Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / Gamifying Sales: A Nigerian Perspective

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Gamifying Sales: A Nigerian Perspective · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome to the show. Before we begin, the usual
• 0:04
  apologies. The kids are home, so I expect
• 0:07
  to hear some noise in the background.
• 0:09
  Also, if listening to the last episode made you feel
• 0:11
  claustrophobic, sorry about that.
• 0:15
  That was because well, of course, like I explained in the
• 0:18
  video, I what I thought was a sore throat actually turned out
• 0:23
  to be something else. And so I, I had difficulties
• 0:29
  with, yeah, let's just say I had a hard time breathing.
• 0:32
  But The thing is I'm responding to medication.
• 0:34
  So I'm feeling a whole lot better today.
• 0:36
  So let's just get on with the with the show.
• 0:40
  And today we're going to talk about how gamification can help
• 0:44
  to boost sales performance. I know some of you might think
• 0:48
  gamification. What is this again?
• 0:50
  I mean, those of you who are tech savvy, you already know
• 0:52
  what that means. But before we go into it, let me
• 0:55
  go straight into the Geek Challenge or the Nerd Challenge.
• 0:58
  I've been sharing stuff that's on my playlist so that you guys
• 1:01
  can help me decide whether I'm a geek or a nerd, like my wife
• 1:04
  says, or whether I'm just a gentleman with fine taste, as I
• 1:07
  like to put it. So today on the playlist, I am
• 1:10
  listening to The Searchers on Spotify.
• 1:14
  They're a really old band. They're contemporaries of The
• 1:17
  Beatles. So if you don't know, you
• 1:21
  haven't heard of the band The Beatles.
• 1:23
  It just means you're an embryo basically.
• 1:25
  It means you were born after, I don't know, 2000 or something,
• 1:30
  but everybody should have heard of The Beatles by now.
• 1:33
  So there are a band based out of Liverpool and had some really
• 1:37
  classic stuff like a song called Love potion #9.
• 1:42
  And I would not recommend any of you guys listening to this
• 1:45
  podcast right now to try looking for any kind of love potions in
• 1:49
  case you're having any problems with the ladies.
• 1:52
  Because if you've been watching Yoruba movies, you will find
• 1:54
  that love potions always seem to have some complications and end
• 1:58
  up backfiring. So if you toss the baby and she
• 2:01
  no agree, just let it go. Don't bother checking the love
• 2:05
  potion. And then the searchers were also
• 2:07
  responsible for this really classic old song.
• 2:13
  If you haven't heard of it, ask your parents.
• 2:15
  Your parents definitely know this song.
• 2:17
  If you don't know it, you've most likely heard of the the
• 2:23
  version that was done by I think was Shabba.
• 2:26
  Is it Shabba Ranks? ABI Shabba Ranks something and
• 2:30
  the pliers I can't remember. Maybe Shabba Ranks.
• 2:32
  But and song is sweet for my sweet and is that one that goes
• 2:38
  sweet for my sweet, sugar for my honey let you go boom boom boom
• 2:46
  boom. So anyway, just good nice old
• 2:48
  time groups. Then on Netflix, on the playlist
• 2:51
  I have, I'm currently watching Res Ball.
• 2:54
  I'm not done with that yet. It's a movie about it's a movie.
• 3:00
  It's a movie about reservation culture.
• 3:02
  When we say reservation, I mean Indian reservations.
• 3:05
  That's indigenous tribes in Northern America.
• 3:10
  And I've always found movies like this interesting because
• 3:13
  I'm TV, I'm from the North Central part, as people call it
• 3:16
  nowadays. But when I was a kid, we used to
• 3:18
  call it the Middle belt. So I found the middle part,
• 3:20
  middle belt part of the world where we're juggling with
• 3:24
  problems like rural, urban migration, poverty, you know,
• 3:27
  things like that. And of course all those things
• 3:29
  have implications on family life, drug culture, you know,
• 3:33
  these sorts of things. And I saw a bit of that when I
• 3:35
  travelled to Scotland as well. I was really surprised to see
• 3:39
  that in the West that they have the same sorts of problems that
• 3:41
  we have over here in Nigeria. So movies like this that explore
• 3:46
  these sorts of issues, they, I find them intriguing, but Res
• 3:51
  Ball is about basketball ultimately.
• 3:53
  So if you like the sport basketball, then you should
• 3:55
  watch Res Ball. So that's it for today on the
• 3:57
  Geek Challenge. So have a look at stuff on my
• 4:00
  playlist. Let me know what you think.
• 4:02
  So far one person has voted and said that they think I'm a geek.
• 4:05
  So I've let my wife know that one person agrees with her.
• 4:09
  Now let's move on. Today we're going to look at how
• 4:13
  gamification can help boost sales performance.
• 4:16
  Now, the rationale behind gamification is this.
• 4:20
  If you make things fun, then you have less barriers to learning
• 4:24
  because trying to learn in the classroom environment, people
• 4:26
  are tired, people are bored, excuse me, everything comes
• 4:30
  across as stiff. And then sometimes when you
• 4:37
  include games and fun into the whole thing, it makes things
• 4:40
  more application based. So you know, people are actually
• 4:43
  trying out, people are practising what it is that
• 4:45
  you're preaching. And so it makes it greater for
• 4:48
  people to make for greater retention and then for more
• 4:52
  participation. And I can tell you that for a
• 4:54
  fact because as someone who handles coaching and training
• 4:57
  sessions, I can tell you that if it's a stiff lecture, you're not
• 5:01
  going to get too many people bought in.
• 5:02
  But if you know how to get people engaged and introduce
• 5:06
  some fun and game elements to it, then you increase the number
• 5:09
  of people who are going to take part in until the end of the
• 5:11
  day. So of course we should define
• 5:13
  what gamification is. And so excuse me, so I like the
• 5:20
  name sounds. Gamification basically is just
• 5:22
  adding game elements to work. Game elements, fun elements.
• 5:28
  And how is something like that supposed to help sales?
• 5:30
  That's supposed to help in different ways.
• 5:32
  Gamification increases the motivation of people because
• 5:35
  everybody wants to get in on the game.
• 5:37
  It increases engagement because, you know, more people want to
• 5:42
  take part. So if you try game elements and
• 5:45
  let's say normally in your sales meetings, maybe Kuli is the only
• 5:48
  person. And let's say Kuli and Kemi are
• 5:49
  the only people who keep talking at the meetings.
• 5:52
  But then you introduce some game elements and Kuli and Kemi look
• 5:54
  like they're having fun, then maybe Abdul Kadir might try and
• 5:58
  maybe Fatima might try. And then, you know, maybe, OK,
• 6:01
  Chuku might try. And you know, that's, that's the
• 6:03
  whole idea. And like I said, greater
• 6:06
  learning. But ultimately the main reason
• 6:08
  why you should try gamification to get your sales people to sell
• 6:12
  more, that's for those of you who are business owners, The
• 6:15
  main reason why you should do it ultimately is because you want
• 6:18
  the improved customer experience.
• 6:20
  Because if you throw gamification into the mix,
• 6:23
  everybody's having fun, everybody's catching trips,
• 6:26
  everybody feels like they're just flexing.
• 6:28
  Everybody's feeling all right. But in that atmosphere,
• 6:31
  everybody is learning. Then the benefits translate to
• 6:35
  your end customers because your sales people will now be on
• 6:40
  point, personable, efficient, professional, take initiative,
• 6:48
  guide the sales process. And these are all things that
• 6:51
  the customer is going to improve greatly from at the end of the
• 6:53
  day, because they won't just call in and then your staff
• 6:57
  members just handle their massive, you know how, you know,
• 7:00
  like that whole civil servant thing, you don't like when you
• 7:02
  really, really need something. I mean, God forbid you need
• 7:05
  something from the Ministry of Justice and you have to go and
• 7:07
  see one of the registrars, especially if it's like
• 7:10
  registering. And then they will not call out
• 7:12
  any particular branch. But I mean, for those who also
• 7:15
  have to go to the civil service, Nigerian civil service because
• 7:19
  we need something, it's, it's torture, absolute torture,
• 7:23
  especially if you go when it's time for prayers.
• 7:25
  I mean, you're on your own. So yeah, ultimately that's why
• 7:29
  we should try gamification because it's going to lead to
• 7:31
  improved customer experience and improved customer experience
• 7:36
  means more money. If your customers are better
• 7:38
  taken care of, they're going to return.
• 7:41
  So there's repeat business, there's referrals, greater
• 7:45
  customer maximizing customer lifetime value.
• 7:49
  Let's see what else. It just means good business,
• 7:53
  more money. So how can you add game elements
• 7:58
  gamification to your sales team? That's very simple.
• 8:03
  There are lots of intra team sales activities that you can
• 8:06
  do, like sales contests. It's something that I've seen
• 8:10
  some people do before. You have a sales team, maybe
• 8:12
  it's eight people, divide them into team A and then team B.
• 8:16
  And the whole idea is from January, February, we see which
• 8:20
  team is going to make some more money during the sales or
• 8:26
  bonanza period or whatever, and the winning team is going to get
• 8:30
  a price or something like that. So you can see you've thrown in
• 8:33
  a contest element to the whole thing.
• 8:37
  And that is something that can, you know, motivate, get more
• 8:40
  people involved. Now there are some real fancy
• 8:45
  ways that have come up in the West, like where people try and
• 8:48
  gamify the CRM. Now, the CRM is a customer
• 8:51
  relationship management tool. Yeah, big words.
• 8:55
  But basically what that means is it's just a tool that helps you,
• 8:58
  the salesperson or the business owner, figure out who are you
• 9:01
  talking to right now, What stage of the relationship are you in?
• 9:07
  Is there anything outstanding that you have to do for this
• 9:09
  potential customer? Is there anything that has
• 9:11
  potential clients, is owing you? What are the relevant next steps
• 9:15
  that you need to take to make sure you close the deal?
• 9:18
  So the CRM basically is just the brain that doesn't live in your
• 9:22
  head that tells you at all times who are you talking to, what is
• 9:28
  the next step you need to take with each person so that you can
• 9:31
  close the deal. So in the West, that's our our
• 9:35
  brothers and sisters in America and in Western Europe, they now
• 9:39
  gamify the CRM. So the CRM is tracking, awarding
• 9:43
  people points, you know, things like that.
• 9:45
  So it's just a way of spicing things up so you can look at the
• 9:50
  CRM and see who has more points and you know, what do you call
• 9:56
  that thing? You know, like when you have a
• 9:57
  slider and The thing is sliding from the left to the right and
• 10:00
  if you hit a certain stage and it gives you a star and then all
• 10:03
  those fancy things. So those are stuff that I've
• 10:05
  heard about that go on. Currently in the West, I have
• 10:08
  not seen and I have not taken part in any of the more fancy
• 10:14
  gamification kind of stuff in Nigeria over here.
• 10:17
  So if you're listening to this and your organization, you're in
• 10:20
  Nigeria and your organization does this gamifies through CRM,
• 10:24
  please hit me up. Let me know.
• 10:26
  I always give my contact details at the end of the show.
• 10:29
  Let me know so I can come and share it over here on the
• 10:31
  podcast so we can learn and see how other Nigerian organisations
• 10:35
  are gamifying things using the CRM.
• 10:38
  Then one that I do all the time is role-playing or simulations,
• 10:43
  and that is how I get people involved a lot of the time.
• 10:46
  So we could be discussing a particular thing, maybe about
• 10:49
  how to handle objections or like a training during a training
• 10:52
  that I gave today. Well, luckily during the
• 10:56
  training they had a microphone because with my breathing
• 10:59
  issues, it would have been very difficult, you know, to stand,
• 11:02
  walk left, right. And you know what, I've been out
• 11:04
  of breath quite easily. And luckily it was a small
• 11:07
  gathering, just about 70 people. So role-playing, that's how I
• 11:11
  got some people involved. So I called the customer service
• 11:15
  gal, the lady, and I was like, OK, in X&X&Y situations, how do
• 11:21
  you handle that sort of thing? And she said, and then her line
• 11:24
  manager was there and line manager said, wait to say that
• 11:28
  again. The person said it, line manager
• 11:30
  had one or two things to contribute, supervisor also had
• 11:33
  something to contribute another person.
• 11:35
  And we were all just freestyling one scenario and basically we
• 11:39
  were trying to figure out what is the optimal process for
• 11:41
  trying to resolve certain kinds of disputes with customers.
• 11:46
  And so by role-playing, coming up with something on the spot
• 11:50
  saying that look, I'm the angry customer, I'm on the phone,
• 11:52
  ring, ring, I call you, I abuse you, I cuss you out, blah, blah,
• 11:55
  blah. This is the problem.
• 11:57
  How do you handle it? So by gamifying that, we got
• 12:02
  lots of other people involved and we got people engaged.
• 12:06
  You know, it's not the same thing as me standing up in front
• 12:08
  of a training room, a conference room, and saying that, look,
• 12:11
  this is how we handle angry customers.
• 12:13
  Option A, do this. Option B, do this.
• 12:16
  Option C and do that. So if you stand in front of a
• 12:19
  classroom and say ABC, then yeah, people will listen.
• 12:21
  Some people will take notes, some people will nod, and some
• 12:23
  people will be sleeping. But if you turn anything to
• 12:26
  drama and say, look, I'm going to be an angry customer, I'm
• 12:29
  going to call right now. I'll pick you at random, I'll
• 12:33
  call and we're going to have this conversation.
• 12:35
  I'm the angry customer. I'm going to cuss you out.
• 12:37
  I abuse your life, I abuse your father, I abuse the business.
• 12:41
  How are you going to calm me down, figure out what the
• 12:43
  problem is and how are we going to resolve the situation?
• 12:46
  So by throwing element of drama into it, you get lots of people
• 12:49
  involved. And yeah, so this one can be
• 12:52
  done very, very easily. In fact, you don't have to be
• 12:56
  missile trainer to do this. You, the business owner, you can
• 12:59
  do this one all the time. Just role play from your
• 13:02
  experience, you've handled angry customers before.
• 13:04
  You've handled the situation before, you've handled that
• 13:06
  situation before. So your Monday meetings or your
• 13:09
  Friday meetings, you know, call everybody together and say,
• 13:12
  look, today we're going to do role-playing.
• 13:14
  This is the role, I am this. How are you going to handle
• 13:17
  that? Then there's sales pitch
• 13:21
  competitions. I've seen that being used back
• 13:25
  when I was selling insurance and financial products to something
• 13:28
  that agency head did once. So this is a pitch, this is a
• 13:33
  competition about this particular product.
• 13:36
  So you come and speak, the person who wins is going to be
• 13:39
  given, she said, recharge card. That's what the agency leader
• 13:43
  said. And I thought she was going to
• 13:44
  say recharge card like 20 K, you know, like to motivate people.
• 13:48
  I don't believe Madam said was recharge card that he said was
• 13:50
  500 naira. And in my mind, I'm thinking
• 13:52
  like Madam, come on, they're trying to motivate people.
• 13:55
  How do you motivate fully grown guys and women with 500 naira?
• 14:01
  If you're going to give somebody recharge card because they won
• 14:03
  the competition, make it 20K30K50K.
• 14:06
  Now you motivate people. So please, business owners,
• 14:10
  agency owners, don't say that you want to motivate people and
• 14:14
  you do a competition and then the prize is 500 recharge card.
• 14:17
  That is absolutely ridiculous. So let's see what else.
• 14:25
  So leaderboards, not something that people do in some
• 14:27
  organisations. So there's a board there and it
• 14:31
  shows. This person is on top.
• 14:32
  He has closed 20 deals. This person is next has closed
• 14:35
  12 deals. This person is next has closed 5
• 14:38
  deals or whatever. Sometimes people do it based on
• 14:41
  money. So number one you have Rosalynn,
• 14:45
  and Rosalynn has brought in maybe 2M in profits.
• 14:49
  And then next is Abdul. Abdul has brought maybe 1.6.
• 14:52
  And then maybe next is Chiniery, and Chiniery has brought 500
• 14:56
  game or something like that. So that's a leaderboard.
• 14:58
  That's the whole idea. And then there's also awards or
• 15:03
  trophies given for performance. There's some people that do
• 15:06
  trivia contests like today we're going to handle objection.
• 15:10
  We're going to do a trivia or a contest on handling objections
• 15:14
  and the price is going to go for the person who can give me the
• 15:16
  most number of ways to handle money objections.
• 15:20
  So if you call and the customer says no thank you, I'm not
• 15:24
  interested because people are too expensive, how do you handle
• 15:27
  that objection? Go give me three options, you
• 15:30
  know, that sort of thing. And then whoever gives the right
• 15:36
  number of answers or the highest number of answers gets to win
• 15:40
  the competition. So all those sorts of things.
• 15:46
  But I hope you guys are catching my drift.
• 15:47
  You can see that there are lots of things that can be done to
• 15:51
  Gamify sales performance, sales training, sales learning, and it
• 15:57
  doesn't have to be anything fancy.
• 15:58
  So if you have those fancy Gamify CRM things like I said,
• 16:04
  if you're in Niger and your organization is using that,
• 16:06
  please hit me up. Let me share it over here on the
• 16:07
  podcast. To be frank, the people that
• 16:11
  hang around, I'm not sure if guys are going to fall for that
• 16:13
  thing, you know, so you give me a couple of stars on on the CRM
• 16:20
  and so, you know, am I in nursery school?
• 16:22
  Are you going to give me a star for doing my homework?
• 16:25
  You know, that's my guess. But if you do it in your
• 16:27
  organization and it works, then please let me know.
• 16:31
  So if you're willing to give this a try in your organization,
• 16:34
  like I said, you don't need to bring in a sales trainer.
• 16:36
  You don't need to be a fancy sales coach, business
• 16:40
  consultant, nothing like that. You can do this yourself based
• 16:44
  on your own experience running the business.
• 16:47
  And sometimes you business owners discount the level of
• 16:50
  experience that you have. Let me give examples.
• 16:55
  Well, these individuals did not discount the amount of
• 16:58
  experience that they have, but this year I've worked with
• 17:04
  that's in the in Q3 and four of this year I've worked with
• 17:08
  someone who has had 17 years of experience, alternative energy
• 17:13
  space, 13 years experience leather in the leather working
• 17:20
  space. Let's see what else I think for
• 17:23
  this year. That's the largest that I've
• 17:25
  that I've done. That's the largest years of
• 17:27
  experience that people have been in the business.
• 17:31
  And so let's face it, even if you didn't go to school to learn
• 17:35
  biz admin or you didn't go to, you didn't take a fancy coaching
• 17:39
  program to learn sales, know how know how over that 17 years you
• 17:44
  have learned some good stuff. Over that 13 years, those 20
• 17:47
  years you have learned some good stuff and you have wisdom to
• 17:50
  impart. So please, by all means, every
• 17:53
  Monday call your sales people, sit them down.
• 17:56
  Who every Friday, who every two weeks?
• 17:59
  If it's once a month, once a month is too is too far.
• 18:04
  Make this weekly if you can. Of course, everybody's busy.
• 18:08
  You have to travel, you have to work.
• 18:10
  I understand. So maybe bi weekly.
• 18:13
  If it is monthly, that's too sparse, too wide.
• 18:16
  And then you can introduce these elements and you're going to be
• 18:21
  able to impart your wisdom, your knowledge, your business acumen
• 18:26
  to your employees, your salespeople, other people within
• 18:31
  the organization in a very fun way that people can take on
• 18:35
  board and that people can learn from.
• 18:38
  And trust me, believe me, it's a lot better to do this than to do
• 18:42
  what the average Nigerian employer does, which is call
• 18:45
  everybody on Monday morning, 8:00 and then abuse the hell out
• 18:51
  of everybody. Now, what are you guys doing?
• 18:55
  You are not professional, you are not this, you are not that
• 18:58
  and just abuse, abuse, abuse and berate, berate, berate everybody
• 19:03
  up and down. Now there's a time that is
• 19:08
  needed for you to call everybody and tongue lash them.
• 19:11
  You know, if it's a sinking ship, then by all means tongue
• 19:13
  lash everybody and try and whip people in the shape, but just
• 19:16
  mix it up. My sister, when she was in, when
• 19:19
  my sister worked in banking, she would talk about the Monday
• 19:26
  she's called the Monday abuse meetings.
• 19:27
  I think it was Monday abuse meetings or something.
• 19:30
  I was at the particular bank. But anyway, that's how their
• 19:32
  manager used to run things. So basically call everybody on
• 19:34
  Monday morning and then abuse the hell out of everyone and
• 19:37
  then pick the worst performing person and abuse the hell out of
• 19:40
  that person. You know, those are not very
• 19:43
  effective ways of getting the best out of people.
• 19:46
  So it might be warranted once in a while.
• 19:50
  By the way, if you're listening to this podcast in the West, if
• 19:53
  you're listening to this in America or if listening to this
• 19:55
  in the UK, do not try this or you will run into trouble.
• 19:59
  People will report you to who, they report you to any of the
• 20:04
  government regulatory agencies that are responsible for these
• 20:06
  sorts of things. So if you try this in the West
• 20:07
  or you try this, if you try this in America or in the UK, don't
• 20:10
  be surprised if you end up behind bars.
• 20:12
  But in Nigeria, that kind of behaviour unfortunately is still
• 20:16
  tolerated for now. So.
• 20:20
  Round your people up. You'd have to be a sales
• 20:22
  trainer. Give me 5.
• 20:23
  Impart the level of wisdom and knowledge that you have so that
• 20:27
  everybody can move the business forward so that we can all make
• 20:30
  greater profits. So you can put more money in
• 20:32
  your pocket and you can send your kids to fancy schools and
• 20:34
  you can increase the salary of your sales staff and everybody
• 20:38
  within the business. So thank you very much for your
• 20:40
  time and attention today. Let's see, what else?
• 20:45
  Oh, yeah. Connect with me on WhatsApp.
• 20:47
  The phone number is 080 64662140.
• 20:52
  The country code is +234. For those of you who are not
• 20:55
  Nigerian, then also connect with me on LinkedIn.
• 20:58
  My name is Tavishima Ayede, you can confirm the spending of my
• 21:01
  name from the link. We're listening to this episode
• 21:04
  so highlight and copy paste on LinkedIn.
• 21:06
  My handsome face pops up. Then connect with me.
• 21:09
  You have questions, queries, comments, tips, insights,
• 21:13
  whatever it is, just connect with me and I'll be in touch
• 21:17
  with you. 24 hours Max 48 hours. I respond to everyone for now
• 21:23
  until I become a bona fide big boy and I'm in super high
• 21:27
  demand. And yeah, then I won't respond
• 21:29
  to all you ordinary people. So by the way, I'm joking in
• 21:36
  case you can't tell. So that's it.
• 21:38
  Thanks for your time and attention.
• 21:39
  I'll catch you guys at the next episode.