Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / Stop Wasting Money: Finding What Actually Works in Sales & Marketing.

Transcript

Stop Wasting Money: Finding What Actually Works in Sales & Marketing. · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome to the show. I'm recording today's episode at
• 0:05
  my desk and the kids are home, so I expect to get some
• 0:07
  interruptions in the background if this is your first time
• 0:10
  listening to the show. The goal of the podcast is free
• 0:13
  business education. So hang around, you're in the
• 0:15
  right place. And if you get any value from
• 0:17
  it, Please remember to share, promote and talk about the
• 0:20
  podcast so that people in Nigeria and abroad can benefit
• 0:23
  from the questions that we tackle.
• 0:25
  So how can they benefit from this?
• 0:27
  Just by subscribing Spotify, YouTube, Apple, or any player of
• 0:31
  your choice. And if you have any sales or
• 0:34
  marketing questions, you can bring them to me by calling,
• 0:37
  sending me an SMS, or send me a WhatsApp on 08064662140.
• 0:45
  Today's episode is going to be a rambling 1, so I want to
• 0:49
  apologize and that's because I had a conversation with someone
• 0:55
  recently. Let's just call him Steve.
• 0:57
  Not his real name, but let's call him Steve.
• 0:59
  So I had a conversation with Steve about ways that he could
• 1:03
  possibly grow his business. He's kind of in the
• 1:08
  pharmaceutical space, let's say health and Wellness.
• 1:11
  Yeah, health and Wellness. So we had a conversation today
• 1:14
  and I just wanted to share with you guys the conversation that
• 1:17
  we had. And hopefully there's some
• 1:19
  useful Nuggets that a couple of you might be able to learn some
• 1:22
  stuff from. So the reason why this is going
• 1:26
  to be a somehow, somehow scattered episode is because,
• 1:29
  you know, I haven't had the time to digest my thoughts and then,
• 1:34
  you know, make a coherent episode.
• 1:37
  But to be honest, you know, I'm behind on a bunch of stuff.
• 1:40
  There's really some podcast episodes I haven't done and
• 1:43
  there are a couple of people that I'm going to have to talk
• 1:45
  with shortly. So I won't have time to sit down
• 1:48
  and just gather my thoughts. So let me just go ahead and
• 1:50
  share this conversation with you.
• 1:52
  Then shout outs. I haven't done shout outs in a
• 1:55
  very long time. Like to shout out Paul Nabukeke.
• 2:00
  That's a very Conch Ebo name. I guess that's a conquest name
• 2:05
  I've had to pronounce so far on the podcast.
• 2:06
  So Paul Nabu Nabukekeke, thank you very much for listening to
• 2:12
  the show. Listeners on Spotify reached out
• 2:15
  to me on WhatsApp. He's currently waiting for his
• 2:19
  UMES And you know what, just having a nice chat.
• 2:21
  And it's always, it always give me joy to come across people
• 2:28
  who, you know, school hasn't quite clicked or maybe like, you
• 2:31
  know, year 1, you know, but you're already getting the itch.
• 2:35
  You're thinking of one or two things to do is the way forward.
• 2:39
  So Mr. Paul and others who are in that situation, there's one
• 2:44
  thing you guys ought to know. Shah because when you get into
• 2:46
  school, you know it's all fun. You get to meet lots of guys
• 2:50
  from different backgrounds, you know, lots of babes from
• 2:52
  different backgrounds as well. So that's a plus.
• 2:54
  So Mr. Paul, enjoy your uni, it's going to be fun.
• 3:00
  And then, you know, there's the course load and it can seem like
• 3:05
  a lot, you know, you come in, you're meeting all these new
• 3:08
  people, getting all these new friends.
• 3:10
  Maybe you hit the party scene, some of you want to start
• 3:12
  blending with church or fellowship, you know, so it's
• 3:15
  it's a lot. So to now come and add hustle to
• 3:19
  it, to now add entrepreneurship to it, you are making things a
• 3:23
  little bit much more difficult. Sorry, 1 moment.
• 3:30
  Sorry about that. One of my kids needed my
• 3:33
  attention. So I was like, so one of my
• 3:38
  children needed my attention. So I just had to pause and sort
• 3:40
  them out and now I'm back. So I think Paul, OK, it's Paul
• 3:45
  Nagbo KK. So it's going to be lots of fun
• 3:49
  and juggling school and socials and everything is going to be a
• 3:53
  handful. So if you're going to add
• 3:55
  entrepreneurship to the mix, you are going to be juggling quite a
• 3:58
  lot. So for people like you that have
• 4:00
  chosen to go down this path, just know that your focus is
• 4:03
  going to have to be on another level because someone was
• 4:06
  entered uni and we played die, as in from day one until the
• 4:11
  last day was play, play, play, play, play.
• 4:13
  Unfortunately, you are not going to be able to have that kind of
• 4:17
  life because let's say you're going to do something as simple
• 4:19
  as Suya, for instance, because it was one of my classmates, not
• 4:23
  in my own faculty. I think it was in social
• 4:26
  sciences. And so that's what he did.
• 4:27
  Suya, shawarma, you know, all those kind of things.
• 4:30
  So when lectures finish for some of us was a matter of OK, let's
• 4:34
  bath, let's go, Jim from Jim went our female hostel, you
• 4:38
  know, but for him he was, you know, lectures is up.
• 4:41
  You have to go and start preparing.
• 4:42
  You have to cut all the vegetable down, make sure the
• 4:44
  meat is on point, go and buy kerosene, make sure the grill is
• 4:48
  on point. What else?
• 4:50
  You know, because he had a business to run.
• 4:52
  So it's going to be a different kind of life no matter what it
• 4:55
  is that you decide to do, except if you're going to be selling
• 5:00
  credit. But even selling credit, Sha has
• 5:03
  its own challenges. But bottom line, what I'm just
• 5:05
  saying is, yes, you're waiting for you and me.
• 5:07
  It's my prayer that this thing is going to click and that you
• 5:09
  are going to have fun in the next stage of your life,
• 5:13
  university. But just know, Sha, that if
• 5:16
  you're going to do this hustling thing, you can't be relaxing.
• 5:20
  And I'm not saying you don't have fun.
• 5:22
  Don't catch trips. Catch trips, yes, but just know
• 5:24
  that you're putting a lot on your plate.
• 5:26
  So you're not going to be able to live as the rest of your
• 5:28
  classmates. Just be OK with that and you'll
• 5:33
  be fine. So yes, I have.
• 5:37
  So my conversation with this guy, Steve, not his real name.
• 5:41
  So Steve is one of these people who reached out to me live on
• 5:44
  the radio show. And of course, that's sometimes
• 5:48
  when I need more details, so I tell people to just hit me up
• 5:50
  WhatsApp so that we can talk some more.
• 5:52
  And it turns out that he's in the health and Wellness space.
• 5:55
  He already has a bunch of stuff that is being sold at H Medics.
• 5:59
  H Medics is one of the big pharmaceutical chains in Abuja.
• 6:04
  Then he also has some stuff in hospitals.
• 6:08
  They've done some sponsored programs, you know, things like
• 6:10
  that. He has some things in medical
• 6:11
  labs. And then they're also using user
• 6:14
  generated content to promote the business because he's in health
• 6:18
  and Wellness space and he happens to have one of those
• 6:21
  drugs where people take it and they say that, you know, this
• 6:24
  thing is a real deal. So they're sending him
• 6:26
  testimonials. And I think that's fantastic
• 6:28
  because the first time I need to see what kind of testimonials he
• 6:31
  got, he sent me like 26 videos. I'm like, now for this guy, when
• 6:35
  you come and send me 26 videos, but I mean, 26 of 26 customers
• 6:42
  sending you video testimonials on solicited like you didn't beg
• 6:45
  them. And once I say, man, this
• 6:47
  testimony, I have to share this testimony.
• 6:49
  Well, I guess it's a it's a good thing.
• 6:51
  Any I'm assuming they're not paid actors anyway, because he
• 6:54
  didn't sound like a fraud and the videos looked all right.
• 6:57
  But even if you don't have that level of success in your own
• 7:00
  business yet, when I say success, I mean people really
• 7:03
  liking your product. Just know that it's possible.
• 7:05
  I also had a call with another entrepreneur, but she's based in
• 7:11
  Lagos. That was yesterday.
• 7:13
  I'll share some of the details later.
• 7:14
  For that one, I definitely have to go over my notes, but I'm not
• 7:17
  saying it is possible that people can love your product
• 7:19
  that much that they will say, look, I just have to send you a
• 7:22
  video to say thank you and stuff like that.
• 7:24
  So he promotes the business by using user generator content
• 7:28
  then because he's in the health and Wellness space.
• 7:31
  In the beginning, they had a mission to keep the cost low,
• 7:34
  but you know, we're in Nigeria now.
• 7:35
  So that was this thing called hyperinflation.
• 7:40
  You know, the cost of production is going up.
• 7:42
  So right now, sometimes they have to sell a bottle maybe
• 7:46
  close to like that kind of tanky.
• 7:48
  So sometimes they can take maybe seven or five.
• 7:50
  But yeah, then let's see what else.
• 7:54
  They also had offices in Kano, but they had to shut down
• 7:57
  operations in Kano because the Abuja office was basically
• 8:02
  financing the Kano operations. So they shut that down.
• 8:05
  You know, these are some of the difficult decisions that you
• 8:06
  have to go into as default decisions they have to make as a
• 8:10
  business owner. So like back when my first son
• 8:13
  was really, really little, I had a studio space.
• 8:17
  But I just thought about it. I was paying like 30 K every
• 8:20
  month. I mean, now 30 KA month is is is
• 8:23
  nothing. So some of you will be laughing.
• 8:24
  Just know that this was a while ago.
• 8:26
  So 30K every month in just to maintain the studio space.
• 8:32
  And I was spending a lot of time, you know, either with him
• 8:35
  or you know, how baby's going to be now, you know, they get sick,
• 8:38
  it's time for immunization, blah, blah, blah.
• 8:40
  So I know how to shut down the office space.
• 8:43
  So, you know, these are some of the difficult decisions that you
• 8:45
  have to make in business. You have to allocate scarce
• 8:48
  resources. You know, it's not as if you're
• 8:51
  a Khashoggi. It's not as if you have all the
• 8:52
  money in the world. So you have to determine where
• 8:54
  can I put this money effectively.
• 8:55
  So they shut down, Stephen had to, Steve had to shut down the
• 8:59
  account office. Then let's see, they've been
• 9:02
  running this business in Abuja 10 years.
• 9:03
  That's real commendable. I hope those of you who are new
• 9:09
  in this space and get to see the level of effort and dedication
• 9:11
  that has to go into this thing. So he's not like he entered
• 9:15
  something and then he changed and then he changed and then he
• 9:17
  changed and he's been running this game for like 10 years.
• 9:20
  And you'll make sense now when you now understand that they're
• 9:22
  doing as on average 3 M in profits monthly.
• 9:27
  You know, so it's not it's not beings it doesn't just start
• 9:30
  like that because the whole bunch of you, especially guys
• 9:33
  are you guys are too impatient. So you start crypto today, you
• 9:37
  do crypto from January to March and then crypto is not popping
• 9:40
  off. Then next thing you know you're
• 9:42
  doing real estate real estate. You do real estate from July to
• 9:44
  August and then real estate is not popping off and then you now
• 9:48
  say you're doing multi level marketing.
• 9:49
  Multi level marketing will not carry you from, you know,
• 9:52
  September to maybe like February next year.
• 9:55
  Then The thing is not working. And then because of Valentine's
• 9:57
  Day, you notice that people are really buying cards and gifts.
• 10:00
  And then now you're in the gifting space.
• 10:01
  I mean, like, you know, calm down.
• 10:03
  You're running too much from left, right to all over the
• 10:07
  place. You're not giving this thing
• 10:08
  time to grow. So lots of business people, the
• 10:13
  average entrepreneur, I mean, they actually have to give this
• 10:15
  in some time to show that you're building something.
• 10:18
  So he's been this, Steve has been in this in this for 10
• 10:21
  years. So of course they have Lagos
• 10:22
  office or office and it looks like they're not doing too bad
• 10:25
  on the Flyers end. That's also something he's been
• 10:27
  using to promote his business. They printed about 20,000 worth
• 10:31
  of Flyers and then they did this really interesting thing I see
• 10:35
  with people, some people where the flyer is front to back.
• 10:38
  So the front is the Wellness products for women, the back is
• 10:43
  one of Wellness products for men.
• 10:45
  Some of you might be saying 20,000 Flyers, like what?
• 10:48
  But remember I told you that Flyers is a numbers game.
• 10:51
  So if you can afford to print 20,000, it's all good.
• 10:55
  Because think about it, if you have 20,000 Flyers and you have
• 10:58
  4 locations like him, there's Lagos, Abuja, Des Abe, is that 3
• 11:02
  or 4? Abuja, Lagos and weary, if you
• 11:04
  only split it, that was only like 7000 Flyers, you know, for
• 11:08
  each city. So if you look at it from that
• 11:10
  point of view, 7000 Flyers per city, yeah, it's not that much
• 11:14
  because 7000 Flyers were finished, you know, shop, shop.
• 11:17
  By the time you call your sales associates, your sales boys,
• 11:19
  your sales girls, you know, you send them out, you give
• 11:21
  everybody, you know, 556600 Flyers.
• 11:24
  I mean before you know, it's 7000 Flyers not finished.
• 11:26
  So don't look at it as if it's that big.
• 11:28
  If you can afford it, make sure no problem.
• 11:31
  Then other things that he has been doing to promote his
• 11:33
  business. Oh, sorry.
• 11:34
  By the way, the reason why I'm running through all these
• 11:36
  things, what he has been doing to promote his business is
• 11:39
  because the reason why he reached out was because I'm
• 11:42
  they've been having problems with patronage, as he called it
• 11:45
  all growing sales. And typically when we're trying
• 11:48
  to solve these kinds of problems, the first thing I like
• 11:50
  to do is I like to say, look, let's sit down and let's try and
• 11:52
  figure out what is it that is currently working or what has
• 11:57
  worked the best. Because when it comes to
• 12:00
  expanding your sales, the first port of call actually is to
• 12:02
  figure out what have I done in the past or what is working now?
• 12:06
  And then let me double down and do most of that thing.
• 12:10
  Because in the beginning, we want to make sure that we're
• 12:12
  doing the right thing. After that, we want to make sure
• 12:17
  that we Max out our effort. It is only after that that we
• 12:21
  can now start worrying about scale.
• 12:24
  So Please remember the challenges that you will face in
• 12:26
  the beginning and the early parts of your business are
• 12:30
  problems of effort or problems that can be overcome by effort.
• 12:35
  What am I doing? Am I doing the right thing?
• 12:38
  Oh OK, I have figured out the right thing.
• 12:40
  I figured out something that works.
• 12:41
  Let me now multiply this thing. Let me do it as much as I
• 12:44
  possibly can. Then next will be scale.
• 12:47
  Now I have figured out what it is that is working.
• 12:50
  How am I going to remove myself from this situation so that I do
• 12:54
  not become a bottleneck? How can I train 5 or 6 other
• 12:57
  people to sell as me so that instead of me, instead of it
• 13:01
  being my own effort, bringing in all this money, let me take
• 13:04
  other people's effort. It is now effort times 5.
• 13:09
  That's why we now start talking about scale.
• 13:11
  So scale is now we're talking about people or talking about
• 13:14
  systems or protocols. So whatever it is, that is when
• 13:17
  you now start thinking, OK, let me get a team, let me train up a
• 13:20
  team or what tech thing can we do here?
• 13:22
  Or how can we gain leverage here?
• 13:24
  You know, So that's the second level scale.
• 13:28
  After that, your problems will be problems of strategy.
• 13:32
  That is where like in Stevens case, they will now start
• 13:34
  thinking, OK, we've been in the health and Wellness space.
• 13:36
  We've been doing this for 15 years.
• 13:38
  Looks like we've maxed out our our profits.
• 13:40
  Should we enter a new city? Should we start a new product,
• 13:43
  you know, or should we partner with this person or whatever?
• 13:46
  You now start thinking strategic things.
• 13:48
  So that is the trajectory. Now, the reason, another reason
• 13:52
  why I'm repeating that today is because lots of you are getting
• 13:55
  this thing twisted. Some of you start and you're
• 13:57
  thinking man ought to be strategic extract like stop the
• 14:00
  strategy thing. There's no strategic nothing.
• 14:02
  Now your reasoning things backward, especially for young
• 14:05
  men right now is a matter of figuring out what is the right
• 14:10
  thing to do. Where should I be spending my
• 14:12
  time that is going to yield results?
• 14:14
  In the beginning, results just mean instruction.
• 14:16
  Traction just means customers are coming in or deposits are
• 14:19
  entering the bank account. That's why you should be looking
• 14:21
  for are customers coming? Are people calling?
• 14:24
  Are people entering the shop? Are people coming through?
• 14:26
  Are people sending me DMS? That distraction then of course,
• 14:30
  you know how much money is entering the bank account is the
• 14:32
  money entering daily is he entering weekly is he entering
• 14:34
  monthly? Is it entering in the amount
• 14:36
  that I like it those are the kind of things you should be
• 14:38
  worried about so we should be thinking about the activities
• 14:41
  that we're doing and whether it's yielding those results so
• 14:44
  effort first after effort, then skill after skill, then
• 14:47
  strategy. So young man listening, stop
• 14:50
  coming into this thing thinking I'm going to be strategic from
• 14:52
  the beginning. It doesn't work like that.
• 14:54
  The time for strategy will come, but of course I'm also going to
• 14:56
  switch off your brains. So the reason why I'm running
• 14:59
  through all these things, you know, he's in age medics, he's
• 15:02
  in hospitals, he's in medical labs, They've done sponsor
• 15:06
  programs, they're doing UGC is the ground sponsored ads is
• 15:09
  because I was running. We're running through a list of
• 15:12
  every single thing that he has done because we're trying to
• 15:14
  figure out what is it that works.
• 15:17
  Because if it turns out that being in pharmacies like age
• 15:20
  Medics is the one that works for your business, then he's a no
• 15:23
  brainer. My advice to you will be OK
• 15:24
  instead of age Medics, how can we go and add 234567 pharmacies
• 15:29
  in Abuja and scale this thing? So you figure out what works
• 15:34
  first the one that is working, just pour kerosene on it and
• 15:37
  then light fire and then you know blow start burning.
• 15:40
  So that's how that's how we go about this.
• 15:44
  And it turns out that H medicine was not a good thing for him the
• 15:47
  pharmacy. And I'm not surprised because
• 15:49
  this is the problem with retail for those of you who want to do
• 15:51
  stuff like this, because like one of my friends, he's, he and
• 15:55
  his wife, they're doing soap. And you know, it's nice.
• 15:58
  It's just that the problem with retail is this.
• 16:00
  You take your, your merchandise, the soap or the, the banana
• 16:07
  chips, the plantain chips, the whatever it is that you've made
• 16:10
  the change in, you now give it to the shop.
• 16:11
  And this is what the shop will tell you.
• 16:13
  The shop will tell you, sure, no problem, you can put it here.
• 16:16
  But honestly speaking, the shop is going to pay you when the
• 16:21
  goods have been sold. And apart from that, their
• 16:25
  standard terms are like 30 days or 60 days.
• 16:27
  So in other words, you will take your chips to the shop January
• 16:31
  1st and the person will collect it from you January 1st.
• 16:34
  But honestly speaking, you won't see any money from that chips
• 16:37
  until March. And the sad thing is sometimes
• 16:41
  you can even show up in March and they will tell you that look
• 16:44
  or the chips that we collected were only able to sell half.
• 16:47
  So this remaining inventory, take it back.
• 16:50
  Isn't it just taking up shelf space?
• 16:53
  So when it comes to this retail thing, man, that's a rough game.
• 16:56
  Rough game, especially for those of you who are starting off the
• 16:59
  first time business. So as much as I want to tell my
• 17:03
  friend, like, you know, but I say, well, let me, let me allow
• 17:08
  them, you know, maybe they'll be able to figure out something
• 17:11
  out. But just for those of you who
• 17:12
  want to start business, you just know that selling through
• 17:14
  retailers is tough, is really, really tough.
• 17:17
  Their payment terms are not nice at all.
• 17:21
  First of all, you have to chase them a lot to put your
• 17:25
  consignment in the shop and then they will agree, OK, bring 100
• 17:29
  cartoons. You bring 100 cartoons and you
• 17:31
  start celebrating. They will not pay you for the
• 17:33
  100 cartoons. Please, I'm repeating again,
• 17:36
  most retailers are not going to pay you upfront for the goods
• 17:40
  that you are bringing to the shop.
• 17:41
  They'll keep it in the shop and they'll say when we sell it,
• 17:44
  we'll give you the money. And even at that payment terms
• 17:47
  is going to be net 60. Sorry, net 30 or net 60.
• 17:51
  That's how they call it net. I don't know why they say net,
• 17:53
  net 30, net this. I'm like, what are you netting?
• 17:55
  So those are the payment terms for just know you're going to do
• 17:58
  retail and you drop 100 cartoons of your potato chips at the shop
• 18:03
  January 1st. Just know, realistically
• 18:05
  speaking, except if you're maybe dealing with a church member or
• 18:09
  something and he says he wants to support your hustle, you're
• 18:12
  not going to see anything from that batch until like February,
• 18:16
  March. That's when you start seeing
• 18:18
  payment for it. So because the payment terms are
• 18:24
  unfavorable, Steve is thinking about discontinuing his, his
• 18:29
  partnership with this particular pharmacy.
• 18:32
  Because for labs and for hospitals, you know, it kind of
• 18:35
  makes more sense because for the labs and the hospital, it's sort
• 18:38
  of like on demand because then health and Wellness space and,
• 18:41
  and they sell stuff that can be used in using IVF or in place of
• 18:48
  IVF. So that one is on demand.
• 18:49
  You know, the hospital will call you and say, oh boy, we have 15
• 18:52
  clients, we need 30 bottles and then they'll just send it to the
• 18:54
  hospital. So that one is, is different.
• 18:57
  So for those of you who've been listening to the show,
• 19:02
  especially episodes where I talk about sales channels, you can
• 19:04
  see now why the choice of sales channel is important because
• 19:08
  some channels work better than others.
• 19:10
  Some channels pay faster than others, some channels have more
• 19:14
  headache than others. So you have to be strategic
• 19:18
  about it. So anyway, that's the reason why
• 19:20
  I'm asking all this question on question like, OK, all these
• 19:22
  things you've done, now which one works the best?
• 19:24
  And then let's double down. Then they also have done some
• 19:27
  seminars and symposium Abbey symposium symposia, symposiums,
• 19:32
  whichever is the plural of symposium.
• 19:35
  OK, I'll be symposium is the plural.
• 19:36
  OK, so single singular should be simple symposia.
• 19:41
  I think English grads, please let me know also.
• 19:45
  So seminar symposium lectures, presentation at churches, you
• 19:50
  know things like that. But I must admit I like Steve.
• 19:52
  I like his I like his gumption. I like the gospel as anyhow
• 19:57
  shall I will make this thing work and the margins on.
• 20:01
  Medicines, pharmaceuticals, you know, stuff like that.
• 20:03
  The margins are small, except if you're in the, you know, doing
• 20:08
  like in the beauty space. I hear that the margins on
• 20:10
  beauty products and perfumes and things like that are wonderful
• 20:14
  as in the margins make more sense, but health and Wellness
• 20:17
  is not. So we can charge that much.
• 20:21
  So, but I like his, I like his, his view.
• 20:24
  Like anyhow, anyhow, who make this thing work?
• 20:27
  So he's he's also in the thing and so big ups to Steve and
• 20:31
  other people who are in Steve's situation.
• 20:33
  So some of the ideas that he was talking about trying out now was
• 20:37
  he said that some people who are doing drop shipping of their
• 20:40
  products both at home and abroad.
• 20:43
  But the reason why he doesn't want to go down that route is
• 20:45
  because the drop shippers are not really moving market like
• 20:48
  that like that. Like it's not really moving
• 20:50
  fast, fast, fast. So they are looking for people
• 20:52
  that will be distributors. And he described his idea and I
• 20:56
  told him, and this is something that I want to let you know in
• 20:58
  case you're in a similar position as Steve is.
• 21:02
  He's looking for people who are willing to invest time and
• 21:04
  money. So people will raise, you know,
• 21:06
  a couple grand, maybe like 100K, you know, buy a couple of
• 21:09
  bottles and then sell. And then he will give them
• 21:11
  margins of like 2K or 1/5 on each bottle.
• 21:15
  And yes, that kind of thing makes sense.
• 21:18
  You know, he works in different circumstances, but I just told
• 21:20
  him like, hey, Steve, sure. You know, like why Niger?
• 21:23
  The moment anybody hears this thing, they will say you're
• 21:25
  doing multi level marketing, they'll say you're doing network
• 21:27
  marketing. He said, yes, I know, but it's
• 21:29
  not network marketing, blah, blah, blah.
• 21:30
  And I told him like, you know, my guy, I'm, I'm with you, I
• 21:34
  feel you. I know it's not multi level
• 21:36
  marketing. I'm just telling you that when
• 21:39
  you start explaining like this, people will start saying this is
• 21:41
  multi level marketing. So part of your sales process in
• 21:46
  getting people to come on board as distributors, you guys need
• 21:49
  to think hard and fast. How are you going to overcome
• 21:52
  this multi level marketing challenge?
• 21:55
  Because Irish Nigeria will hear this thing.
• 21:56
  I will say, ah MLMI beg me, I don't want to do 419 This is
• 22:01
  this not about that. So you have to think about that.
• 22:04
  Then I also told him that the distributor play, that the
• 22:08
  reason why it works in other industries is because the
• 22:13
  distributors can see that the owner of the intellectual
• 22:17
  property, the person who owns the brands typically has
• 22:19
  invested a lot of money in sales and marketing.
• 22:22
  So it gives people comfort that even though I'm buying
• 22:25
  merchandise from the owner of the company, I'm buying maybe
• 22:30
  like 2 million worth of product, they have confidence that OK,
• 22:34
  the thing will move, I'll be able to sell because of the
• 22:37
  advertising that people are doing.
• 22:39
  So the example that I gave him was NBC, that's Nigerian
• 22:43
  Breweries Company, Abby, Nigerian Breweries Corporation,
• 22:48
  any NBC shop. Those are the people that do
• 22:51
  Coca-Cola. I think they also do star that
• 22:55
  star beer, Coca-Cola, Fantas Pride star, you know all of
• 22:58
  that. So for those of you who live in
• 23:00
  Lagos, you know when you want to enter a Laosa from our Wall Rd.
• 23:03
  So depending on where you're coming from, by the time you get
• 23:07
  to what's this place now? I, I think it used to be catch a
• 23:12
  city mall. I'd be catch a country mall.
• 23:13
  I can't remember because I've been in Lagos for a very long
• 23:16
  time. So by the time you pass, you
• 23:18
  catch a city mall, you now turn right.
• 23:22
  That's if you're coming from Nepal side, where you're coming
• 23:24
  from Allen Ave. junction and that'll be before you get to the
• 23:28
  mall. You now turn left.
• 23:29
  So NBC, that's where they are. So Fanta coke star and
• 23:32
  everything. So those people, this is the
• 23:36
  model that they do. So if I am a seller of star, I
• 23:39
  will go to NBC and I'll say NBC or I give me 100 crates of star
• 23:44
  and I will pay NBC upfront for the bottles of star and then
• 23:47
  I'll collect my 100 crates. It is now left to me to sell my
• 23:50
  100 crates of beer, add my own markup, and then now settle
• 23:54
  myself and everything is cool. The reason why people do that no
• 23:58
  confidence is because they see that NBC is putting up
• 24:03
  billboards, star, Sunshine Bubble, putting TV
• 24:07
  advertisements, Sunshine Bubble, putting advertisements for
• 24:11
  Fanta, for sprites, for I think the one Marinda as well, Abby
• 24:16
  and let me also do 1. I don't know.
• 24:18
  But The thing is NBC is advertising all over the place.
• 24:20
  So I can go there with some confidence and say give me 100
• 24:24
  crates of Star, give me 500 crates of Coke, give me 200
• 24:28
  crates of Fanta and pay them because I'm seeing
• 24:31
  advertisements. That has given me some comfort
• 24:36
  that anyhow, sure, I will sell this thing because I can see the
• 24:41
  marketing that people are doing. So I told him that look is
• 24:43
  something you guys have to factor into the equation.
• 24:46
  Do people see that you guys are investing into promoting this
• 24:50
  thing? Then they might feel more
• 24:52
  secure. Like OK, 200,000 is a lot of
• 24:56
  money, but the way these people are pushing this thing, this is
• 24:58
  going to blow or give me 500 boxes.
• 25:04
  So we had that conversation. And so if you are in that space
• 25:07
  and you're thinking of recruiting distributors that
• 25:09
  way, these are two challenges that you need to know.
• 25:12
  I'm not saying don't use it. I'm not saying just know that
• 25:15
  Nigerians will say, Bros, you're doing multi level marketing, I'm
• 25:18
  out. You need to know how to have
• 25:20
  that conversation with them. Then the second thing is you
• 25:23
  also need to be able to, part of the risk mitigation will be to
• 25:26
  let them know that this is how much we're investing in
• 25:28
  promoting the brand. This are the, these are the
• 25:31
  plans that we have for promoting and marketing the brand in the
• 25:35
  future. And this is our track record in
• 25:38
  the past. This is what we're going to in
• 25:39
  the future. This is why it's going to make
• 25:41
  sense for you to put some time and some effort behind this.
• 25:46
  So there's one problem I had in particular with Steve.
• 25:50
  And the problem is, well, of course, you know, Steve's been
• 25:52
  doing this for 10 years. He's done a whole lot.
• 25:55
  He's tried a whole lot. So trying to figure out the one
• 25:57
  that is actually working 1 is actually popping off was kind of
• 26:00
  like a problem because he's done a lot.
• 26:03
  So excuse me. My advice for, you know, people
• 26:09
  like this, like your vein, your ginger is, is high and you're
• 26:13
  moving here, moving there, trying to make things work.
• 26:16
  Always try and be keeping records, be writing down things
• 26:19
  here and there, you know, small, small, small, small so that one
• 26:23
  day after six months or one year, you can look back and say,
• 26:25
  Kai, isn't that I tried. Did this thing even work?
• 26:29
  OK, What? How well did it work?
• 26:30
  So you can make decisions because in the future, if you're
• 26:33
  going to call a consultant and sit down with a sales
• 26:36
  consultant, we need to see some of these things that OK, you did
• 26:40
  Instagram ads. How much money did you drop?
• 26:42
  OK, after you drop money, how many customers came?
• 26:47
  OK, You tried Flyers? How much money did you drop from
• 26:50
  the money that you drop? How much customers came?
• 26:52
  OK, you deal billboard. How many billboards did you buy
• 26:55
  during that period? How much food traffic did you
• 26:58
  get? How many people came into the
• 26:59
  office? How much, how many customers did
• 27:02
  you get? We need to ask these questions
• 27:03
  because that's what's going to be able to help us figure out
• 27:07
  the, what's it called? ROI?
• 27:09
  I mean the return on investment. That's what's going to be able
• 27:12
  to help us figure out all these things.
• 27:15
  How much money did you drop? What were the results?
• 27:18
  How quickly did the results come in?
• 27:20
  It is then we'll be able to say you know what, this flyer thing,
• 27:24
  double down on the flyer. This is the one that makes
• 27:25
  sense. Or you know what, this billboard
• 27:27
  thing that I want to make sense pass while I double down on
• 27:30
  that. Or you know all the seminars
• 27:32
  you've been doing, that's where the money is.
• 27:34
  So instead of doing 1 seminar a month, let's say how we can be
• 27:38
  doing like 4 seminars every month.
• 27:40
  So we actually need these things.
• 27:41
  So as you're perambulating, as you're doing this, as you do
• 27:44
  also up and down, just be writing things down.
• 27:46
  Now, I know it's hard because that's why I'm not very
• 27:49
  organized. So I have lots of books that I
• 27:52
  keep when I'm just being writing, writing, writing,
• 27:54
  writing, writing. So that back when I still used
• 27:58
  to work with my accountant, so that at the end of the year, my
• 28:00
  accountant needed any information.
• 28:02
  I mean, it was hard work, but the thing was, at least I had
• 28:05
  everything. If my accountant asked for
• 28:06
  anything, I'll be able to say, you know what?
• 28:07
  I don't have the information. But here, take all these
• 28:09
  receipts. If you check all these receipts,
• 28:11
  you'll be able to figure it out or, OK, I don't have all the
• 28:13
  information you're looking for now, but all these papers I have
• 28:16
  here like this, should I check all these people?
• 28:17
  You find everything. I mean, the poor guy used to
• 28:20
  give me stress, but should I be writing things down here, here,
• 28:23
  here, here, here? Let's try and figure out what it
• 28:25
  is that works. So remember that as you're
• 28:29
  trying these things, as you're trying billboard flyer, this,
• 28:35
  that. Should I just be writing things
• 28:37
  down? This is how much I spent in
• 28:38
  Flyers from this period to this period will not be able to go
• 28:42
  and check your invoices, check your Excel sheet, check your
• 28:46
  wherever, where you track where you're selling.
• 28:49
  And I'll be able to figure out that OK, in this period that we
• 28:52
  spent X amount, this is what came in.
• 28:54
  OK, maybe this is always responsible.
• 28:57
  So yeah, that was my difficulty. But I told him that look, since
• 29:00
  you already have 20,000 Flyers lying around, we might as well
• 29:05
  because The thing is just lying down there.
• 29:08
  Why waste it? We've already spent the money,
• 29:09
  so let's start pumping the Flyers out.
• 29:12
  So we had to come up with a plan.
• 29:14
  Then the next part was having conversations to try and figure
• 29:18
  out the ICP. So we came up with women 20 to
• 29:21
  2245 for that particular product because the even though it's
• 29:25
  health and Wellness, it deals with specific reproductive
• 29:28
  issues. So consumption heavy, heavy
• 29:32
  flows, delayed period, you know, all these sorts of things.
• 29:36
  And then of course, Abuja is doing good, although he says
• 29:40
  most of the money comes from Lagos, but he is based in Abuja.
• 29:44
  So I said, OK, no problem, you're based here.
• 29:46
  So we want to see how we can beef the Abuja market soon.
• 29:48
  Walla. So women 22 to 45, you know,
• 29:51
  Abuja, we got a sense of the occupation, the typical people
• 29:57
  that buy from him. We had to figure that out.
• 29:59
  And this is how I explained it to him.
• 30:01
  So I explained to him like this, you know, when we're running
• 30:03
  Instagram ads, there's a place in the Facebook ad manager.
• 30:07
  What do you think will ask you to sign train information?
• 30:09
  Now? Who should I show this
• 30:11
  advertisement to You're on That will now decide.
• 30:13
  So I told him all those things that you enter into the Facebook
• 30:16
  ad manager, we need that information as well.
• 30:19
  It's not only online that you do it like that.
• 30:21
  In the real world, we actually, we actually need this
• 30:23
  information as well because it determines where we are going to
• 30:26
  go. So if we're going to go and drop
• 30:29
  Flyers and we have information that says women 22 to 45 living
• 30:34
  in Abuja, most of them are civil servants.
• 30:37
  One idea that came up was to see how we could enter.
• 30:42
  What's this place? What's this place called?
• 30:46
  I think I skipped my mind. It's in central area Federal
• 30:51
  secretariat. So new secretariat, old
• 30:53
  secretariat, you know, was an idea, just hashed it out.
• 30:59
  Oh, by the way, one of the reasons why I'm considering when
• 31:01
  I see people who want to do the flyer game, why I think of ideas
• 31:06
  like this, is because doing Flyers, sending out, handing out
• 31:12
  Flyers can be very hard work. So if you're going to do it like
• 31:16
  how people are doing it in Abuja, real estate, people in
• 31:18
  Abuja, they stay at traffic lights and then they give off
• 31:20
  Flyers. The problem with that is you're
• 31:22
  just making the work unnecessarily hard because not
• 31:25
  everybody will collect traffic starts and stops.
• 31:29
  They won't have to be there for a very long time.
• 31:30
  But if you go to a place where cars are already parked, let's
• 31:33
  say 2000 cars are parked. Oh, that's easy.
• 31:37
  Four or five people can walk around in 45 minutes, one hour
• 31:40
  and conveniently drop Flyers in every single car in the parking
• 31:45
  lot that has, you know, 2000 cars.
• 31:48
  OK, no, let me not say one hour, maybe say maybe like 2 hours, 3
• 31:51
  hours. So it will be worth more of your
• 31:52
  time. So that's why I was thinking
• 31:54
  these sorts of things. But anyway, because of some
• 31:56
  particular reasons why we decided to scratch that idea.
• 31:59
  So it made more sense based on his relationship with churches
• 32:02
  to go down the churches route, you know, presentation in
• 32:05
  churches and then dropping the Flyers at the car parks in
• 32:09
  churches like that one seemed like you can make more make more
• 32:13
  sense. Then remember I said I've been
• 32:17
  doing billboards and billboards in Abuja is like 300 grand.
• 32:22
  That's what he said. The last time he did it was 300
• 32:24
  K. And this also another reason why
• 32:26
  if you're talking to a consultant, you know, just like
• 32:29
  me, will be asking you some kind information because it's when we
• 32:32
  know exactly the time or the amount that you've invested in
• 32:36
  something, we might have a sense of where it might be, how to put
• 32:43
  it. We'll get a sense of where best
• 32:46
  to reroute these resources that might have more impact because
• 32:50
  Steve is very knowledgeable. So this is his life.
• 32:52
  He's been doing this thing for the last 10 years.
• 32:54
  So you know, infertility, what else?
• 32:57
  Infertility, PCOS, hormonal issues.
• 33:00
  But I mean, like, that's his thing.
• 33:01
  He's obviously very knowledgeable and he's obviously
• 33:04
  very passionate about the thing. I even forgot to ask him like,
• 33:06
  how did you get involved in all this?
• 33:07
  Because it's, I mean, apart from people who went to school to
• 33:11
  study, it's you know, like medicine, medicine, medicine.
• 33:13
  I don't know of ordinary guys who just carry this thing on
• 33:16
  their head like that. Anyway, so he's your passionate.
• 33:23
  And so while we're talking, it also got to me now look, instead
• 33:26
  of dropping 300K on billboards, you're better off routing that
• 33:31
  thing through radio and then going through a content
• 33:34
  marketing strategy. And at that point he said that's
• 33:38
  actually the reason why I called into the show.
• 33:40
  I was like, oh, OK, fantastic. We're on the same mind then.
• 33:42
  And so that's the plan that we came up with and that is how we
• 33:45
  ended the meeting. We hashed out the plan for the
• 33:48
  churches he's going to execute and then I hooked him up with
• 33:53
  somebody else who is in radio because Radio Maria is a
• 33:56
  not-for-profit. So Radio Maria does not do this
• 33:58
  kind of thing. You can't go and do advert
• 34:01
  advertising on Radio Maria, especially since it has some
• 34:04
  kind of connection or implication.
• 34:06
  Some time to IVF is not something that even if Radio
• 34:10
  Maria was not a Catholic station, they wouldn't even
• 34:12
  collect the money. So I hooked him up.
• 34:17
  I know someone who's in the marketing team at some other
• 34:22
  radio station and then I hooked them up and this is what we
• 34:25
  agreed. So I told him that this is the
• 34:27
  play. I'll try and get you on radio
• 34:29
  and I'll try and get you on radio so that you will be the
• 34:32
  only person on the show. Because he told me that he has
• 34:35
  done radio in the past, but he was a panel of four.
• 34:37
  And I said, Oh no, no, panel of four does not make sense.
• 34:39
  The attention is diluted. So I'll try and get you on
• 34:43
  radio. You'll be the only person on the
• 34:45
  panel because this your charisma, this your vision, this
• 34:49
  your knowledge, it has to come through, especially if it's a
• 34:52
  calling thing where people can call in and ask questions.
• 34:55
  So you'll be the only one that will be there.
• 34:57
  And so I told him when you get there, don't sell.
• 35:00
  And he agreed his of course, I'm not going to sell on air.
• 35:03
  See, this is also some people need to learn.
• 35:04
  Sometimes those of us who are trying to move markets, we try
• 35:08
  and do it in a very what's that word in a very like if we're
• 35:13
  trying to sell too hard, people will know and you know they'll,
• 35:16
  they'll just because nobody likes being sold to.
• 35:20
  They're just this one is a hack. This one is a Hulkster.
• 35:23
  So sometimes you're just giving value, just giving value, just
• 35:26
  giving value. People be coming forward who's
• 35:29
  OK, I'm interested or I want to learn more.
• 35:31
  And it is when you're now having one-on-one interactions with
• 35:34
  people that you not have a chance to sell.
• 35:36
  So I told him when you're on the radio, don't sell anything.
• 35:39
  He said, of course not will be a matter of discussing all these
• 35:41
  issues. PCOS, What is PCOS?
• 35:44
  How is it caused? How do you know if you have it?
• 35:47
  What are the symptoms? What are the signs, what are the
• 35:50
  things healthy living that you can do to help out with this and
• 35:53
  to that and to that and blah, blah, blah.
• 35:56
  And then the call to action at the end of the radio show now
• 35:58
  will be if you would like to learn more about any of these
• 36:02
  things, call me on blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
• 36:05
  So that's the scope. Some of you might be saying this
• 36:09
  sounds a lot like your podcast. Yeah, you'll be correct.
• 36:12
  It is the scope. So he said yes, yes, yes, that
• 36:17
  no problem. So we've agreed.
• 36:19
  And by the way, this thing I say about call to action, you see
• 36:22
  why I say it's very, very important because there's some
• 36:24
  of you who go on radio, because I see it a lot on LinkedIn.
• 36:29
  Oh, I was called to do this, this on this radio station or
• 36:33
  this TV station. And they have a nice segment,
• 36:35
  but at the end of the day, there's no call to action at the
• 36:38
  end of the segment. I mean, it's OK, It's good for
• 36:40
  branding, but for sales is not entirely good.
• 36:48
  I mean, if I'm talking to the producers, it's of, of like if I
• 36:52
  ever get invited to be on Channels TV, it's something I'm
• 36:54
  going to talk about with the with the producers.
• 36:57
  We got to introduce a call to action there, even if I'm not
• 37:02
  the one that's going to say it. I mean, at the very least while
• 37:04
  the segment is going on, like can my website be flashing at
• 37:07
  the bottom of the screen? Like I will talk to the
• 37:09
  producers like we got to put something there anyway, So those
• 37:15
  has to be a call to action. If you see me, you like you
• 37:17
  sound interested, then call me on this number.
• 37:20
  So that's how we ended the meeting.
• 37:25
  And I'm hoping that from my rambling so far that you guys
• 37:29
  might have been able to take one or two things.
• 37:31
  I should be able to help you in your own, yeah, in your own
• 37:37
  situation. But I guess the big thing that I
• 37:40
  just want to stress from all this is we, we, we spend a lot
• 37:46
  of time, a lot of money, a lot of effort in trying to promote
• 37:50
  our businesses. We should be trying to write
• 37:53
  down something somewhere on your phone, in your sheet of paper,
• 37:56
  in an Excel sheet, in something. Just try and get a sense of what
• 38:01
  am I trying, what is working, what is not working.
• 38:04
  It is then you'll be able to know that for your business or
• 38:07
  for your city or for your circumstances that Flyers is
• 38:10
  rubbish. All that for your business, for
• 38:13
  your circumstances, for your customers, that Instagram
• 38:16
  advertising is awesome or for your circumstance, for your
• 38:22
  context, for your industry, that being on TV or radio is rubbish.
• 38:27
  It is only if we are writing down our keeping records that
• 38:32
  we'll be able to know. So if you're writing and you
• 38:35
  notice that, oh, every single time I go on radio, I receive 50
• 38:39
  phone calls and out of the 50 phone calls, I closed two
• 38:42
  business. You can now do some math in your
• 38:45
  head that OK, to be on that radio show, I had to pay 100
• 38:48
  grand. But those two customers that I
• 38:50
  got gave me a profit of 650. You can now do the math in your
• 38:54
  head, OK, I paid 100 grand. I came out with 650.
• 38:57
  So if you might not say that means I made 550K profits, is it
• 39:01
  worth it? I think it might be some people
• 39:04
  might say, I know you only gave me two customers, it's not worth
• 39:06
  it. So you know, it depends.
• 39:08
  So let's brighten all these things down so that after a
• 39:13
  while, after 1/4, after a year, after six months, after every
• 39:16
  month, we can sit down and be looking.
• 39:18
  I will now be able to decide, OK, you know what?
• 39:20
  This was not worth my while. I will never do this again.
• 39:23
  Or this was worth my while and I'm going to do more of it.
• 39:27
  So that's all for today, folks. Hopefully the next podcast
• 39:30
  episode I'm going to make will be much more organized.
• 39:35
  So thanks again to Paul. Now book KK.
• 39:39
  Like your son knew. It's really, really solid.
• 39:43
  Yeah. So we're hoping and praying with
• 39:45
  you that the UMES will turn out well and you'll get admission
• 39:48
  and you're going to go on to better, brighter, much more
• 39:51
  beautiful things. Welcome to the world.
• 39:55
  Welcome, Ish to the world. Because between secondary school
• 39:58
  and university, it's not say university is the real world
• 40:00
  job, but you're still taking a step closer to us.
• 40:03
  So welcome. We're here.
• 40:05
  We're waiting to embrace you and to support you in any way that
• 40:08
  we can. Now, for those of you in school,
• 40:10
  continue with your hustle. I know it's not easy, but shall
• 40:12
  I try and make it work? You can graduate first class.
• 40:14
  Please, by all means, graduate with the first class.
• 40:16
  I'm not one of those people who tell you that first class is
• 40:18
  rubbish. No, first class is not rubbish.
• 40:20
  First class is good. If you can't get that first
• 40:22
  class, get that first class. You know when we're talking
• 40:25
  one-on-one, I'll tell you the benefit of the first class.
• 40:27
  It's not what you think. So that's all for today.
• 40:30
  If you've got sales and marketing questions, then bring
• 40:32
  them to me. You can call, you can SMS or
• 40:34
  send me a WhatsApp on 08064662140.
• 40:38
  Thank you very much for your time and attention.
• 40:40
  I'll catch you, dear listener, at the next episode.