational and operational priorities collide?

Too often, these decisions are assumed rather than designed, and the gap becomes visible quickly.

OPCs sit on the critical path of reputation

OPCs are not neutral containers. They're live by default; attended by journalists publishing in real time; recorded, clipped and redistributed immediately; and accessed across borders, time zones and editorial contexts. This means design choices become reputational choices.

An OPC that appears controlled but inflexible raises different concerns from one that appears responsive but disorganised. In both cases, journalists draw conclusions not only about the issue at hand, but about the institution behind it.

This is why, in practice, OPCs demand far more than technical execution. They require governance, media judgement, and active stewardship of how information moves across markets.

Five judgements that separate stable OPCs from fragile ones

This isn't about tools or formats. It's about governance under pressure.

1. Access must be designed, not assumed
Open access is not inherently inclusive. Controlled registration protects the integrity of the briefing without limiting legitimate media participation.

2. Responsibility must be explicit
An OPC is not one task. Moderation, access control, technical oversight and decision authority must be clearly owned. When roles blur, response slows precisely when speed matters.

3. Preparation is about failure, not polish
Dry runs expose handover gaps, translation delays, escalation blind spots and decision bottlenecks. In pan-regional OPCs, preparation is risk mitigation.

4. Escalation must be agreed before it’s needed
Live environments do not allow for internal debate. Effective OPCs define in advance who can intervene, pause proceedings or redirect if the briefing is compromised.

5. Distribution is part of the event
An OPC disconnected from press release publishing, newsroom access and post-event assets fragments interpretation and weakens impact.

Beyond rehearsals: why design drills matter

Among the organisations APO Group consults with, the most effective OPCs are marked by a shift away from traditional rehearsals and towards design drills.

Rehearsals focus on logistics: speakers, timing, slides and links. Design drills focus on decision authority. In practice, this means stress-testing realistic scenarios where information is incomplete, questions escalate unexpectedly, or legal, reputational and operational priorities collide. The aim is to identify where authority is unclear – before that uncertainty plays out in public.

This approach builds institutional confidence, not just presentational polish.

Pan-African OPCs in practice

APO Group’s OPC work creates the unmatched opportunity to assemble key journalists from across the continent in one setting. Spanning the full lifecycle of a virtual media event, our team develops the brief, secures panellists, manages registrations, coordinates media outreach across markets, and runs the live technical environment – including moderation, Q&A management, and recording.

The differentiator is how these elements are orchestrated to protect credibility under scrutiny.

In Somalia, for example, APO Group supported TikTok’s #SaferTogether digital safety campaign by mapping a high-risk media landscape, working with the Somalia Journalists Association, managing live Q&A, and supporting post-event coverage – resulting in strong qualitative engagement and sustained media dialogue.

In West Africa, a bilingual OPC for Nestlé Maggi combined English and French media participation, same-day execution, and integrated post-event distribution to drive both visibility and measurable commercial outcomes across multiple markets.

In Guinea, OPC activity formed part of a broader launch strategy for Mercy Ships’ dental education initiative, combining live and on-ground media engagement to position the programme as a regional healthcare milestone.

Across these contexts, the common factor is discipline: how access is controlled, how authority is exercised, and how narratives are guided once the session ends.

What strong organisations are doing differently in 2026

OPCs will continue to grow because they solve a real operational problem: speed, access and scale across markets. But the organisations getting real value from them are treating OPCs less like isolated events and more like repeatable systems.

They design the briefing for the way journalism actually works – anticipating what will be quoted, clipped, shared and reframed across markets before the first question is asked.

They also plan for what happens after the session ends: coordinated press release publishing, newsroom-ready assets, rapid turnaround of quotes and cut-downs, and distribution pathways that reduce fragmentation and prevent parallel narratives from forming.

This is the shift that matters.

An OPC that runs smoothly in the room but produces confusion in the replay is not a briefing. It is a missed opportunity.