Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / The Sales-Branding Connection: How Customer Focus Shapes Your Brand Identity

Transcript

The Sales-Branding Connection: How Customer Focus Shapes Your Brand Identity · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome to the show. If
• 0:03
  you've been enjoying our relationship so far, if
• 0:06
  you've been enjoying the episodes, then when you're
• 0:08
  done listening to this one, please leave a rating and
• 0:11
  a review. Okay, apologies, today's an out
• 0:15
  and about recording, so expect to hear the usual
• 0:18
  interruptions. Although today I don't think I'm
• 0:20
  close to any chickens, so we shouldn't get any
• 0:23
  interruptions from chickens. So
• 0:27
  today we're going to look at building a powerful
• 0:29
  personal brand. But before we do that, I'd
• 0:32
  like to talk about something that has come up
• 0:34
  in the news, or at least the kind of news that I
• 0:37
  follow. There's a podcast that I listened
• 0:39
  to called Tech Point, Tech Point Africa podcast. I
• 0:43
  think that's the name, Tech Point Africa podcast. But
• 0:47
  they usually have Tech Point in all their
• 0:48
  branding, so if you just take your podcast player
• 0:51
  and type in Tech Point Africa, Nigeria, something
• 0:54
  like that, they should show up. And
• 0:56
  in that news, they spoke about a Kenyan company that
• 1:01
  is a FinTech, that just raised funding for their
• 1:03
  series B, and they're able to raise $20 million. Now
• 1:07
  the reason why I'm bringing this up today is just to
• 1:10
  let you guys know that a lot of the stuff that we
• 1:12
  talk about here on the podcast is not just
• 1:14
  theoretical. It's highly practical, it's real
• 1:16
  world, it's stuff that is going on. So
• 1:18
  when I'm making the podcast episode about how to sell
• 1:22
  your FinTech ideas in Nigeria, it's not because
• 1:24
  I'm trying to be high for lootin'. It's
• 1:26
  just that this is stuff that is going on right
• 1:29
  now, so people are actually doing that. So
• 1:31
  you have bright young boys and girls in Nigeria and
• 1:33
  in Kenya, coming up with interesting FinTech ideas
• 1:39
  and raising good funding for it. Because
• 1:43
  $20 million, it might not be much in terms of
• 1:46
  dollars, but by the time you come back home to the
• 1:48
  African continent, exchange rates, you multiply that,
• 1:51
  and it's quite a good chunk of change to start
• 1:56
  your business idea. Now the company in question, I
• 1:59
  didn't note down the name because I was doing my
• 2:01
  usual. When I'm listening to podcasts,
• 2:03
  I'm just out and about driving. Oh
• 2:06
  by the way, when I'm listening to my podcast and
• 2:08
  I'm driving, I'm not using headphones, so don't do
• 2:11
  anything silly. I'm using Bluetooth through the
• 2:14
  car speakers and then going for a stroll, stuff like
• 2:18
  that, so I didn't write down the name of the
• 2:19
  company. But I do remember that the
• 2:22
  problem that they're trying to solve, that's the Kenyan
• 2:25
  company, is they're trying to make insurance accessible
• 2:28
  to low income farmers. Because
• 2:30
  we don't have a culture of insurance in Nigeria and
• 2:32
  apparently we don't have a culture of insurance in
• 2:34
  Kenya either. And with the kind of losses
• 2:37
  that low income farmers face, okay let's bring it
• 2:41
  back to Nigeria, you know, banditry, full -on -e issues,
• 2:44
  you know, they come and destroy your farm crop.
• 2:48
  What else? You
• 2:49
  know, you get the whole idea. Oh
• 2:51
  and then climate change, changing weather, you know,
• 2:53
  all those sorts of things. So
• 2:55
  the losses that the low income farmers are making
• 2:59
  is quite high and then there's nobody in the
• 3:02
  space, whether it's a government or private
• 3:04
  actors, that are making good on these losses. So
• 3:07
  that is what this fintech, there's a problem that this
• 3:10
  fintech is trying to solve. Now
• 3:11
  they mentioned on the podcast, you know, which is
• 3:13
  quite true that in this part of the world, you
• 3:16
  know, we don't send insurance, you know, God is
• 3:17
  in control of everything and I'll sort myself out
• 3:19
  if anything happens. So if you go and tell low
• 3:23
  income farmers that hey buy our insurance product and
• 3:25
  then people are just going to laugh at you. Because
• 3:27
  well first off, what are you saying? What
• 3:29
  is insurance? So what this fintech did was
• 3:33
  they partnered with banks in Kenya and with
• 3:36
  government agencies so that the insurance premiums, you
• 3:39
  know, the monies that would be paid and all what not
• 3:41
  are priced into seedling price, fertilizer, you know,
• 3:45
  things of that nature. Now because I'm not in that
• 3:47
  space, I'm not an agric person, I don't know the
• 3:50
  details of how this sort of thing works, but I just
• 3:52
  wanted you guys to see that the things that we're
• 3:54
  talking about here are live and practical. And
• 3:57
  one of the recommendations that I gave in the
• 4:00
  episodes where I spoke about selling your fintech
• 4:02
  ideas in Nigeria, you know, I did talk about how you
• 4:05
  should partner with local agencies because it gives
• 4:07
  you access to other stakeholders and a wider
• 4:11
  customer base. So you can see that people
• 4:15
  are carrying out these ideas live. So
• 4:18
  these young boys and girls in Kenya, oh and by the
• 4:20
  way, the reason why Tech Point was talking about it,
• 4:23
  Tech Point Nigeria was talking about it was
• 4:24
  because they also plan to do operations in Nigeria as
• 4:27
  well to get low income farmers on insurance
• 4:32
  products. Yeah, okay, yeah, so one of the
• 4:37
  things I spoke about is how you could partner with
• 4:38
  banks and you can see it live and direct that people
• 4:40
  over in Kenya, well obviously without listening
• 4:44
  to the podcast. Who knows, maybe they listen to
• 4:46
  the podcast. That is one of the strategies
• 4:48
  that they are trying to do, they are partnering
• 4:49
  with banks and they are partnering with governments
• 4:51
  so that they can gain access to low income
• 4:54
  farmers who are underserved in the financial value
• 4:57
  chain. So yeah, so that was me just
• 5:02
  sharing the news, just to let you guys know that all
• 5:04
  the things we talk about here on the podcast are
• 5:06
  topical, they are timely, they are applicable, it's
• 5:09
  not just theory. So maybe you might listen to
• 5:11
  a podcast episode and think, hmm, this doesn't
• 5:13
  apply to me. But rest assured, I'm looking
• 5:17
  for concrete topics and I'm trying to answer concrete
• 5:19
  questions. So rest assured it applies to
• 5:21
  someone and the best that we can do is to take
• 5:24
  these principles and theories and even if it
• 5:28
  doesn't apply to us now, see how we can find
• 5:30
  corollaries that apply to our own business context
• 5:33
  today. So now that we're done with
• 5:37
  the news and that is out of the way, let's go
• 5:40
  straight to the question on building a powerful brand.
• 5:44
  Now, for those of you who have
• 5:45
  been listening from the beginning, you know because
• 5:50
  I have strut it time and time again that the whole
• 5:52
  point of this podcast is not to come and talk about
• 5:54
  things like brand. In fact, I am the anti -brand
• 5:58
  guy. So brand is primarily, is not
• 6:01
  my primary focus. But however, whenever I am out
• 6:07
  in public engagement, whether it's one on one
• 6:10
  trainings or things like that, the question
• 6:12
  ultimately comes up, how do I build a powerful brand?
• 6:15
  So as much as I am the anti
• 6:17
  -brand guy and I try to stay away from talking
• 6:20
  about brands, I always get the question about brands
• 6:24
  and so I guess I can avoid it. And
• 6:25
  some of you may have been listening to the podcast.
• 6:28
  We have over 830 episodes now.
• 6:31
  I'm sure some of you have
• 6:31
  listened to a couple, maybe a few dozen or maybe a
• 6:34
  hundred and you're thinking, why is this guy not
• 6:36
  talking about brand? So today's your day. I'm
• 6:38
  going to talk about brand. So
• 6:40
  the reason why I don't talk about brand on the
• 6:41
  podcast is because I think it is not the most
• 6:44
  important thing that you need to get your business
• 6:45
  going. Also because I think that sales
• 6:49
  and business development already has implications for
• 6:52
  brand perception anyway. In other words, if you do
• 6:55
  sales right and you do business development right,
• 6:59
  you are already reinforcing your brand. So
• 7:02
  that's my own thesis. And so we are going to examine
• 7:07
  that today to see how sales and business
• 7:09
  development principles can help reinforce your brand.
• 7:14
  So I'm talking about brand but
• 7:16
  in a way I'm wearing around about and I'm
• 7:19
  talking more about sales and how that can influence
• 7:21
  your brand. So if you've been listening to
• 7:25
  the podcast for any length of time, you know that I
• 7:27
  keep talking about how sales practices and
• 7:29
  principles have implications for brand. And
• 7:31
  one of them is uniformity and consistency. And
• 7:34
  that's a problem that lots of people face. You
• 7:36
  know, when you go and you get a brand person first,
• 7:39
  these are some of the mistakes that you make. You
• 7:41
  go ahead and then you create this wonderful,
• 7:43
  compelling brand. Then you start your actual
• 7:47
  business and interact with customers. And
• 7:51
  then the customer experience and all what not now
• 7:54
  becomes that odd with this brand that you guys created
• 7:58
  in the strategy room or at your board meeting or
• 8:02
  whatever. Let me give an example. The
• 8:05
  few of yous are back in Abuja. I
• 8:07
  was queuing to buy fuel a couple of days ago. It
• 8:09
  was a two hour wait, but luckily, okay, no, not two
• 8:12
  hours. Let's say more like one hour 30,
• 8:15
  one hour 45. So luckily I was queuing at
• 8:20
  night and this was a filling station that I was
• 8:21
  going to sell late into the night. So
• 8:23
  we was cool and it wasn't too hot and uncomfortable.
• 8:27
  And then a NEPA truck pulls
• 8:30
  in. Well, first of all, it's not
• 8:31
  NEPA. It's now called the Power
• 8:32
  Holding Corporation of Nigeria. So
• 8:34
  for those of you who are not Nigerians, those are
• 8:36
  the people who are responsible for our power
• 8:38
  infrastructure to make sure that we get electricity. So
• 8:41
  the thing comes in and it's the brand clearly is
• 8:45
  on is there on the truck and it says PHCN. So
• 8:49
  not even PHCN, it says I'm AEDC. That's
• 8:52
  the Abuja Electricity Development Corporation. Now
• 8:55
  power has been really crappy around where I live
• 8:58
  in in a boat in Gherki in Abuja. And
• 9:03
  so the thing pulls in on the queue and then all of
• 9:06
  a sudden the attendants start hurling insults at
• 9:09
  the AEDC officials. And of course the brand is
• 9:13
  there on the truck saying AEDC, but everybody keeps
• 9:18
  calling them NEPA. So you see what I mean? I'm
• 9:22
  sure billions of Naira. Okay,
• 9:23
  maybe not billions. Millions of Naira was probably spent
• 9:25
  on coming up with the PHCN branding and with the AEDC
• 9:31
  branding. But on the streets, everybody
• 9:33
  is still calling you NEPA. Then
• 9:38
  people are harassing them because the logo on the
• 9:40
  truck was a beautiful logo and then he had that,
• 9:44
  what's it called? Something about the you and
• 9:47
  everything. You know how everybody today
• 9:49
  when they're coming up with brands, they try to make
• 9:51
  the brand all you focused on. You
• 9:53
  know that whole thing. And well anyway, I'm not
• 9:57
  legitimizing what was happening because even
• 9:59
  though we have misgivings towards our public utility
• 10:02
  companies, it doesn't give you the right to start
• 10:04
  harassing NEPA officials and water board officials
• 10:07
  because they're in the Nigerian space like we are.
• 10:11
  They're suffering the same sorts of
• 10:12
  inequities that we are. So they are angry just like
• 10:15
  we are. So the fellow on the queue,
• 10:17
  QA also for two hours just like us was also angry. So
• 10:21
  it doesn't give you the right. So
• 10:25
  lots of money spent on the brand. Let's
• 10:28
  see what else on the brand positioning, but it doesn't
• 10:30
  adequately reflect the reality that is on the
• 10:33
  ground. But if, let's say AEDC decided
• 10:38
  to do what it is I recommend, which is engage
• 10:40
  a sales professional first. With
• 10:43
  sales professionals, you're able to pick out where the
• 10:47
  customer experience is flawed, where things are
• 10:49
  breaking down, where you need to improve. Because
• 10:52
  these are things that you need to work on before you
• 10:54
  can drive revenue and would have been able to come up
• 10:57
  with a much more honest brand positioning at the
• 11:00
  end of the day. Because if my guess is if they
• 11:04
  had a sales professional first to come in and to
• 11:07
  look at the whole thing, it will be obvious that
• 11:09
  these companies AEDC, Ikeja, Distribution Company back in
• 11:14
  Lagos and all these other companies are dealing with
• 11:16
  insurmountable problems to try and deliver electricity
• 11:19
  to people. And I think if they come up
• 11:22
  with a engage the services of a sales professional
• 11:24
  first, whatever branding that they would have come
• 11:27
  up with later on would have been built around
• 11:29
  themes or ideas of working harder to service you or
• 11:33
  working harder to improve your life or whatever. And
• 11:36
  that actually is much more honest brand positioning
• 11:38
  that customer service people, that their engineers
• 11:43
  and people like that can actually rally around.
• 11:46
  Because you can actually say that
• 11:47
  we are working hard to service you or working hard
• 11:51
  to improve your position and working hard to
• 11:53
  whatever. Because it would have been a much
• 11:56
  more honest narrative that would have come out of
• 11:58
  trying to solve problems on the ground rather than
• 12:01
  sitting in a boardroom under air conditioner and
• 12:04
  thinking what should our brand positioning be. And
• 12:06
  then you spend millions of Naira and then come up
• 12:08
  with something and then it's ineffective. Now,
• 12:11
  I deliberately picked the worst possible example to
• 12:15
  go with on purpose just to show you how wrong these
• 12:19
  sorts of things can get. That
• 12:20
  you have corporations because now AEDC, Ikeja,
• 12:25
  DC, Power Holding Corporation, what people now
• 12:28
  call NEPA, they are actually private companies.
• 12:31
  But it shows you the extent to
• 12:33
  how bad things can go. That
• 12:36
  private corporations can spend plenty of money
• 12:38
  bringing brand and public relations people. You
• 12:41
  come up with wonderful campaigns that have no
• 12:43
  relations or what's that word, no relations. Yeah,
• 12:48
  let me stick with relations, no relations to
• 12:50
  what it is actually is going on the ground. So
• 12:54
  that's one of the reasons why I recommend that you
• 12:56
  get a salesperson first because we salespeople,
• 12:58
  we're not pying the sky, we're not thinking about
• 13:01
  high -financy things. As is just, okay, we're here,
• 13:04
  what's the problem, where the revenue shortfalls, who
• 13:07
  are the customers, what are the problems we're facing,
• 13:09
  how can we solve all our problems. And
• 13:11
  in the midst of trying to solve all these problems,
• 13:13
  we get a lot of data that is going to be useful for
• 13:16
  the brand people later on. So
• 13:18
  if you're calling a meeting with your branding folks,
• 13:19
  you say, this is who we are, these are the
• 13:21
  customers we service, these are the problems that we
• 13:24
  solve, these are the challenges that we have,
• 13:25
  this is where we want to go. You
• 13:27
  can come up with a much more honest narrative. So
• 13:30
  that's more for all thesis. But
• 13:31
  in a micro context, in a smaller way of breaking it
• 13:35
  down, if you're doing good sales and business
• 13:38
  development practices, you're going to get a uniform and
• 13:41
  consistent process. So if you run an electricity
• 13:44
  company like my brothers and sisters in AADC, then
• 13:49
  there's going to be a uniformity or consistency
• 13:51
  with the engineering crew, with the customer service
• 13:54
  crew, with the people in corporate office, with head
• 13:57
  office, because we can't solve sales problems if
• 14:00
  everybody is singing from the wrong script. So
• 14:02
  we actually have to make sure that everybody is
• 14:04
  singing off of the same script, the same framework,
• 14:07
  the same processes. And then if you do sales
• 14:11
  right, it leads to an improved customer experience.
• 14:15
  And like I said, you get all
• 14:16
  the data that you need from trying to run sales
• 14:22
  motions and business development practices,
• 14:27
  because going out, you own the customer relationship,
• 14:30
  you're trying to figure out who the customers are,
• 14:32
  you're trying to figure out what their problems are,
• 14:34
  you're trying to figure out the best way to pitch your
• 14:36
  product and your service. You
• 14:38
  get a lot of data that can help you inform what
• 14:41
  logo should I use, what color will resonate with
• 14:44
  these people, what kind of font will resonate with
• 14:47
  these people, what kind of tagline should we use that
• 14:50
  these people, sorry, by the way, when I say these
• 14:52
  people, I mean our customers, what kind of
• 14:54
  tagline should we use that will resonate with these
• 14:56
  people and stuff like that. So
• 14:57
  how are we going to go about our marketing
• 14:59
  positioning? So it's only when we try to
• 15:01
  do sales right that we get all of this information,
• 15:03
  all of this data on our ideal customer profile, then
• 15:07
  we're able to work on our branding and our market
• 15:13
  positioning. Okay, so 15 minutes. Now
• 15:16
  let me give you guys some concrete steps on things
• 15:17
  that you need to do to build a powerful brand.
• 15:23
  Okay, yeah, so let's look at
• 15:24
  some concrete steps. So number one, define your
• 15:26
  niche and expertise because there's no point in
• 15:29
  building a brand in vacuum. So
• 15:32
  all these other brands that you guys like, whether Coca
• 15:33
  -Cola or Nike or Apple, they have a clear idea of
• 15:37
  who it is that they're trying to target. So
• 15:40
  when Apple is coming up with all their brand
• 15:41
  positioning and things like that, Apple is not bothered
• 15:44
  about me because when I say me, I mean me, Tavish
• 15:47
  Amar is an individual, because they know that
• 15:49
  somebody like Tavish Amar, when it comes to tech, I'm
• 15:52
  a prostitute basically. So right now I'm using the
• 15:55
  Xiaomi 13C. I really love its
• 15:58
  capabilities, really powerful phone, solid phone, and I
• 16:01
  suspect that I will use, buy another Xiaomi when I'm
• 16:05
  moving on from this one. But
• 16:07
  I've used everything. I've used Nokia, I've used
• 16:10
  Samsung, I'm using Xiaomi, I've used, okay, I haven't
• 16:16
  used Techno, but I'm prostitute when it comes to
• 16:18
  phones. So I move up and down. So
• 16:20
  Apple is not concerned about me. The
• 16:24
  branding, their positioning, their targeting, their
• 16:27
  everything, you know, is tied towards, is trying to
• 16:30
  attract a certain kind of person. Gosh,
• 16:34
  how I like explain this. Okay,
• 16:36
  you know what, let me not say the wrong thing and
• 16:37
  then I get into trouble because maybe it sounds
• 16:38
  like I'm insulting iPhone users. But
• 16:41
  you guys get the point. So Apple is not worried about
• 16:43
  me. They are not trying to come up
• 16:45
  with branding or advertising or positioning that is
• 16:48
  going to capture people like me. So
• 16:50
  because they know the niche, the market they
• 16:54
  serve, the customer they serve, it helps them to
• 16:56
  come up with very precise and clear branding. So
• 16:58
  you need to know that. And running good sales plays
• 17:02
  helps you with that. Because
• 17:04
  it's when you go out into the market and you try to
• 17:05
  chase a couple of people that you realize that, you
• 17:08
  know what, these kind of people like our product,
• 17:11
  these kind of people don't like our product. So
• 17:13
  in future, let us ignore men between the ages of
• 17:16
  social so on, so living in this part of the city in
• 17:18
  Nigeria who earn this kind of income. And
• 17:20
  let us only target women and senior citizens between
• 17:25
  the age of this and this, earning so on, so living
• 17:27
  in this part of the country and blah, blah,
• 17:29
  blah. So all these things, the
• 17:31
  demographics and the psychographics, they're
• 17:32
  important in coming up with your brand. So
• 17:34
  define your niche, define your expertise. And
• 17:38
  in my own opinion, please do not define your niche
• 17:41
  and your expertise in the boardroom. Don't
• 17:43
  sit down in your house with your business partner
• 17:47
  or with your husband or your wife and then
• 17:49
  academically try and define who your niche is. Come
• 17:52
  up with a guess. Now, okay, for this business
• 17:54
  that we're going to do, we're going to target blah,
• 17:56
  blah, blah, blah, blah. Then
• 17:57
  go out in the market to try and see that you might
• 17:59
  drum off some business. You will discover that your
• 18:01
  people where you make the most money from and that
• 18:04
  you have the best relationships might not be
• 18:06
  the same kind of people that you thought of when
• 18:08
  you were sitting down in your room or in the
• 18:11
  boardroom or when you were meeting with your investors
• 18:14
  or other stakeholders or whatever. So
• 18:16
  define your niche, define your expertise. Then
• 18:20
  another tip that I'm going to give is that you guys
• 18:23
  should be creating content consistently. Move
• 18:26
  on social media because it's also one of the
• 18:28
  things that helps to define our brand. And
• 18:32
  in my own opinion, the content you should be
• 18:34
  putting out should be to showcase your expertise
• 18:37
  because we're trying to become a trusted resource.
• 18:39
  If you're one of these people
• 18:40
  who wants to put out entertaining content, you
• 18:42
  want to be pointing and dancing and TikTok and
• 18:44
  stuff like that. Yeah, that's also part of
• 18:46
  building a brand, but it's not something that I have
• 18:48
  expertise in. You know, I don't dance, I
• 18:50
  don't point, I don't work. So
• 18:53
  I can give advice on that. So
• 18:54
  that's the kind of content I think you guys should be
• 18:56
  putting out. Then one thing that I want to
• 18:59
  point is regarding social media is that we should be
• 19:01
  deliberate with our social media. So
• 19:04
  that means when I say deliberate, I mean come up
• 19:06
  with an idea and come up with a plan. Don't
• 19:07
  jump from one thing to another. So
• 19:09
  back with this whole thing of trends and everything.
• 19:11
  If you are pointing and
• 19:13
  dancing today, trying to put out expert content
• 19:16
  tomorrow, then putting out memes next tomorrow, and
• 19:20
  then taking pictures of what it is that you eat
• 19:22
  and then sharing pictures of your children on
• 19:24
  Saturday and Sunday. That's a little bit all over the
• 19:27
  place and doesn't lead to a consistent brand. So
• 19:29
  you need to be deliberate and come up with one
• 19:32
  thing, one core idea and then just push it from
• 19:34
  there. Now I'm going to use the worst
• 19:37
  possible examples again that I can come up with just
• 19:39
  to prove a point. Now let's look at former
• 19:41
  President Trump for those of you who are Americans.
• 19:44
  And then for those of us who
• 19:45
  are Nigerians because we know what's up, what's
• 19:47
  going on in America, what's going on over here. Let's
• 19:50
  use current President Tinumbu. Now
• 19:52
  it is obvious that Trump is deliberate about social
• 19:55
  media. He knows who he is talking to
• 19:57
  and that determines the kind of content that he
• 19:59
  puts up. So whether you like Trump or
• 20:02
  not, it is very clear that he is deliberate about what
• 20:06
  he puts up. Now our beloved President on
• 20:08
  the other hand, doesn't seem to be, you know, they
• 20:12
  don't use social media in a deliberate manner. So
• 20:16
  between the two, I'm not saying one person is good
• 20:19
  and one person is bad, but I'm asking the question,
• 20:21
  between Trump and Tinumbu, those of you Nigerians who
• 20:24
  are listening, who has a clear brand? Does
• 20:26
  Tinumbu have a clear brand? The
• 20:28
  answer is no. Does Trump have a clear brand?
• 20:31
  The answer is yes. So
• 20:33
  regardless of whether you fall, when it comes to
• 20:35
  political affiliations or whatever, the whole point
• 20:38
  about social media is that we need to be deliberate
• 20:40
  and we need to be very clear who am I talking to.
• 20:43
  That will now inform how it is
• 20:46
  that you use social media to enhance your brand. But
• 20:49
  then again, if you're like a current President, you
• 20:52
  know, Tinumbu and coming up with a brand is not
• 20:55
  important because you have other plans for trying to
• 20:58
  achieve what you want to achieve. And
• 20:59
  I guess you can shirk the whole branding thing. But
• 21:02
  for those of us who are in private practice,
• 21:05
  corporate practice, business practice, we can't run away
• 21:08
  from these issues. We have to be deliberate about
• 21:11
  our branding and our market positioning. Then
• 21:13
  we should also be networking to try and build
• 21:15
  our brand. We're trying to build professional
• 21:17
  alliances and collaboration. So
• 21:21
  we have to be deliberate about networking. Then
• 21:23
  when it comes to brand building, really have to be
• 21:26
  authentic. And you know, that's where the
• 21:28
  AEDC, former network companies, that's where they
• 21:30
  fall flat. You know, there's no
• 21:32
  authenticity there. They're talking pie in the sky.
• 21:35
  They're talking aspirational. This
• 21:36
  is what we want to do and everything. But
• 21:39
  they're not being authentic. They're
• 21:40
  not having an honest conversation using their own
• 21:42
  perspectives. So in your own business, don't
• 21:45
  fall into that whole trap. Use
• 21:46
  your own perspective. And don't copy other people and
• 21:50
  make sure that you're talking about stuff that is
• 21:52
  relevant to your own audience. So,
• 21:56
  okay, I started off in the wedding photography space.
• 22:00
  So let me go back to my
• 22:01
  constituency. There are wedding planners who
• 22:03
  try to do a premium brand positioning and all those
• 22:07
  sorts of stuff. So like, why are you forming
• 22:10
  premium brand positioning when you're the kind of
• 22:13
  company that your clients, the halls that they use
• 22:16
  are? Maybe these halls in Garuki,
• 22:18
  maybe like those halls in area 8 or area 3, area
• 22:26
  10, those kind of small halls. And
• 22:28
  you're putting premium positioning. I
• 22:30
  mean, who are you kidding? That
• 22:32
  is not a premium experience. Be
• 22:34
  authentic. If that is the kind of market
• 22:37
  that you're serving, that particular kind of
• 22:41
  demographic. Sorry, by the way, I'm not trying
• 22:44
  to talk down to... Okay, let me stop there before I
• 22:49
  get cancelled or say something wrong. What
• 22:51
  I'm just trying to say is I'm not trying to talk
• 22:53
  down to anyone. I'm just saying that let's be
• 22:54
  honest, let's be authentic. If
• 22:56
  you're not doing premium nothing, then don't try and
• 22:59
  put premium messaging as part of your branding and
• 23:03
  market positioning. Let's keep things authentic to
• 23:06
  our perspectives, to our experience, to your own
• 23:10
  lived experience and things like that. So
• 23:13
  don't copy anybody. The people who are doing
• 23:16
  premium brand positioning, the bigger halls in wedding
• 23:19
  halls, who say to those halls that sit 2500 people
• 23:23
  and you're able to call Davido to perform for the
• 23:27
  audience and things like that at the wedding. You
• 23:30
  know, those kind of wedding planners, yes, they're doing
• 23:32
  positioning themselves as premium brands. You
• 23:35
  know, it's okay for them because it's authentic to
• 23:36
  them because it is part of their perspective and part
• 23:39
  of their lived experience. If
• 23:41
  you're not there yet, then don't try and make that as
• 23:43
  part of your brand positioning. Keep
• 23:45
  everything authentic. It also will make your
• 23:49
  marketing communications much more clearer. If
• 23:53
  you're positioning yourself as premium brand, but the
• 23:56
  market that you serve is actually the area 8, area
• 23:59
  10, area 3 crowd and they see premium. They
• 24:02
  will think, ah, this guy is expensive, this girl is
• 24:04
  expensive and they will run away. She
• 24:07
  actually might be shooting yourself in the foot by
• 24:08
  doing that whole premium branding positioning thing
• 24:12
  when actually you are not. So,
• 24:14
  if you're not there, who say to massive event hall,
• 24:20
  importing musicians from Lagos, kind of wedding
• 24:23
  planner, watch area 8, wedding planner, area 3
• 24:26
  wedding planner, you know, then just keep your
• 24:33
  branding, keep your messaging, keep it
• 24:36
  authentic. Let me put it that way. Okay,
• 24:38
  over 20 minutes. Let me bring things to a stop.
• 24:42
  So anyway, that's it for
• 24:43
  today. Let's see, summary. What
• 24:47
  did I say? Anyway, in summary, I just said
• 24:50
  that sales has implications for how you do branding.
• 24:53
  So do good sales and business
• 24:55
  development practices first. When
• 24:57
  you have all the data on who is your customer, how
• 25:00
  do you start conversations, where do your customers
• 25:02
  live, how do you build relationships with them,
• 25:05
  what are the kinds of conversations that you have.
• 25:07
  When you sorted out all these
• 25:09
  things with your sales team, then you can now
• 25:11
  call a branding person to say, Olga brand specialist,
• 25:15
  Madam brand specialist, please help us come up
• 25:19
  with branding, document, brand positioning,
• 25:22
  everything. And this is all the information
• 25:24
  that we have for you. Then those people will be able
• 25:26
  to do a very good job because they have all the
• 25:28
  information they need. It won't be people sitting
• 25:30
  down under the AC and guessing about what the
• 25:33
  brand should be. It will be because you've done
• 25:35
  good business and you know because you've been, you
• 25:38
  know, your shoes are on the ground. You're
• 25:40
  interacting with your customers. So
• 25:41
  you know for a fact that these are what your
• 25:44
  customers like. This is what they care about.
• 25:47
  This is what they hate. This
• 25:48
  is what they wish people could do better. You'll
• 25:50
  not be able to come up with a solid business brand
• 25:55
  or the personal brand. But remember that you also have
• 25:59
  to be deliberate about it and we should also be
• 26:03
  authentic about it. So let's not copy what other
• 26:06
  people do. Another person's brand looks really
• 26:09
  nice. It doesn't mean it should be
• 26:11
  your brand, their own experience, their own
• 26:14
  customers, their goals, their shortcomings, their
• 26:16
  relationships are different from yours. So
• 26:20
  thank you very much guys for your time and
• 26:21
  attention. Remember to follow me, connect with
• 26:24
  me on WhatsApp. The phone number is 080
• 26:26
  -64662140 and the country code is 234. Then
• 26:32
  connect with me on socials, especially LinkedIn where I
• 26:35
  spend most of my time. My name is Tavishima Ayede.
• 26:38
  I'm the host of the show. You
• 26:40
  can confirm the spelling of my name from the link we
• 26:42
  are currently listening to this episode. My
• 26:44
  email address is there in case you're an email person
• 26:46
  as well. So thanks for your time and
• 26:47
  attention. I'll catch you guys at the next
• 26:49
  episode.