Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / Funding Your Nigerian Business: Leveraging Global Networks & Grants

Transcript

Funding Your Nigerian Business: Leveraging Global Networks & Grants · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to the show. Today's episode is being
• 0:03
  recorded at my desk. The home is being cleaned and
• 0:06
  the kids are home, so expect to hear some noise in the
• 0:09
  background. Now the podcast is a well
• 0:12
  listener. Participation is strongly
• 0:14
  encouraged on the podcast. So please call SMS, send a
• 0:18
  WhatsApp message to 08064662140 in case you have any questions
• 0:24
  or you want to explore some strategy sessions or do an audit
• 0:29
  with me. Now today we are going to do a
• 0:32
  it's going to be a two in one. I'm going to look at OK, so
• 0:39
  we're going to explore opportunities in grants.
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  That's for those of you who want to get financing for your
• 0:46
  business because since I made the episode about how to finance
• 0:51
  businesses, especially women owned businesses, and then I
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  made the, I went on radio and spoke about the same thing.
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  I've been receiving lots of inquiries about that sort of
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  thing. You know, this is my business
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  idea. Financing is a problem.
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  I'd like to raise some funds, you know, blah, blah, blah.
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  So this is going to be one of those episodes that will explore
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  some more in that. So that's all we'll start off
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  with. We're going to be looking at
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  grants exclusively how you can be creative when it comes to
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  looking at grand ideas to finance your business.
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  Then I'm also going to look at rather we also going to look at
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  dealing with inbound inquiries. Now, inbound inquiries just
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  means you're there, you're in the house, you're in the shop,
• 1:31
  you're whatever, and then people come in to you.
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  So the two philosophies when it comes to generating business are
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  outbound and inbound. Outbounds means that you go out
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  and start chasing people down. Inbound means you're chilling
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  under your AC in your office and then people start sending you
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  DMS, People start calling you, people come into the office.
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  Of course, whenever we touch on topics like this, people want to
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  ask which is the best? Should I be doing outbound or
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  inbound? You know, it depends.
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  It depends on the nature of the business, the nature of the
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  product or the service. It depends on your skill set.
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  Ultimately, every single business should be doing both.
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  You should be doing some measure of going out to chase people,
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  and you should also be trying to set things up, whether in the
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  real world or online, whether it's advertising or whether it's
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  putting out content marketing or whatever.
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  You should be doing stuff that also gets people to come in to
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  chase you. So it is both inbound and
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  outbound. It is not a matter of which is
• 2:28
  better because people engage in all these debates all the time.
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  So you should be doing both. But of course, I have my
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  preferences. So with anybody that I'm going
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  to be working with, I will always start off with seeing how
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  we can get some outbound motions going because it is the easiest
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  to do and is the most. It is the one that is most
• 2:48
  within your control. Let me put it that way because
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  yesterday we did the podcast episodes on content marketing
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  and I'm sure you guys are going to see how much work goes into
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  content marketing and you're beginning to understand why it
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  will take like one year before you start seeing results.
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  You know, six months, one year before you start seeing results.
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  And the average business person does not have six years, sorry,
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  six months or one year to sit behind the keyboard and start
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  hoping for results, which is why I advocate that for most people.
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  Let's start without bound because to go and talk to
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  someone in church, in the office, in the mosque, talk to
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  your neighbors. It's an easy way to just get
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  things going, get one or two sales and you know, you just
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  feel like you have some momentum going and you're getting some
• 3:29
  progress. So these are some of the things
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  that we're going to be exploring today.
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  How can you use grants to finance your business?
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  And then what is the proper way to deal with inbound inquiries?
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  Because there's some of you who are receiving inbound inquiries.
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  You're just chilling. Somebody sends you a WhatsApp
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  message. There's some of you who are not
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  handling those WhatsApp messages the right way.
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  And that's the reason why your business is not where it is
• 3:50
  supposed to be. So before we get into the meat
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  of the matter, I'd like to shout out two people.
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  First, we're going to shout out Tess dot Afy, of course,
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  obviously not her real name. She's a listener of the show on
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  Spotify. She commented on the podcast on
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  Spotify, the episode that I heard about finding your ICP.
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  That's your ideal customer profile, the people you're
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  supposed to be running after. And then of course, whether
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  you're going to be doing outbound or inbound ways of
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  developing your business, you need to have a strong sense of
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  who your ICP is. You need to know who you're
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  chasing after or you need to know who you're trying to
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  attract before you start doing any kind of outbound or inbound
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  motions. So ICP really foundational is
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  something that we cannot ignore. So in that particular episode, I
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  mentioned that one way of determining your ICP is to look
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  at your trading history and then try and get a sense of who are
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  the people I've done business with in the past?
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  Of the people I've done business with in the past, who are the
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  people that paid me the most? Who are the people that I
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  enjoyed working with? And who are the people that when
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  I work with them, they think just lightens my soul.
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  Because if you're working with people who every single time
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  they call or they buzz or you go to their house, they come to
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  your office, you know, you feel enlivened, you feel excited.
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  On top of that, they pay you good money and then they pay you
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  on time. They're not only you, they don't
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  give you stress. That is the ideal person that
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  you should be running after, at least in the beginning because
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  you'll make your life easy. No stress.
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  Well, easier, let me put it that way, because there's no business
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  that does not have stress. So make your life easier.
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  So Tess wanted to know what do I do if I don't have any trading
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  history? So what I did was I told her
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  that, well, unfortunately you have to use some common sense to
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  try and answer the question who might benefit most from my XYZ,
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  from my product, from my service and then take the conversation
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  from there. And then plus you can also use
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  AI to do some ideation. So I put my phone number there
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  and test AFY. If you're listening again, hit
• 5:50
  me up on WhatsApp. The number is 08064662140.
• 5:55
  Country code is +234. Hit me up, let's have a chat
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  some more because I'm, I would love to show you especially the
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  AI bit, how we can use AI to come do some sharp, sharp
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  ideation about who our target audience might be.
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  But then Tasafi just behind my sha, that ideation is just half
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  the thing. We can come up with the perfect
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  ideas about who the target audience is, but then if we do
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  not take any actions to start chasing these people down, we
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  would have wasted our time. So coming up with the strategy
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  or with the idea is one thing. Executing on the idea is another
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  thing altogether. So Tessafi, reach out to me when
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  you get in touch. Just bear in mind the main thing
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  is going to be not coming up with the ideas, but then with
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  executing. Then shout out also to Israel
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  Echo or Backwall law. Sorry, I'm not pronouncing your
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  name correctly. I know that for sure.
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  And of course, he says he's reaching out from the ancient
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  Benin city and he mentioned that he binge pod.
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  He binge listened to my podcast last Sunday.
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  So of course, thank you very much for the kind words.
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  It's always nice to meet a podcast listener.
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  And I must say that those of you from that part of the world, you
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  know, Israel echo a back bottle or you guys have the most
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  interesting names, you know, you Midwestern people.
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  So every time I'm chatting with someone and, you know, it's
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  obvious they're from Aquamar or they're Asia or they're Bini or
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  from Organic Body or Auchy and, you know, from the Midwest,
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  maybe even down to like that Delta side.
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  Like you guys have the really, really, really the most
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  interesting surnames. Let me just put it that way.
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  So it's a pity that in Nigeria, the curriculum that we do is,
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  you know, Hausaibo, Yoruba, because there are lots of
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  tribes, there are lots of other people.
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  You know, it's a wonderful country, lots of interesting
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  people, lots of interesting tribes.
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  So it'll be nice. Hopefully, maybe sometime in the
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  future, our educational curriculum will be broadened a
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  little bit to recognise the fact that, you know, there's a whole
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  lot more than just Hausaibo, Yoruba, you know, different
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  tribes, different regions, different parts of the country
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  so that we can be exposed to other people and other cultures.
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  OK, so now straight to the meat of the podcast now.
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  So the first thing we're going to be looking at is our grants
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  to financial business. Now the reason why I'm coming up
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  with this is because there's a friend, an old friend as I went
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  to university together, but she's currently no longer in the
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  country, now based abroad. Mum, she's back here running a
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  school. Don't worry, I know if you're
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  listening, you'd be wondering, you know, is it you?
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  Yes, it actually is you. But I'm not going to use your
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  name because everybody needs to know, you know, your personal
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  business. But I just thought that in the
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  conversation that we had, we shared a lot of useful stuff
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  that some people could also hear as well.
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  Also some interesting perspectives when it comes to
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  FFF, as she put it, because she called FFF the Bank of friends,
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  families. And I can't remember FFF.
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  There were three FS, there was friend, there was family.
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  I can't remember what the other F is.
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  So anyway, just some interesting perspectives about how you can
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  finance your business. So anyway, half of her siblings,
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  UK mom C still in Niger, and they have a family school that
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  they're running. But then of course, with the way
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  that the country has gone recently, you know, with the
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  hyperinflation and you know, with the increase in school fees
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  and then hyperinflation, so the cost of running the school just
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  went up. I mean, really, really, really
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  went up. You know, all of a sudden
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  teacher salaries are inadequate. What else?
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  School fees have to be raised. And then they also had to hurry
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  up and move to the permanent sites because, you know, rent
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  also was increased. So it was just a perfect
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  trifecta of, you know, things to just make things really, really
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  difficult for the business. So house rent goes up.
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  So when I say house rent, I mean the rent that they had to pay on
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  the premises that the school was occupying.
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  So quickly, let's rush to the permanent site, put it in place,
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  let's rush to the permanent site.
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  So they had to move. And then you also have to review
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  teacher salary. Teacher salary has to go up, you
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  review school fees, school fees go up.
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  But then of course, when you increase school fees, what
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  happens? Some people leave the school and
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  then you move to a new location as well.
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  So there's distance. They already had the school bus,
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  but then the cost of petrol has gone up.
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  So the cost of fueling the car has even gone up.
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  Then you have to now raise the prices again.
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  Anyway, bottom line is there are some schools that have been
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  caught in a really, really nasty situation with the whole with
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  the way that the economy has turned recently.
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  So because of that now, and since it's a family business,
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  they've been knocking heads together to see how they can
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  come up with a fund injection to inject funds into the business.
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  Because now that they are the permanent side, if you can, to
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  shop the cool, the school, clean it up, you know, walk on the
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  packaging, help with operational costs, you know, things like
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  that. It might provide some runway,
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  you know, and give time, you know, for sales and marketing
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  efforts to to what's the word, you know, to stabilize.
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  So they start getting a new set of students coming in.
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  And also, you know, trying to explore the fact that they're in
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  a new location now. And since, you know, the cost of
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  school runs has gone up because of fuel and everything, now that
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  you're in a new location, it also provides an opportunity
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  because lots of people are looking for opportunities to
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  make sure that their children school local so that you don't
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  have to, you know, you don't live in one part of the city and
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  then send your kids to school in other part of the city.
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  Like for those of you who are based in Lagos, you know, if you
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  live in Oba but your children's school is on Allen Ave. for
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  instance, you know, that's kind of a stretch.
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  So The thing is, if you live in Oba now people are trying to
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  see, OK, how can I send my children to schools within Oba
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  So I'm not spending too much on fuel.
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  So that's just the situation basically.
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  So we started discussing a bunch of stuff and she told me about
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  some people that they were talking to possible financiers,
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  but they were mindful of the fact that it's a family
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  business. They want to keep it family
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  owned. And so they're kind of running
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  away from anything that sounds like equity investments.
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  But you know, at the end of the day, we had to come down to that
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  hard conversation. And look, when it comes to
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  raising money, there's either bootstrapping.
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  Bootstrapping is not an option here because the unit economics
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  are still in flux. Then there is raising loans.
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  You go and borrow money from the bank.
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  Unfortunately, interest is there, equity.
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  If anybody's dropping millions and millions know how, know how,
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  you know, they want to have a say in how the business is wrong
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  and they'll think of themselves as partners.
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  So in my own opinion, I was like, you know what?
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  I think Grant is the best option for now.
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  But in the discussion with her, a couple of things came up since
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  they're based in the UK. And this is something that I
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  totally forgot because I've seen another business do this as
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  well. The children are based in the
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  UK, Mumsy is here in Niger and Mumsy is the one who is
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  operating the farm with one of the younger siblings.
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  So what they did was people in the UK were able to raise a
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  bunch of money, a couple of 1000 lbs.
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  And then with the forex, whatever, you know, the, the
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  rate of forex now you raise money in pounds or you raise
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  money in dollars, you send it back to Mumsy and your brother
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  over here in Niger. Then you service the loan in
• 13:22
  America over, you know, 12 months, 15 months, whatever.
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  But you know, because of how those societies are organised,
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  you know, you have a steady job, you should be able to pay back
• 13:32
  the whole thing on a monthly basis, you know, from a salary.
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  So stuff like that. So that is one level of
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  financing when it comes to FFFI. Can't really remember the last F
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  friends, family and something else.
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  So that is one level of financing that I've not explored
• 13:47
  at all either on my radio show or over here.
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  But just so that you guys know that, you know, these
• 13:52
  possibilities are there for those of us who have family
• 13:54
  members abroad. Yeah, it's something that can be
• 13:56
  done. Like you guys are abroad.
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  We're here in Niger, we're trying to plug this business.
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  Look, this is the problem. We need a cash injection also.
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  So, so, so, so if you guys can raise the finance, you know, pay
• 14:07
  it off, you know, will give us breathing space and then over
• 14:10
  time, this is how we settle you guys back.
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  So those sorts of conversations can be had.
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  Well, of course, I told my friend that look, when it comes
• 14:18
  to FFF, you know, friends, family and whatever the last F
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  is. The thing is we have to be very
• 14:24
  clear on these conversations because these things can get
• 14:26
  messy. So like I said, if you're
• 14:29
  collecting money from Momsy and Popsy, or maybe it's just you,
• 14:31
  you're collecting from your older brother or your older
• 14:34
  sister, after a while, big sis can say, you know what, just
• 14:37
  just actually forget as in, yeah, I gave you the money, but
• 14:41
  don't worry. No, I'll you know, I'll freed
• 14:43
  and happens across different cultures because I was listening
• 14:46
  to marketing school by these two Indian shops.
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  I can't remember their name, but they're multimillionaires now.
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  And you know, the fellow was talking about how one of his
• 14:53
  earliest businesses was like that.
• 14:54
  He entered into the business, one of his big cousins and they
• 14:58
  answered some busy and we're about to wind up.
• 15:00
  So by the time they wound up, everything was after they paid
• 15:03
  everybody. He now realized that they
• 15:05
  settled everybody, but they didn't settle because so now
• 15:08
  called because and it's like because and how far now I
• 15:10
  noticed that with the money we gave everybody, we didn't give
• 15:13
  you back. And he said no, no, no, no
• 15:15
  Allah, you know, I'm at a different stage in life.
• 15:18
  I can shoulder the burden and these things happen.
• 15:20
  And they went on to do other businesses and other businesses
• 15:24
  succeeded. So if you're just one family
• 15:27
  member and both of you are cool, these sorts of things can
• 15:30
  happen. You know, they won't understand,
• 15:31
  they'll forgive a loan, they'll let the money go, you know,
• 15:34
  something like that. But if you're going to start
• 15:36
  talking to multiple FFFS, multiple family members,
• 15:39
  multiple friends, then these things needs to be very, very
• 15:41
  clear. I'm raising money from you.
• 15:43
  How much am I raising? Is it dash or is it loan?
• 15:46
  I mean, you want to be own and share in the business and it's
• 15:49
  not easy managing all of those individual, all of those
• 15:54
  individual conversations. So if you're trying to raise
• 15:57
  money for your business like that, you know, just bear in
• 15:59
  mind, sha, these are sort of the things that you need to take on
• 16:02
  board. Now, I've already made a podcast
• 16:04
  episode where I went into all these in depth, the sort of
• 16:07
  issues that you should be looking at, whether you're
• 16:08
  considering loans or whether you're considering equity
• 16:11
  financing. So I'm not going to repeat that
• 16:13
  here. So that was just a new angle of
• 16:17
  the FFF financing debate that I have not explored over here that
• 16:22
  yes, because of the way that currency and exchange issues are
• 16:26
  right now, an easy way of financing the business might be
• 16:29
  for you to talk to your siblings who are in the UK who raise it
• 16:33
  or in America who raise it. They settle the thing over, you
• 16:38
  know, a year and a half or something like that, or maybe 2
• 16:42
  years. But The thing is, for the
• 16:43
  business here back at home, you'd be surprised that because
• 16:46
  of the way that the currency is, they might raise some small
• 16:48
  money there. You know, really like 5000
• 16:50
  pounds, 7000 pounds, 10,000 lbs, by the time you collect, you
• 16:54
  convert it to Nigeria is millions and millions and
• 16:56
  millions and those kind of things, they help to put the
• 16:59
  business afloat or help with whatever project it is that
• 17:03
  you're working at at home. So yes, the Bank of FFFI can't
• 17:07
  remember the last F. There's friends, there's family,
• 17:09
  there's something else. So please, if you remember the
• 17:11
  last F, let me know. So yes, the Bank of FFF, apart
• 17:17
  from bootstrapping, you know, that is another way that you can
• 17:20
  finance your business. But anyway, because of where the
• 17:23
  family is with the business, I just thought that OK, FFF, yeah,
• 17:30
  that's cool. But I really think grants would
• 17:34
  be a much more tidier way to go. Just my own opinion given some
• 17:38
  of the circumstances because, you know, we're discussing in
• 17:40
  detail. Like I said, I've known this
• 17:41
  lady since university, so this is a relationship that like it's
• 17:46
  like 20 something years we've known each other.
• 17:48
  So we're really talking in detail about the ups and downs.
• 17:52
  So my recommendation was, you know, look, there are lots of
• 17:57
  grants that are built specifically for these purposes.
• 17:59
  It's just turns out that I've been talking a lot about women
• 18:02
  owned businesses. So that's if you're going to
• 18:04
  explore grants, you know, with some creativity, you can see
• 18:06
  that you can apply to different kinds of grants.
• 18:08
  And these are some of the categories that we came up with.
• 18:11
  Because it's a school, then obviously we can be looking at
• 18:13
  educational grants to fund. Or by the way, if you're
• 18:16
  listening to the show for the first time, a grant just means
• 18:20
  not dash them, dash you as in the people dash you the money,
• 18:22
  the money is came, it's free, you don't have to pay back.
• 18:26
  But even though you don't have to pay back, there are some
• 18:28
  restrictions and there are some conditions that are applied.
• 18:30
  So like in this case, now if they collected a grant from
• 18:34
  somebody, educational grant for let's say 20M or 50M or 100M or
• 18:39
  200 M, the people who are given the grant, they want to be sure
• 18:42
  that at 200 M that you collect, you take it and you use it for
• 18:46
  school purposes only. Now that you take it and use it
• 18:49
  to go and do BBL or you take it and use it to buy land or you
• 18:53
  take it and use it to marry second wife.
• 18:56
  So even though grants are free and have basically they're free
• 19:02
  as you're not going to repay back, there's no interest and
• 19:04
  then they don't own your business.
• 19:06
  There are some monitoring requirements.
• 19:08
  So you will have to be getting in touch with them from time to
• 19:10
  time. The money that we took from you,
• 19:12
  this is how we've been using it. We have done this like this, we
• 19:14
  have done this like this, we have done this like that.
• 19:16
  So there are those obligations. So I told him that yes, it looks
• 19:20
  like it's free money, but there will be obligations there,
• 19:23
  eligibility, eligibility criteria that you have to meet.
• 19:26
  Sometimes it's age, sometimes it's sex, sometimes it's
• 19:29
  location. So there's some grants that are
• 19:30
  only available to people in the UK.
• 19:32
  So if your school is in Niger, you know nothing for you.
• 19:36
  Or there's some grants that are only available to people who are
• 19:38
  in Nigeria. So if your school is in the UK,
• 19:40
  nothing for you. So all those things, eligibility
• 19:42
  and then reporting obligations. So one way we could look at it
• 19:46
  was educational grants. Another way we could have looked
• 19:49
  at it was women owned businesses because the last time I had to
• 19:52
  advise a family member on this sort of thing, When you say
• 19:55
  women owned, it doesn't have to be 100%.
• 19:57
  It can be majority owned. And then this is a family
• 20:00
  business where you know, of course mom sees a woman and then
• 20:03
  three daughters and then one son.
• 20:04
  So that is 4 to 1. So you know there are some
• 20:08
  grants that we recognize that as a woman owned business.
• 20:12
  Then since the school is North Central, there are also grants
• 20:15
  that are available for educational institutions in the
• 20:17
  North Central. The school also happens to be
• 20:21
  well the proprietress is Catholic and so the school is
• 20:24
  being run on Catholic principles.
• 20:25
  So there are some grants that are also open to Catholic
• 20:29
  institutions. Then unfortunately, this right
• 20:34
  of mine, mom sees a is a widow and I lost pops here a while
• 20:37
  ago. So there are also business
• 20:39
  grants that are available for businesses owned and managed by
• 20:43
  widows. So you can see that when it
• 20:45
  comes to grants, even though you are one business or one
• 20:48
  institution, there are ways that with some creativity, you can
• 20:51
  see how you can apply to different kinds of grants and
• 20:55
  broaden the chance that you know something might click.
• 20:57
  So it's one school, but you can see now we're able to flesh it
• 21:00
  out five different ways. Educational grants, less apply.
• 21:04
  Grants for women owned businesses less apply.
• 21:07
  Grants for schools in North Central, let's apply.
• 21:11
  Grants for Catholic institutions, let's apply.
• 21:14
  Grants that cater to businesses owned by window widows, let's
• 21:18
  apply. You know, God willing, something
• 21:20
  will kick. So with ChatGPT, with Gemini,
• 21:25
  with Google, with Bing, with, you know, whatever, we can sit
• 21:29
  down, we can search and we can start applying.
• 21:31
  But like I've said in previous podcast episodes, if you're
• 21:35
  going to go the ground route, just know that it's going to be
• 21:37
  plenty, plenty, plenty of writing because the application
• 21:40
  is very, very formal. So it's not like you can call
• 21:42
  somebody up and then say how far and then you know, it's not a
• 21:45
  matter of man, no man. Although if you try, I know one
• 21:51
  or two people in the in the organization wouldn't be a bad
• 21:54
  idea. And I've made episodes about
• 21:56
  that, how you can do multi threading.
• 21:58
  That's how you can know multiple people within the organization.
• 22:01
  And for people that I've advised to try grants before, I have
• 22:04
  also recommended once in a while, like let's say you're
• 22:08
  based in Bedroom state or Maiduguri or whatever and you're
• 22:13
  applying to some grants that's supposed to come through some
• 22:15
  government agency. It's not a bad idea.
• 22:17
  Once in a while, at least from the e-mail, you know the name of
• 22:20
  the account officer or the regional office or the whatever.
• 22:24
  It's not a bad idea that you're passing through Abuja.
• 22:26
  You just pass through the office, you say I just make, I
• 22:29
  agree to you. You know, that kind of thing.
• 22:30
  By the time you see somebody one-on-one face to face, you
• 22:33
  have one or two phone numbers, you know, stuff like that.
• 22:35
  It makes it easy to build relationships within the
• 22:37
  organization and to follow up on your application and then
• 22:40
  particular things. So lots of writing is going to
• 22:43
  be involved. So get ready for writing and
• 22:47
  editing and trying to make a case for why you should receive
• 22:49
  the grant through. I'm just saying there's going to
• 22:54
  be plenty of signing documents back and forth.
• 22:57
  And then of course it's lengthy. It's a lengthy process because
• 22:59
  this kind of thing doesn't happen in one week.
• 23:02
  Because of course thousands of people are looking for these
• 23:04
  grants. The organization will receive
• 23:05
  thousands of applications and it will take their time to review,
• 23:08
  review everything. And unfortunately, grant giving
• 23:12
  organisations don't, are not very good when it comes to
• 23:14
  customer service. So they won't even send, most of
• 23:17
  them won't even send you a message to say, oh, thank you
• 23:18
  very much, we received your application.
• 23:20
  We'll get back to you before November next year.
• 23:23
  They won't even tell you that kind of thing.
• 23:25
  So you just be sending grant applications.
• 23:27
  I'll be wondering, are these people receiving it?
• 23:30
  How far are we listing? Are we making progress?
• 23:32
  You know, so these are just some of the drawbacks when it comes
• 23:35
  to trying to get some grants. So, OK, 20 minutes.
• 23:40
  So let's move on to the next one now dealing with inbound
• 23:42
  inquiries. OK, Now the reason why I'm
• 23:47
  looking at this is because there are lots of you who are doing a
• 23:49
  lot to build a business. You're marketing and you're
• 23:52
  doing all kinds of things. Well, then you don't have a very
• 23:54
  good game plan for when people reach out to you over the phone
• 23:57
  to try and get them to do business with you.
• 23:59
  Now, the reason why I'm bringing this up today is, is is this, I
• 24:03
  want to make some personalized T-shirts because I want to see
• 24:06
  if I can use that to promote the podcast.
• 24:07
  I'll talk about that later anyway, but it's just some idea
• 24:10
  that I had. So of course I called up my
• 24:12
  houses. I'm late.
• 24:13
  What's up and how you did? I'm good, how's work, blah,
• 24:16
  blah, blah. She's an artist, so she has an
• 24:18
  installation coming up. How's are you planning for the
• 24:20
  installation? Oh, we're good.
• 24:21
  We're good. We're good, you know?
• 24:22
  So by the way, those are your T-shirts that you made for me
• 24:25
  that time. Yeah, I remember.
• 24:26
  I beg I ought to do something similar to promote my podcast.
• 24:29
  Oh, really? Let me send you the guy's
• 24:30
  number. OK.
• 24:31
  Thanks. She sent me the guy's number.
• 24:33
  So I messaged the guy and I told him, hey, what's up?
• 24:36
  I got your number from blah, blah blah.
• 24:38
  Concerning this is this. She said you're the person to
• 24:41
  talk to. You believe the guy's response.
• 24:45
  You will not believe this guy's response after all this story
• 24:49
  that I said hello, I got your number from, blah, blah, blah
• 24:52
  concerning this, this, this. She said you're the person to
• 24:55
  talk to. He responded, yes, good
• 24:57
  afternoon, full stop. Some of you might be surprised,
• 25:05
  but OK, let me put it this way, some of you are not surprised.
• 25:08
  You are not surprised. Let me put it this way, if
• 25:10
  somebody gives you all this story and your response is yes,
• 25:12
  good afternoon, you are seriously waiting for the other
• 25:16
  person to continue to be chasing you to get the business.
• 25:20
  I don't know why some of you have not realized that the
• 25:22
  responsibility for guiding the conversation rests with you, who
• 25:26
  is the business owner. You should be taking the
• 25:29
  initiative and guiding the conversation.
• 25:34
  It is very irresponsible that somebody reaches out to you
• 25:38
  saying I got your number from this, is this.
• 25:42
  She referred me to you. She says you're the person to
• 25:45
  talk to because I'm doing this and this and this and this and
• 25:47
  this and this and this project. And then your response is, yes,
• 25:50
  good afternoon. And you don't say anything else.
• 25:54
  But anyway, I'm not who's looking for something else.
• 25:57
  So of course I can't be pushing the conversation along.
• 25:59
  But that's because me, I'm a motivated buyer.
• 26:02
  Motivated buyers are just people who know exactly what it is that
• 26:05
  they want. They know the goals they want to
• 26:06
  achieve, and so they will do whatever it is that they can to
• 26:08
  make things work. But not everybody's a motivated
• 26:12
  buyer. That's the reason why you should
• 26:14
  take responsibility for guiding the conversation along because
• 26:17
  let's face it now, if you're dealing with an average person
• 26:19
  and your response was just, yes, good afternoon, let me tell you
• 26:22
  what will happen. Chances are the person would
• 26:25
  have sent messages to three or four other vendors.
• 26:28
  You responded, yes, good afternoon.
• 26:31
  For the other three people that they send messages to, two of
• 26:34
  them will have brain and two of them will have a plan for
• 26:36
  guiding the conversation along. Who do you think the
• 26:38
  conversation is going to continue with?
• 26:41
  The conversation is going to continue with the other two
• 26:43
  people who are most responsive. So at the very beginning,
• 26:46
  because you didn't have a plan for continuing conversations,
• 26:49
  you have shot yourself in the foot.
• 26:53
  You didn't even have a chance for closing the deal.
• 26:56
  So if you're going to be doing all this hard work, paying for
• 26:59
  Instagram ads or doing a good job and having happy customers
• 27:03
  because my half sis is a happy customer, which is the reason
• 27:06
  why she sent me to this Bros, what's the whole point of
• 27:09
  creating referrals that you're not in a position to now
• 27:12
  maximize to take advantage of at the end of the day anyway, 30
• 27:17
  minutes. So let me just wrap this up now.
• 27:20
  This hand should have handled it.
• 27:21
  I've said it time and time again on the podcast.
• 27:23
  I'm going to say it here again. If this is your first time
• 27:25
  listening to the show, if anybody ever reaches out to you
• 27:28
  and they mentioned somebody's name, before you respond, go and
• 27:32
  check your CRMCRM is customer relationship management tool.
• 27:35
  That is where you keep all your information on who your
• 27:37
  customers are. When you did business, how long
• 27:39
  you did business, how much was the amount?
• 27:41
  You know all their personal things.
• 27:43
  Go and check the referral source or go and check your WhatsApp
• 27:46
  messages to try and remember who this person is.
• 27:49
  So if somebody is out, you say, hey, what's up?
• 27:52
  I got your number from my half sister Cheney Lu.
• 27:54
  By the way, that's not my sister's name.
• 27:56
  I'll get a number from my half sister Cheney Lu.
• 27:59
  Quickly go and check your CRM. Go and check your WhatsApp.
• 28:01
  Go and check your whatever, check your receipt, check your
• 28:03
  everything because it's an opportunity for building rapport
• 28:06
  and commonality so they can respond and say, Oh yeah, I
• 28:09
  remember Chinilo, how is she doing now?
• 28:12
  You see, you start the start the thing on the very you're already
• 28:15
  assuming that you know, we're cool or like we're family or
• 28:18
  like we're friends. Start this conversation on some
• 28:20
  rapport or some commonality. It's not just yes, good
• 28:23
  afternoon. So Oh yes, I remember Chinilo.
• 28:26
  How has she been doing? I haven't even heard from her in
• 28:29
  a while. It's true after they suffer when
• 28:31
  I'm ping her and so is it because of that job that I did
• 28:33
  with her? That's why she sent you to me,
• 28:35
  Abby. OK, So what about that job did
• 28:38
  you see that you liked in particular?
• 28:41
  OK, OK, I know Allah. So this particular one that
• 28:45
  you're working on now. OK, so tell me more about this
• 28:47
  project now. How can I help?
• 28:49
  You can see that this is a much more fruitful way of carrying on
• 28:51
  this conversation. See, The thing is this is not a
• 28:55
  very structured podcast episode and apologies for that, but I'm
• 28:58
  just trying to say that you should have a plan for carrying
• 29:02
  on conversations. We can't keep doing this thing
• 29:04
  of yes, good afternoon. The thing is, it's not just me
• 29:08
  because because I'm involved in sales, you know, my wife also
• 29:10
  shows me her messages and surprisingly there are lots of
• 29:12
  Nigerian vendors who that is all they do.
• 29:15
  Somebody will send a message, your response will just be yes
• 29:19
  or good afternoon. Some people even write good PM
• 29:22
  like when did that start? Can we stop being lazy please as
• 29:25
  business owners? Which one is your?
• 29:27
  You're replying to somebody right?
• 29:28
  Good PM you don't even have the decency to type out good
• 29:32
  afternoon info. You will need to have a plan for
• 29:35
  carrying out conversations. Referral business is the easiest
• 29:40
  business to close. Because there's already some
• 29:42
  assumed level of trust for my half sis because I've already
• 29:46
  seen the thing she made the T-shirt for me.
• 29:48
  For me to like this thing. There's really a certain assumed
• 29:51
  level of trust. So when I call in, when
• 29:53
  somebody's calling you up or D Ming you or something, it's
• 29:59
  these kind of things are a lot easier to close than when you're
• 30:02
  going to look for business fresh and the person is a total
• 30:04
  stranger. So please, you should have some
• 30:07
  sort of CRM on your phone, whether it is notes you're
• 30:09
  keeping on your phone or whether it's that under the contact name
• 30:13
  you now write notes underneath the contact name or whether you
• 30:17
  check your WhatsApp, Bosch, if somebody's calling in and it
• 30:20
  looks like this thing is a referral, before you respond to
• 30:22
  that message, go and check. And then start off this
• 30:26
  conversation with some level of familiarity, with some level of
• 30:30
  commonality and try and build some rapport.
• 30:32
  It will not be hard to say. Oh yeah, thank you very much for
• 30:35
  reaching out. I remember Choma, always been a
• 30:38
  while. How is she doing?
• 30:41
  And then, of course, you want to know why Gemma referred you.
• 30:46
  So that whole question of, oh, is it because of this is ID for
• 30:49
  trauma and that's why you get in touch.
• 30:50
  Oh, you saw that. OK.
• 30:51
  What is it that he liked about it?
• 30:53
  OK, no, Anna, no problem. So this project that you're
• 30:55
  doing now, what is it? OK, how can I help?
• 30:58
  And then you go into needs analysis.
• 31:03
  I find out exactly what they need so that you have all the
• 31:05
  information that you need to be able to make an effective
• 31:08
  proposal and presentation. And by the way, after you're
• 31:12
  done with this, you know, pick up the phone and, you know, now
• 31:15
  go back to the person who referred, you know, go back to
• 31:18
  Chummer. You now call Chummer up.
• 31:20
  Chum, how far? Happy New year.
• 31:22
  It's been a long time, so I haven't been in touch you.
• 31:24
  Your brother just called me up. And Chummer, I really appreciate
• 31:27
  the support. I really appreciate how you been
• 31:29
  promoting my business, you know, blah, blah, blah.
• 31:31
  Thank you very much. I really appreciate you.
• 31:33
  That conversation goes a long way.
• 31:35
  The person who has made the referral, she now feels good.
• 31:40
  In fact, sometimes it's the only way that we can pay these people
• 31:42
  back because of some of these people who if you reach out and
• 31:45
  say thank you very much for the business, I beg, what's your
• 31:48
  bank account, they will feel insulted.
• 31:52
  There are some people who will be insulted if you try and give
• 31:54
  them something. So in most cases, the only way
• 31:57
  you can even say say thank you, you actually used to call them
• 32:00
  up and say, oh, thank you. Your cousin called me, your
• 32:03
  sister called me, your brother called me.
• 32:05
  Thank you very much. I really appreciate the support.
• 32:10
  Then maybe once in a while, since giving money back is a
• 32:13
  tricky thing. Maybe once in a while you you
• 32:15
  drop a free something like in this case, since it's a matter
• 32:18
  of T-shirts and you've already done business with Sharma in the
• 32:21
  past and you know the kind of thing that Sharma likes.
• 32:23
  Maybe might not be a bad idea that when Sharma's birthday come
• 32:26
  round, you now tell your delivery guy just want to drop
• 32:28
  one free shirts, the free T-shirt that you designed for
• 32:31
  her in her house. And by the way, this is the
• 32:33
  reason why every single business should have ACRM, the customer
• 32:36
  relationship management tool. There should be somewhere in
• 32:39
  your business that you're keeping all this data that I did
• 32:41
  business with drama. It was over this.
• 32:44
  This was the amount, this is how many copies that she bought.
• 32:47
  These are the things that she likes.
• 32:49
  This is her birthday. This is her husband's name.
• 32:52
  This is her husband's birthday's name.
• 32:53
  These are number of children. Well, OK, maybe that kind of
• 32:56
  information is becoming too much, but we need to have some
• 32:58
  store, storehouse of data somewhere, which is why I keep
• 33:02
  talking about having a CRM for your business.
• 33:05
  If you don't want to pay for a dedicated CRM tool, you can just
• 33:07
  use your phone. The note taking function is OK.
• 33:10
  There are some people that that is how I store their phone
• 33:12
  number. So let's say I store the number
• 33:14
  Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. By the way, I don't know her.
• 33:18
  She's a famous author, but let's just say I've done business with
• 33:20
  her. Maybe for one of her books,
• 33:22
  maybe marketing plan. All righty there, Chimamanda
• 33:25
  Ngozi Adichie when she got married, it wasn't the news.
• 33:28
  I'll put it down the in my in my notes under her name got
• 33:32
  married. So, so, so of course, since I
• 33:34
  have a direct phone number, I don't have you to I'm just
• 33:36
  saying if I did, I would have called her.
• 33:38
  Of course, the whole world would be congratulations.
• 33:40
  So she wouldn't have answered, but I record and then sent a
• 33:42
  message that we've seen. Oh, thank you, congratulations.
• 33:46
  Is the Lord doing you know, she's she's a family, so I would
• 33:48
  have teased her like it is the Lord doing the God has elevated
• 33:51
  your profile. You know that kind of thing
• 33:53
  because you know, when you want to make families angry in a
• 33:55
  playful way, that's how you as are you stroke them smaller.
• 33:58
  You're getting married. Finally, we start the whole
• 34:01
  conversation over here. What do you mean, you idiot?
• 34:04
  Are you saying that before I was married, I was not a woman or I
• 34:07
  was not complete, you know, but I just how some playful ways
• 34:10
  that you just move conversation forward.
• 34:12
  By the way, you only do that if you're a friend, if you're a
• 34:14
  total stranger and you're trying to crack some kind jokes and
• 34:18
  we'll come across one how somehow, which is why trying to
• 34:22
  use humor to build relationships is is dicey, is dicey.
• 34:27
  Anyway, I'm just saying that I need to have something like that
• 34:29
  on my phone so that if I have done business with him, Amanda
• 34:32
  and Garcia DJ, it will be there on my phone.
• 34:34
  This is when we did business. This is what I did for her.
• 34:37
  This is the marketing campaign that we came up with for her
• 34:39
  books. This is how many units we think
• 34:42
  she showed she sold. I think I was able to book on
• 34:45
  XYZ number of shows. She has gotten married also.
• 34:48
  So, so, so did she now has a child, blah, blah, blah, you
• 34:53
  know, all that sort of thing. These are things that make
• 34:55
  relationship building and relationship nurturing easier.
• 34:59
  Anyway, I have strayed too far on what it is that I wanted to
• 35:02
  talk about, but basically summary what I wanted to say is
• 35:05
  this. For those of you who have
• 35:07
  businesses, the Bank of FFF, friends, family and whatever, if
• 35:12
  it's an option, particularly if you have siblings abroad, they
• 35:15
  can raise some money at relatively lower interest fees
• 35:22
  than you can over here. By the time you convert it to
• 35:25
  NIRA, it's millions and millions and millions, even though what
• 35:28
  they took was hundreds or maybe thousands.
• 35:31
  But if you must do that, please be having very clear
• 35:34
  conversations with all these people that are collecting money
• 35:36
  from sources that this brought, this cousin, this anti this.
• 35:41
  I'm collecting £200 from you. You have to be very clear.
• 35:44
  The 200 lbs, is it dash or is it a loan?
• 35:47
  Ambition wants to invest in the business.
• 35:48
  It needs to be very clear. So for Uncle Kunle, I collected
• 35:52
  2800 lbs from you. You need to be very clear.
• 35:55
  Did Uncle Kunle dash you 2800 lbs or did Uncle Kunle loan you
• 35:59
  202,800 lbs? And when he pays back, when you
• 36:03
  pay back, he's expecting that you should pay back 3100 lbs.
• 36:06
  Or is it not Uncle Kunle's 2800 lbs?
• 36:10
  He's collecting it. He now expects that he's a 5050
• 36:12
  owner for the business or for the school.
• 36:14
  Be very clear about these sorts of conversations.
• 36:17
  If you're going to be a grant, you can take the grant and split
• 36:20
  it different ways. So like in this case, the
• 36:22
  school, we could do educational grant, women owned grant, North
• 36:26
  Central grant, Catholic grant, or business owned and run by
• 36:29
  widows because those are the different contexts under which
• 36:32
  we can slot the school. And therefore, those of us who
• 36:34
  are dealing with inbound inquiries, please have some sort
• 36:39
  of plan for how to carry on the conversation saying yes, full
• 36:43
  stop, That is not a plan. Saying yes, good afternoon, that
• 36:48
  is not a decent way to get the conversation ongoing and saying
• 36:51
  yes, good PM or yes, good AM, please stop being lazy.
• 36:55
  Come up with some sort of plan, any kind of plan.
• 36:59
  But the most important thing is you, the business owner should
• 37:02
  take the initiative for moving the conversation forward.
• 37:04
  Stop saying good afternoon, full stop.
• 37:06
  And you expect that the other person should now lead the
• 37:08
  conversation. Let's be real here, everybody's
• 37:13
  talking to three or four different vendors at the same
• 37:16
  time. Even is just yes, good
• 37:18
  afternoon. The other person that says, Oh
• 37:20
  yes, good afternoon. How can I help Even a small
• 37:24
  extra yes, good afternoon. How can I help?
• 37:26
  Can you see that the other person is taking the initiative
• 37:30
  small to move the conversation forward?
• 37:32
  Even just adding how can I help question mark is better than
• 37:36
  just saying yes, good afternoon. Yes, good PM, Yes, good AM.
• 37:41
  Business owners, let's get serious about this thing,
• 37:43
  please. You know, all mature people.
• 37:45
  Let's not behaving irresponsibly here.
• 37:47
  All right? Yeah.
• 37:49
  So that's it. If you would like to connect
• 37:52
  with me for a strategy session for a business audit or you have
• 37:54
  questions you'd like to answer, the number is 08064662140,
• 38:00
  country code +234. Thank you very much for your
• 38:02
  time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next
• 38:04
  episode.