Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / Listen, Adapt, Win: Mastering Multiple Approaches to the "Busy" Objection"

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Listen, Adapt, Win: Mastering Multiple Approaches to the "Busy" Objection" · 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
• 0:05
  apologies out and about. It's a rainy day.
• 0:10
  Well, of course I'm in the car, wound up the windows, but I
• 0:13
  still I'm in a noisy environment so expect to hear some
• 0:16
  interruptions, you know, some people talking and stuff like
• 0:19
  that. Then the sore throat is getting
• 0:22
  better. I'm sure you guys can tell, but
• 0:24
  I still have the cold to deal with, so there might be some
• 0:27
  sniffles and hacking during this episode, but I'll do my best to
• 0:30
  keep it professional if this is your first time of listening to
• 0:35
  the show. We are currently having a series
• 0:37
  of discussions on how to deal with business objections.
• 0:41
  Sales objections and objections are reasons that people give for
• 0:45
  not wanting to do business with you.
• 0:46
  Now, for not wanting to go ahead with whatever agenda you have on
• 0:50
  the table. And if you are a church worker
• 0:53
  or you work in the Civil Service or you work in Access Bank or
• 0:55
  Zenith Bank, and you have some department or meetings, any
• 0:58
  reason that people give or not wanted to go ahead with a
• 1:01
  specific agenda? Those are the things that we
• 1:03
  call objections. Now, when you're done listening
• 1:06
  to this episode, I want you to skip back a couple of episodes.
• 1:10
  Right now, maybe five to seven episodes, you're going to listen
• 1:13
  to other objections that we have discussed over here on the show,
• 1:17
  the reasons why they occur and possible ways for handling it.
• 1:21
  Now, I've been discussing them primarily in the business
• 1:24
  context, but like I keep mentioning, in in every single
• 1:27
  episode you'll find that you can take these business principles
• 1:30
  and apply the same thing to your church departmental work, to
• 1:34
  your Access Bank departmental meeting, or if you work in
• 1:39
  Ministry of Finance, you know, same thing.
• 1:41
  You can apply these principles to dealing with your boss or
• 1:44
  whichever stakeholders that you're trying to interact with
• 1:49
  to get something done. Now, the objection that we're
• 1:53
  going to deal with today is I'm too busy right now, So it comes
• 1:58
  in different flavours. I'm too busy right now, come
• 2:02
  back later. Can't you see the things on my
• 2:03
  desk? You know, blah, blah, blah.
• 2:05
  Whatever the variant is, we're now examining those situations.
• 2:09
  I'm too busy right now. Oh, by the way, if this I'm too
• 2:11
  busy right now doesn't sound sexy enough for you and this is
• 2:14
  your first time of listening to the show, then if you skip back
• 2:17
  five to seven episodes, like I said, you will definitely start
• 2:21
  off with the most sexiest or the well, OK, maybe not the most
• 2:24
  sexiest. The the usual objection that we
• 2:26
  get the most, which is you're too expensive.
• 2:29
  Do you want to build house? Are you mad?
• 2:32
  How can you be charging that in this economy?
• 2:34
  You know, blah blah blah, all those money objections.
• 2:36
  The first two are the money objections.
• 2:38
  So if you don't think if you haven't come across this one,
• 2:42
  I'm too busy right now, then when you're done, skip back to
• 2:46
  the beginning of the series and then you find the much more
• 2:50
  sexier objections or the most common objections that we
• 2:53
  receive now. I'm too busy right now.
• 2:57
  It does happen. We do run into it, although
• 2:59
  money objections typically come up first and it can come up in a
• 3:03
  number of scenarios. Well, First off, it can happen
• 3:07
  because people actually have some genuine time constraints.
• 3:12
  If you're in the business to business, you're selling B to B,
• 3:14
  business to business. Let's say you sell.
• 3:18
  What can I think of? OK.
• 3:20
  Let's say you sell stationary and you're trying to sell
• 3:23
  stationary to the Access Bank in your neighbourhood.
• 3:26
  And then maybe you're trying to sell toilet paper to the hotels
• 3:30
  that are based off of your street.
• 3:32
  Yeah. Yeah.
• 3:33
  So for those of you who live in Lagos, because in Lagos, it's
• 3:35
  not unusual for you to live in a place like the last place where
• 3:39
  I lived on the Mina Crescent, there were, I think, 3 or 4
• 3:44
  hotels on my street. And it's kind of typical in
• 3:48
  Lagos. That doesn't happen as much in
• 3:51
  Abuja because hotels are concentrated in certain parts of
• 3:54
  the city. But so, but for those of you in
• 3:56
  Lagos, you know, you get my gist.
• 3:58
  So that is a business to business.
• 4:01
  Those are business to business scenarios.
• 4:03
  So you sell stationary, you sell paper, you sell tissue paper,
• 4:07
  you sell. What else?
• 4:09
  What else do they need? Staplers, staple pins, you know,
• 4:13
  those sorts of things. And you're trying to approach
• 4:15
  the Zenith Bank, which is not far from your street because you
• 4:18
  live in Lagos where we have banks everywhere.
• 4:21
  And then sorry about that. And then you're also trying to
• 4:26
  sell to, what did I say, banks? Yeah, hotels.
• 4:32
  Sorry, forgive me. My brain is a little slow this
• 4:34
  morning. You know, whenever I have colds
• 4:36
  and things like that, my brain just slows down.
• 4:39
  So now you're looking at banks and then you're looking at
• 4:43
  hotels. So you're trying to sell your
• 4:44
  stationary, your tissue paper, your staple pens, your printing
• 4:48
  paper and all of that jazz. Now, since this is a business to
• 4:51
  business scenario, the person that you're going to go and see
• 4:54
  might actually have genuine time constraints.
• 4:57
  So the chief procurement officer or whoever it is that buys
• 5:00
  tissue paper for all the Access Bank branches, you know, in your
• 5:03
  city, the guy might be in lots of meetings and deadlines and
• 5:07
  urgent talks and things like that.
• 5:10
  And right now the person just generally doesn't have any time
• 5:12
  for sales conversations. So right now you're being a
• 5:14
  bother. So sometimes it's genuine or
• 5:19
  back to the hotel thing you're trying to talk to.
• 5:22
  OK, well, for Niger hotels, especially small time hotels,
• 5:27
  not big hotels like Hilton Hotel and things like that, you
• 5:29
  probably will be dealing with Madam Managing Director or
• 5:33
  something like that. So managing director right now,
• 5:35
  she might be in the middle of some stuff, you know, maybe
• 5:37
  kitchen stuff broke like 50 plates this morning.
• 5:41
  Cleaners didn't show up on time. So they have 20 toilets, maybe
• 5:46
  12 of them are dirty. Let's see what else 50 people
• 5:53
  booked room yesterday and then all of a sudden this morning out
• 5:56
  of the 5048 of them cancelled the bookings.
• 5:59
  So you know, there's cash flow issues and maybe there might be
• 6:03
  customer service issues involved.
• 6:05
  So The thing is, Madam MD genuinely right now has genuine
• 6:10
  time, time constraints as far. She's trying to do lots of
• 6:13
  stuff. And right now you and your
• 6:15
  tissue paper is just the least of her problems.
• 6:18
  So really, sometimes it's just not the right time.
• 6:22
  People have busy circumstances and because of that, they're not
• 6:25
  receptive to your products, not receptive to your service.
• 6:29
  Sometimes people just say I'm too busy right now because it's
• 6:33
  a it's just shorthand because really what they mean is, you
• 6:38
  know, there's no urgency here. They don't have any immediate
• 6:40
  pain, pain and they don't have any immediate need.
• 6:44
  Now when we're talking about urgency here, we're talking
• 6:46
  about short term needs or short term pains because there are
• 6:50
  some things, OK, let me switch medical so that you guys can
• 6:52
  understand what I'm talking about.
• 6:54
  Now, some people who live with chronic back pain, now, chronic
• 6:59
  back pain, that's when you have pain in your back, whether upper
• 7:02
  back or lower back. And you go through this pain
• 7:05
  every day. But it doesn't stop you from
• 7:09
  driving, It doesn't stop you from walking around.
• 7:12
  It doesn't stop you from playing with your children.
• 7:14
  It doesn't stop you from being with your spouse.
• 7:16
  And so there are lots of people, particularly Nigerians, who have
• 7:20
  chronic back pain because of poor posture.
• 7:23
  Let's see what else poor posture, poor health and Safety
• 7:29
  at Work practices, you know, slouching at your computer,
• 7:31
  things like that. So they have this problem, but
• 7:33
  they just go on living their lives and it's not unusual to
• 7:36
  find someone in Nigerian and there's no reason to believe,
• 7:41
  You know, perhaps this is not just a Nigerian problem, but
• 7:44
  it's not a out of place to a new medical doctors.
• 7:48
  You can attest to this, that you're talking to someone, the
• 7:50
  person has chronic back pain. But Shah, the person has just
• 7:52
  been managing for the last, you know, three or five years and
• 7:55
  they're just going on because it can go on.
• 7:57
  Now clearly there's a pain here and clearly there's a need here,
• 8:01
  but this is a long term thing and you can still manage.
• 8:05
  It's not the same as if you fall from the stairs and then you
• 8:09
  break your leg. Now that's a different thing.
• 8:12
  This one is short term and it's immediate, as in it's now, now,
• 8:16
  now, now, now. It's not something you can't
• 8:17
  ignore. So in personal issues, health
• 8:22
  issues, there's some things that are long term and can be
• 8:25
  ignored. There's some things that are
• 8:26
  immediate right now and sharp and that you can't ignore.
• 8:29
  And it's also the same in business.
• 8:31
  Sometimes your product or service is really, really
• 8:34
  important. But yeah, there's no short term
• 8:37
  need. So back to the wedding
• 8:40
  photography thing. That's my primary constituency
• 8:42
  because I started off in the wedding photography and the
• 8:44
  event space about a decade and a half ago.
• 8:48
  So wedding photography, Well, anyway, let me not go into that
• 8:53
  debate. Some people say wedding
• 8:54
  photography is a vanity, there is no necessity.
• 8:56
  And some people say it's absolutely important, you know,
• 8:59
  for different reasons. So I'm not going to go into the
• 9:00
  debate of whether wedding photography and wedding
• 9:03
  videography is a useful service or not.
• 9:07
  Because on some level you can make arguments about things one
• 9:11
  way or another. Like chewing gum, for instance.
• 9:13
  Is that a useful service or not? But who cares?
• 9:16
  People who make chewing gum, they make lots of money or else
• 9:18
  they wouldn't be doing it. So you're trying to sell your
• 9:25
  wedding photography services or wedding videography services.
• 9:29
  If the baby is not getting married until nine months from
• 9:31
  now, it's not really an urgent thing right now.
• 9:35
  But let's say the babe's wedding is coming up in like 2 1/2
• 9:40
  months, maybe 1 1/2. You can see that it's kind of
• 9:44
  more urgent right now. So sometimes it's all.
• 9:48
  It's also a matter of timing, depending on when we catch
• 9:50
  people. You know, is the pain immediate?
• 9:53
  Is the need immediate, you know? So questions of urgency come up
• 9:59
  and that's the reason why on the podcast I've always advocated
• 10:02
  that whenever we're talking to people, we should always try and
• 10:04
  get a sense of urgency because there's no point.
• 10:07
  And I repeat, there's no point talking to somebody who has low
• 10:10
  urgency because you're just wasting your time.
• 10:14
  So back to the wedding photography, you think your
• 10:16
  wedding photographer confirmed this girl is engaged, but
• 10:21
  wedding is 2 years from now. I mean, like what are you trying
• 10:23
  to do? High pressure, whatever,
• 10:24
  whatever. And collect deposit.
• 10:26
  It's two years. I know that in the West, you
• 10:29
  know, in America and in the UK, yes, you pay your wedding
• 10:31
  photographer sometimes a year in advance.
• 10:36
  But some of these things are culturally determined.
• 10:37
  In Nigeria, the wedding is in two years.
• 10:40
  No bride is going to drop money for wedding photography or
• 10:43
  videography or for a caterer for a wedding that is 2 years out.
• 10:46
  Sometimes, depending on which part of the city you live in,
• 10:49
  wedding halls might be in high demand.
• 10:51
  So maybe they might book the hall, you know, six months, one
• 10:56
  year in advance or something like that.
• 10:58
  But maybe not photography. Anyway, let me not get caught
• 11:02
  with a detergent. What you're seeing that these
• 11:05
  are a couple of reasons why people say I'm too busy right
• 11:07
  now. There's a genuine time
• 11:09
  constraint. This is not the right time.
• 11:10
  There's low urgency, and sometimes the fault is yours
• 11:14
  because you haven't done a good job at qualification.
• 11:17
  Now qualification. Those are those conversations.
• 11:20
  And remember, I keep stressing conversations because you should
• 11:23
  always think of yourself in most selling situations as being in a
• 11:30
  conversation with someone. Because if you're talking at
• 11:33
  someone, you are a pest. I don't want to get rid of you.
• 11:36
  But if you're in conversation with someone that is somewhere
• 11:38
  poor, you guys are vibing, then you know that's good.
• 11:41
  You know there's there's room. It doesn't mean the deal will
• 11:43
  close, but it means that you're setting up the environment and
• 11:49
  setting up the context now so that you can be successful at
• 11:54
  closing the deal tomorrow. So sometimes somebody says I'm
• 11:58
  too busy right now because you've done a poor job with
• 12:00
  qualification. You're probably talking to the
• 12:02
  wrong person. Maybe the person doesn't have
• 12:04
  decision making authority over the whole thing.
• 12:07
  And like I said, Nigerians are nice.
• 12:08
  So rather than the person saying no, actually you should be
• 12:10
  talking to Ogar Kohli. He's the one who does this.
• 12:13
  You, you know the person. Just so I'm too busy, I'm too
• 12:15
  busy. I don't have time.
• 12:16
  I don't have time tomorrow, next week.
• 12:18
  I don't have time. I don't have time.
• 12:20
  If you find out later on that actually you're talking to the
• 12:23
  wrong person, that it actually is Olga Kunley or Madam BC who
• 12:27
  you should have been talking to. Don't be like all these people
• 12:30
  who go on social media, on LinkedIn and on Instagram and
• 12:34
  start complaining about how customers are confused.
• 12:36
  They don't know what they want to blah blah blah.
• 12:38
  The fault is yours. You should have done a better
• 12:40
  job of qualifying, having qualification conversations in
• 12:45
  the first place. So sometimes the person doesn't
• 12:47
  have decision making authority. They're trying to delay, they're
• 12:50
  trying to brush you off. Sometimes you're speaking to the
• 12:55
  someone who is not your ideal customer.
• 12:58
  So you know there are lots of issues around timing.
• 13:06
  Sometimes there are also issues around timing, because there's
• 13:12
  some industries where seasonality is also a part of
• 13:14
  it. Like people used to say, wedding
• 13:18
  photo weddings and events are seasonal.
• 13:21
  I well, I don't quite agree because I've short weddings in
• 13:25
  the dry season. I've short weddings in
• 13:26
  Hammertown. I've short weddings in the rainy
• 13:28
  season. I know that weddings in the
• 13:33
  rainy season are kind of tricky, so I don't know, maybe weddings
• 13:37
  are season. Nothing.
• 13:37
  But OK, let me look for something else.
• 13:39
  Paint. Paint.
• 13:40
  Yes. So I think for people who sell
• 13:42
  paint, you know, like Dulux and all these people I hear, I
• 13:47
  haven't confirmed because I've never been in the paint
• 13:49
  business. I've heard that it's a seasonal
• 13:50
  thing that people that the paint market doesn't really move in
• 13:54
  the rainy season. And well, I guess it makes sense
• 13:56
  because who paints the houses in the rainy season?
• 14:00
  But I hear that there are modern paints now that you can use even
• 14:03
  during the rainy season, and it's not going to run off and
• 14:05
  it's going to dry properly and things like that.
• 14:07
  But for now, let's just stick to old school paints, Dulux and all
• 14:12
  those sorts of things, seasonality.
• 14:15
  So yeah, so I'm too busy right now.
• 14:17
  You could have come at the wrong time.
• 14:19
  You meet a property developer, You're trying to have
• 14:21
  conversations surrounding paint. But it's rainy season now, so
• 14:25
  maybe the developer is worried about all other things, you
• 14:29
  know, delivery of cement, the building schedule, you know,
• 14:32
  blah, blah, blah. These are things that are much
• 14:35
  more on his mind right now. So having your conversations
• 14:39
  around buying paint is not really it's problem right now
• 14:43
  because, you know, poor timing, you've come out of season and
• 14:47
  then sometimes the problem is that you haven't built
• 14:49
  commonality or rapport with the person.
• 14:52
  And if you haven't built rapport with the person, you're just the
• 14:55
  pest. And of course, who likes having
• 14:57
  pests around? So people say anything to get
• 15:00
  rid of a pest. We'll just try and brush you
• 15:01
  off, OK? So we spent too much time
• 15:04
  dealing on how these things arise.
• 15:07
  So let's come up with some suggestions about how we can
• 15:10
  deal. We can handle situations where
• 15:12
  people say I'm too busy right now.
• 15:14
  So First off, like I've been saying for the past couple of
• 15:17
  episodes, five, maybe 10-7, I don't know, I've been counting.
• 15:22
  First off, we have to acknowledge and to empathize
• 15:24
  because nobody likes to be being, nobody wants to be
• 15:27
  thought of as a liar or things like that.
• 15:29
  So if somebody says I'm too busy right now, even though in your
• 15:32
  heart of heart you think, like, how can you say you're busy,
• 15:35
  your desk is empty. You have nothing to do.
• 15:37
  When I came in here, you're watching DSTV.
• 15:40
  You're going to be thinking all of that in your mind.
• 15:42
  And you think maybe the person is trying to brush you off, but,
• 15:45
  you know, don't point out all those things that look, dude,
• 15:47
  you can't say you're busy because I came here.
• 15:49
  You're eating rice and chicken and you're watching DSTV.
• 15:52
  How can you say that? You don't have time.
• 15:54
  So rather what you do is you acknowledge, you empathize and
• 15:58
  you validate their time constraints or their feelings of
• 16:01
  overwhelm. So it's like, yeah, Bros, I
• 16:03
  understand. Yeah, you know, busy time of the
• 16:05
  day, blah blah blah. So many things to do, you know,
• 16:08
  use your own verbiage. So, but The thing is you have to
• 16:10
  acknowledge whatever it is that they saying.
• 16:14
  Now there are different approaches for what you do next.
• 16:18
  There are some aggressive folks who say that what you should do
• 16:21
  is propose a short call to show some value.
• 16:25
  So you can say, yeah bro, I understand that you know, it's
• 16:27
  busy and my culture at the bad time, but you know what?
• 16:30
  Just give me 5 minutes. I can show you sharply the
• 16:33
  reason why I'm here and how this thing is important to your hotel
• 16:37
  or to your bank or to your whatever.
• 16:39
  So can you just give me like 5 minutes?
• 16:41
  Now that's a very aggressive approach.
• 16:43
  It has its merits. It has its demerits.
• 16:46
  You know, everything works. There's nothing in sales that
• 16:51
  doesn't work in quote. So it's all about contextual.
• 16:54
  So yes, there are times when you might have to take the
• 16:56
  aggressive approach to say, Oh yeah, I know I've got you at a
• 16:59
  bad time. But you know what?
• 17:00
  I just need 5 minutes. I'll be sharp.
• 17:02
  I'll be able to tell you who I am, what this thing is about,
• 17:06
  how this thing can help you make more money, or how this thing
• 17:08
  can help you solve this problem, how this thing can help you do
• 17:10
  this, I can help you do that. So there are times that you can
• 17:14
  be aggressive. So Madam MDI understand I had
• 17:17
  perfectly well wonder talking about the broken toilets, but
• 17:20
  you know I'm an MDI. Just need 5 minutes to show you
• 17:23
  how if you use this as superior cleaning products, you're going
• 17:26
  to be able to save 25% on all your cleaning expenditure in the
• 17:30
  hotel. So Madam, can you give me like 5
• 17:32
  minutes? That's the aggressive approach.
• 17:34
  Then there's a much more passive approach.
• 17:36
  Some people also recommend, which is where you try and
• 17:39
  establish alternative communication channels.
• 17:42
  Just Madam MDI, understand, I understand that this is really
• 17:47
  busy time for you and this and this and that and that.
• 17:50
  So would it be OK if I just send you an e-mail and then send the
• 17:53
  information there? And when you say, OK, yeah,
• 17:56
  sure, no problem, collect it from my secretary and then she
• 17:58
  leaves. So that's an alternative
• 18:00
  communication method there. Some people might try an
• 18:05
  alternative WhatsApp, like, oh Madam, it's OK if I WhatsApp you
• 18:08
  instead, you know. So like I said, you know, it's
• 18:12
  all contextual. Some things work, some things
• 18:14
  don't work. Start with whatever you find
• 18:17
  much more comfortable. But this passive approach of
• 18:20
  getting an alternative communication method is is also
• 18:24
  a viable strategy. It's also something that works.
• 18:27
  Now what I recommend is kind of in the middle, but some of you
• 18:32
  might, it might, some of you might be too uncomfortable
• 18:35
  trying this out. But this is what I recommend
• 18:37
  anyway, because some people say it's closer to the aggressive
• 18:40
  end of the spectrum. Now, for me, I say that we
• 18:44
  acknowledge, we empathize, and then we show some respect for
• 18:46
  the time. So Madam Mdi, understand, it
• 18:48
  looks like you're dealing with a lot here.
• 18:50
  And then you ask for permission because you want to ask a few
• 18:53
  questions around her priorities and around her deadlines.
• 18:57
  And you're trying to get an advancement, You're trying to
• 19:00
  get another meeting agreed to right now.
• 19:03
  You get it on the calendar. So the reason why some of you
• 19:08
  are scared is because listening to you is because person has
• 19:10
  already told you I'm too busy right now and then you're not
• 19:14
  feeling like somebody. Madam MD has told you she's
• 19:16
  busy, but you you now have delivered to be asking her
• 19:18
  questions. So I understand, yes, it might
• 19:20
  be a bit scary, but so long as you're respectful, this is also
• 19:23
  something that can work. So Madam MDI understand this is
• 19:26
  a busy problem, Busy time for you right now.
• 19:29
  But is it OK if I just ask you a couple of questions?
• 19:32
  I'm just trying to figure out what you guys are doing now
• 19:35
  around, you know, this, this, this and that, that, that.
• 19:37
  And maybe we can get a better time for us to talk later on.
• 19:43
  And she might say, Oh yeah, sure, I have 5 minutes.
• 19:46
  So what is it you ask one or two questions, you get a sense of
• 19:49
  what is important to them regarding your products, you
• 19:53
  know, your stationary, your cleaning supplies, your whatever
• 19:55
  it is that you're trying to sell.
• 19:57
  And then you get a sense of her schedule.
• 20:00
  Maybe her. Low work days are Wednesday
• 20:03
  afternoons. Maybe every morning is is busy,
• 20:06
  but Wednesday afternoon, those are low work days for her.
• 20:10
  And then you just get it on the calendar.
• 20:11
  You know, both of you agreed that OK, next week Wednesday you
• 20:14
  come back again by the hotel or something like that.
• 20:17
  So be respectful of the person's time, ask some questions, try
• 20:20
  and figure out their priorities, the deadlines, things like that.
• 20:24
  And then you try and get a meeting on the calendar.
• 20:27
  You try. And when I say on the calendar,
• 20:28
  what I mean is that you will agree.
• 20:30
  So whether she writes it in her diary or she doesn't write it in
• 20:33
  the diary, But The thing is, you propose this time, she says yes,
• 20:37
  it's OK, no problem. And then you agree to it.
• 20:40
  You also agree to the follow up actions.
• 20:42
  It's OK Oh man. We agreed for Wednesday 1:00.
• 20:46
  So would it be OK if I call you Tuesday afternoon to remind you?
• 20:50
  She says yeah, sure, sure, sure, no problem.
• 20:52
  Collect my phone number from the secretary, You know, that kind
• 20:54
  of thing. So that's what I mean when I say
• 20:56
  have it on the calendar or have it on the books.
• 20:58
  I mean, just make it very clear. Now, both of you have agreed
• 21:01
  this is the next step, and this is what we're going to do to
• 21:04
  facilitate that next, that next step.
• 21:08
  Now, there's also another technique that you can use
• 21:12
  around these issues, but it is also something that some of you
• 21:16
  will find very scary. And for good reason, because
• 21:19
  this is only something that can be done competently by people
• 21:22
  who have by experienced sales people or experienced business
• 21:26
  people. The questions it involves
• 21:30
  funneling involves asking direct questions and very direct
• 21:35
  questions because you're trying to arrive at the truth.
• 21:37
  Now, this only works only when you have experience, because
• 21:40
  when you have experience behind you, you know you know what's
• 21:45
  real, you know when people are bullshitting you, and you know
• 21:47
  the typical excuses that people can get.
• 21:49
  So let's say back to the stationary thing, you've been
• 21:53
  selling stationary for seven years.
• 21:55
  Yeah, you've been selling stationary for seven years.
• 21:57
  I mean, you've heard it all. You've heard it all from the the
• 22:02
  procurement person at Access Bank or the different banks or
• 22:06
  the different hotel managers. You've heard all the BS that
• 22:08
  they can say. So, you know, and of course,
• 22:13
  when you have some business experience or some sales
• 22:16
  experience, you're not the kid. So it's not like you're 18 years
• 22:19
  old. So if you're 18 years old and
• 22:20
  you want to try this sort of thing, it's going to backfire
• 22:22
  because people will their country.
• 22:25
  Look at this boy. I mean, I have like, when was
• 22:28
  this guy born and he's yanning me all this, all bats.
• 22:31
  So this works. You have age and experience on
• 22:35
  your side. You just ask direct questions,
• 22:36
  'cause you're trying to arrive at the truth.
• 22:38
  So. And it involves multiple
• 22:40
  questions. So of course you acknowledge so.
• 22:42
  Oh, Madame. Empty.
• 22:43
  Yeah, I understand. Yeah.
• 22:44
  A really busy period in time and blah blah blah blah, but matter
• 22:48
  ending, you know, I've been doing this for a while, so to be
• 22:50
  frank, when people tell me I don't have time, it's usually
• 22:54
  one of two things. It's usually they're not
• 22:55
  interested or they already have something that is working for
• 22:59
  them. So Madam, which is it?
• 23:01
  Because if you're not interested, no problem, I'll
• 23:02
  just leave and I won't come back again.
• 23:04
  You know, I won't stress you. So if you're not interested,
• 23:06
  just say it and then you keep quiet and then you listen and
• 23:12
  you're going to find out something really interesting.
• 23:14
  Sometimes you find out that the person is not interested and
• 23:17
  maybe then you just keep your promise and you leave and never
• 23:19
  come back. The thing is, at least you have
• 23:22
  saved yourself some time. Instead of trying to book
• 23:25
  meeting, trying to follow up and trying to everything, you spend
• 23:28
  three weeks on something only to discover that Madam was never
• 23:31
  really interested in the 1st place.
• 23:32
  If she's not interested, it's best to find out now then.
• 23:37
  So if they're not interested, there's also another approach
• 23:42
  that's called the challenger method of sales.
• 23:44
  It's not something I've spoken about a lot on the podcast,
• 23:47
  'cause there's something much more advanced and I'm focused on
• 23:51
  making sure that people know the basics first.
• 23:53
  But the whole thing with the challenger approach is where you
• 23:55
  lead with insights, where you're trying to close a sale.
• 23:58
  So in this case, let's say we're dealing with a carpet cleaning
• 24:02
  business. You know these sorts of things.
• 24:03
  This is where you lead with insight.
• 24:05
  You say and the Madam of hotel says she's not interested.
• 24:08
  Let's say, Madam, you're not interested.
• 24:10
  You are aware that the Nigerian medical Society or the American
• 24:15
  Society or whatever, whatever, whatever, says that in 80% of
• 24:19
  hotels carpets are not cleaned up to whatever times per month.
• 24:24
  And so because of that it has carcinogens, leads to allergens
• 24:29
  in in in hotel guests, you know, blah blah, blah, blah.
• 24:33
  You know, you put out those that research that studies that
• 24:36
  insight. So Madam, I'm sure you're not
• 24:37
  facing any of these problems. You know, staff complaining
• 24:41
  about allergen issues or guests complaining about musty rooms,
• 24:47
  or, you know, any. You get my you get my gesture,
• 24:50
  you lead with some strong insights, and then you ask a
• 24:54
  very direct question. So you know Madam, so clearly
• 24:56
  you're not facing any of these problems.
• 24:58
  And then you listen to what it is that she has to say.
• 25:01
  Of course, if the person says, no, I'm not facing on these
• 25:03
  problems, I'm fine. Get out of my office.
• 25:05
  Then. I guess, you know, that's all
• 25:06
  you do. Just get out of our office and
• 25:09
  look for somebody else to talk to.
• 25:11
  And then remember that for the funneling here, we're trying to
• 25:16
  get them to pick between two options that Look, Madam, is it
• 25:18
  that you're not interested or is it that you have a solution that
• 25:21
  is already working for you? If they say they already have a
• 25:24
  solution that is working, then what you do is you listen to an
• 25:27
  older episode that I made, but you don't have to skip back too
• 25:29
  far, 'cause I made it a couple of days ago.
• 25:31
  I just can't remember the episode title.
• 25:33
  And that's the episode where you deal with the objection when
• 25:37
  people say we're happy with our current vendor, we're happy with
• 25:40
  our current supplier, we're happy with our current XYZ.
• 25:43
  So you know, you'll be able to learn in detail what next steps
• 25:49
  you can do then. So we've spoken about a lot.
• 25:57
  OK, maybe was not a good idea because I I went into too many
• 26:01
  options on what you should do because I OK, let me just
• 26:05
  summarize anyway, 'cause we're close to 30 minutes, I'll bring
• 26:07
  this into a close. So bottom line, what I'm trying
• 26:10
  to say is I'm someone says I'm too busy right now.
• 26:12
  Sometimes It could be that they're really busy for a number
• 26:15
  of reasons. But whatever.
• 26:16
  The objection is, first of all you empathize, you acknowledge
• 26:20
  you validate their feelings, you know, things like that.
• 26:22
  And then there are number of approaches that you can do.
• 26:25
  In this case, some aggressive, some passive, and some that
• 26:29
  require some business experience.
• 26:31
  So pick whatever you're comfortable with and just make
• 26:35
  sure that you're applying it to the most respectful and ethical
• 26:42
  way that you can. But I would recommend that the
• 26:46
  more aggressive approaches, especially if you're new in
• 26:49
  business, don't try them out yet.
• 26:51
  So maybe the more passive things.
• 26:53
  I wish you tried if you're new in business.
• 26:54
  So, oh, Madam. Oh, I understand that you're
• 26:56
  busy. Is it OK if I collect your
• 26:59
  e-mail from Secretary? I'll.
• 27:00
  I'll. I'll send you an e-mail later.
• 27:03
  OK, Madam, I understand you're busy now.
• 27:04
  Can I WhatsApp you later? You know, so maybe those passive
• 27:07
  approaches work, but respect their time.
• 27:11
  Eventually you still have to ask questions around priorities and
• 27:13
  deadlines and things like that so you can see where you can
• 27:16
  slouch yourself into their calendar.
• 27:19
  But remember that for this objection, especially these
• 27:23
  sorts of objections, the non money ones, we really should try
• 27:27
  and figure out. Are they trying to brush
• 27:28
  ourselves, Are they interested or not?
• 27:30
  Or eventually we have to get back.
• 27:33
  We have to get down to trying to figure out those sorts of
• 27:35
  issues. So let me bring it to a close on
• 27:38
  this one. If this is an episode that you
• 27:40
  guys don't find convincing or clear enough then let me know.
• 27:48
  So connect with me on WhatsApp. My phone number is 08064662140.
• 27:55
  The country code is +234. For those of you who are not
• 27:57
  Nigerian, then connect with me on LinkedIn.
• 28:01
  My name is Tavishima Ayede. I'm the host of the show.
• 28:03
  You can confirm the spelling of my name from the link.
• 28:06
  We're listening to this episode and my e-mail address is there.
• 28:09
  If you guys have any questions. It's always nice to run into and
• 28:14
  have chats with podcast listeners, so thanks for your
• 28:17
  time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next
• 28:18
  recording.