Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / Sweet Success & Solid Structures: Launching Chocolate, Chicken, Honey, & Aluminum Businesses

Transcript

Sweet Success & Solid Structures: Launching Chocolate, Chicken, Honey, & Aluminum Businesses · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:00
  Hello and welcome to the show. Today I'm on an audio booth, so
• 0:04
  this is going to be a noisy recording.
• 0:07
  And Speaking of that, I need to change my intro because I
• 0:11
  received a message from someone today.
• 0:13
  We've been chatting on WhatsApp. I can't remember the fellow's
• 0:16
  name. Anyway, he said that he can
• 0:18
  recite my. The way I opened the show almost
• 0:22
  developed him. So I think it's time for me to
• 0:24
  switch things up. And OK, some of you know that I
• 0:28
  have a radio show on Radio Maria.
• 0:30
  The TV show hasn't pulled through yet, but I had a
• 0:33
  wonderful surprise when I was on air last night and one of you
• 0:37
  listeners of the show called in, and I think his name is Imano.
• 0:40
  I'll have to check my notes. So Imano called in based in
• 0:44
  Abuja. They're listening to the
• 0:45
  podcast. And so just called in to the
• 0:46
  show to say hello. And I really appreciated that.
• 0:50
  And it's nice to see that there's starting to be some
• 0:53
  crossover in, you know, my radio people and my podcast people.
• 0:57
  So that was real nice. So if any of you happens to be
• 1:00
  listening to Radio Maria, that's 91.3 FM and you want to pop in
• 1:05
  and say hi, sure, no problem. You can do that.
• 1:08
  It would mean it would mean a lot to me.
• 1:11
  Now, Speaking of radio, the topic for today, there's there's
• 1:17
  a series I did a very long time ago, maybe last year on how to
• 1:21
  start a business in three easy steps.
• 1:23
  I think this was something that I came up with when I was doing
• 1:27
  some work with Avon, Avon Tech Hub, Avon Incubation Hub.
• 1:33
  Yeah, there was a seminar that we did for some of their people
• 1:36
  on how to start a business in three easy steps.
• 1:38
  Now, because of some of the questions that I've been getting
• 1:40
  on the, excuse me, the questions I've been getting on the radio
• 1:44
  show, like one guy called in, his name is emoji, well some
• 1:49
  sort of initials and he was talking about starting cottage
• 1:51
  industry. He wants to do something small,
• 1:53
  you know like chocolates. I think he has a location in
• 1:57
  Cross River and he wants to start with that.
• 2:00
  Then there was also someone else who called his name was Jack
• 2:02
  from Duty Alhaji in Abuja who wants to rear broilers for meat.
• 2:07
  Another caller, Emmanuel Edoko, calling from Asokoro, also in
• 2:10
  Abuja, who wants to sell aluminium products for
• 2:15
  construction and then Mary from Area One who called because she
• 2:19
  wants to get into beekeeping. So because I've been getting all
• 2:22
  these kinds of questions like, OK, this is what I want to do.
• 2:24
  I want to run chocolate business.
• 2:26
  I want to sell broilers, I want to do aluminium, I want to do
• 2:29
  bees, I want to do this, I want to do that.
• 2:32
  I've been having to use some of my material, not share some of
• 2:37
  the material that I made that I've, you know, spoken about
• 2:40
  over here on the podcast, on the radio as well, just to guide
• 2:44
  people and help structure the process for how you get involved
• 2:47
  in businesses. So that's what I want to show
• 2:49
  right here on the podcast today and flesh it out with a new set
• 2:53
  of examples. Someone who wants to start a
• 2:55
  chocolate making business, Somebody who wants to rear
• 2:57
  broilers. Broilers are just chickens.
• 3:00
  Someone who wants to sell aluminium products for
• 3:03
  construction. Another person who wants to do
• 3:05
  beekeeping. So just to flesh it out with
• 3:07
  different examples and to show you how this simple framework
• 3:11
  applies whatever business it is that you want to do.
• 3:16
  So it's a very simple framework. It's a tripartite thing.
• 3:19
  I'll be tripartite. Yes.
• 3:21
  A tripartite thing is a three-part thing.
• 3:23
  So number one, we have to select the right idea #2 we have to
• 3:26
  make sure if the idea is feasible and #3 we have to be
• 3:29
  able to build a selling framework around it.
• 3:32
  Now, of course, there are lots of other things that are going
• 3:34
  to be involved. You know, those of you who have
• 3:36
  legal backgrounds like me, who say, hey, calm down.
• 3:39
  First you have to do intellectual property protection
• 3:42
  because you have to protect your idea.
• 3:43
  You also have to go and register a business name.
• 3:47
  Those of you who studied accounting, you say, hey, calm
• 3:49
  down is not that simple. You have to go and do
• 3:51
  accounting. You have to register for NIN,
• 3:53
  blah, blah blah. Those of you who studied health
• 3:55
  and Medical Sciences, you say a countdown pipeline.
• 3:57
  You have to do health and safety, you have to go and
• 4:00
  register for NAFDAC and blah, blah, blah.
• 4:02
  So yes, all those things have to be done.
• 4:05
  I'm not denying that those things have to be done.
• 4:07
  I'm just saying that if we don't get these three steps right, if
• 4:10
  we're on the wrong idea, if the idea is not feasible and we
• 4:13
  can't build a selling framework around it, then going to go and
• 4:17
  do register patents and register company name and then file 14
• 4:22
  number and thinking of health and safety procedures.
• 4:25
  I mean like all to what end? The thing is not going to fly.
• 4:28
  It's not going to pop off. So all these things are
• 4:31
  important, but I think the foundation is make sure you
• 4:33
  select the right idea. Is this idea feasible?
• 4:36
  And can we sell the damn thing if we can sell it?
• 4:38
  No, Hala let's you know more the move.
• 4:41
  We'll just be moving forward small, small, and then we can
• 4:42
  figure out the rest later. What's the business name that we
• 4:45
  should use? We can figure out that later.
• 4:48
  What's the CAC registration process?
• 4:50
  You know, we can figure out that later.
• 4:51
  Your younger brother is in law school.
• 4:52
  You can call him up. You know, there's ways that we
• 4:54
  can work out the other stuff. OK, well NAFDAQ, we can't get
• 4:58
  around NAFDAQ, so eventually we have to go for our Nafdaq
• 5:01
  number. But bottom line, sha select the
• 5:03
  right idea. Is the idea feasible?
• 5:05
  Can we build a selling framework around it?
• 5:08
  Now on selling the right idea, I went to do this whole thing of
• 5:12
  people selecting businesses because of passion.
• 5:14
  And I had to point out to the radio audiences and I keep
• 5:16
  telling people that this passion thing, for most of you, this
• 5:19
  passion thing will put you guys in a heap of trouble, plenty of
• 5:22
  trouble. Because the thing with passion
• 5:24
  is that before you do it as a business, the passion thing, you
• 5:27
  know, it motivates you. It makes you nice and calm.
• 5:29
  It makes you cool. You know, like those of you who
• 5:32
  like to paint, for instance, painting, you know, you have a
• 5:35
  busy day, it's a rough day at work, Nappa is misbehaving, you
• 5:41
  know, just overall stress. But then the moment you paint,
• 5:45
  you just feel cool. You just feel calm, you feel
• 5:49
  nice, you know? So in the beginning, painting is
• 5:52
  nice and it's an escape. But then when you now start
• 5:56
  having to charge for painting and somebody has paid for
• 5:59
  painting and you're supposed to deliver this painting, believe
• 6:02
  me, the dynamic is different. I know somebody who used to
• 6:05
  paint before just so that she can chill.
• 6:08
  And then now that their deadlines is not the same.
• 6:12
  When is your passion thing? I wake up in the morning, you
• 6:14
  know, it's you, you relax, it's your own deadline.
• 6:17
  It's you know, it's just you. You're trying to fulfill
• 6:19
  yourself. But I want somebody that has
• 6:22
  dropped money. It's nothing like I'm waiting
• 6:23
  for inspiration. The painting is person is
• 6:25
  waiting for a damn painting. I better, better get on.
• 6:28
  So when you now add money motives to passion things, the
• 6:31
  thing now becomes, it becomes hard.
• 6:34
  Those of you who love to teach, you know what it is I'm talking
• 6:37
  about. In the beginning, you used to
• 6:38
  teach and used to teach children and teach children and the thing
• 6:41
  just brought you joy. Then you went to go and open
• 6:44
  crash, and then you went to go and open school.
• 6:46
  You've now collected money from people.
• 6:48
  You're now dealing with all kinds of regulatory burdens.
• 6:51
  And now The thing is just like a second job.
• 6:53
  And before you select children now, there are some days you
• 6:56
  can't stand the sight of children.
• 6:59
  So these are some of the unfortunate dynamics that come
• 7:02
  into play when some of you decide, OK, I'm passionate about
• 7:05
  this thing. That means you don't start a
• 7:07
  business. But of course, it's not all
• 7:09
  downhill because the whole thing about loving the passion means
• 7:15
  that that is what is going to give you the all.
• 7:19
  I call it now the the love, the love, the the fuel to be able to
• 7:25
  push through these hard times because we need a certain amount
• 7:30
  of discipline and a certain amount of dedication to make
• 7:33
  this thing work. So passion has his good side.
• 7:36
  He has his bad side. But me, I'm not a fan of
• 7:40
  starting people starting passion businesses, except if you're
• 7:46
  ready for the emotional rollercoaster that is going to
• 7:50
  come with the whole thing. So me advocate that people
• 7:54
  should start businesses around their efforts, their skill set,
• 7:57
  their expertise. You know, you're good at this
• 7:58
  thing. You do it anyway, even though
• 8:00
  nobody's paying, paying you, whether there's passion or
• 8:03
  whether there's no passion, like you're doing this thing anyway.
• 8:06
  It's like me and the sales thing.
• 8:08
  I was already doing the sales thing anyway, you know, other
• 8:11
  vendors having problems going to talk to me.
• 8:13
  This is a problem I have, you know, this, this, that, that.
• 8:15
  How do I go about this? I was doing this anyway.
• 8:18
  So, OK, well, I might as well, whether I'm passionate about
• 8:21
  this thing or not. So effort, skill set, expertise,
• 8:25
  yeah, that's what I'm most comfortable at.
• 8:27
  And then of course, there are those people who regardless of
• 8:29
  passion, they try and see is there a gap in the market?
• 8:31
  Is there a problem in the community?
• 8:33
  Is there a problem in the environment?
• 8:34
  How can I solve this problem? And then they just enter just
• 8:37
  like that. So those are the traditional
• 8:39
  avenues. Now, the reason why this
• 8:42
  question is important, select the right idea is because if you
• 8:46
  are in the wrong business idea, if you don't like it, if you're
• 8:51
  not juiced up, if you don't have subject matter expertise, if you
• 8:54
  pick something that doesn't blend or jive with you, it's
• 8:58
  questionable whether you have the staying power to devote to
• 9:01
  making this thing work. Because you know, depending on
• 9:04
  which studies you look at, it says on average, you know three
• 9:06
  to five years to make a business work.
• 9:09
  If you're on the wrong vehicle, if you're on the wrong business
• 9:13
  idea, are you going to have the staying power for three to five
• 9:16
  years? So that's why this whole thing
• 9:18
  of, you know, is this the right idea?
• 9:19
  It's a very big question. The next thing is the idea
• 9:22
  feasible? Feasible just means is that
• 9:25
  money here? Is that demand here?
• 9:27
  Is that product market fit? Do enough people like this thing
• 9:31
  and enough people looking for it and the people who are looking
• 9:34
  for it, are they willing to pay? What is required for me to be
• 9:38
  able to make a comfortable living out of these things?
• 9:40
  So these are the questions that we're going to be asking
• 9:42
  ourselves because if you're on the right idea, but
• 9:44
  unfortunately nobody's paying for this thing, then guy, you're
• 9:46
  fresh out of luck 'cause there's this podcast I was listening to
• 9:52
  and the lady, what she likes is painting with algae Hobby.
• 9:57
  Yeah, I think it's algae or, or something like that.
• 9:59
  You know, this fungus kind of like things.
• 10:02
  And I'm impressed with the kind of things that people use to
• 10:04
  make art these days, because when I went to school, we did
• 10:09
  fine art, we did classical art and you know, basic stuff now,
• 10:14
  pencil crayon, charcoal, all those sorts of things.
• 10:19
  But now people are using fungi, colourful fungi.
• 10:21
  You dye the fungi, use it to make out.
• 10:24
  Like I'm impressed. So let's say now that that is
• 10:26
  your jam, you went to maybe New York School of Art, New York
• 10:32
  Academy of Art or something. You go and learn this wonderful
• 10:34
  technique and I think it's just shocking and you're like, man,
• 10:37
  let me come back to Nigeria. I can't wait to launch this
• 10:40
  thing is, you know, it's going to take off and blah, blah,
• 10:42
  blah, blah, blah. But if in this part of the
• 10:44
  world, people here fungi and they think bacteria, if that is
• 10:47
  where we are right now and nobody is digging this sort of
• 10:51
  thing, then it's it's not going to fly.
• 10:58
  So is that their feasible? Is their demand?
• 11:02
  Is that product market fit while looking for the markets to
• 11:04
  validate whether this thing is a good idea or not.
• 11:06
  It's not about what you think, it's about what the market
• 11:08
  thinks. If you can come up with some
• 11:12
  clever marketing campaigns or you know, express the value in
• 11:15
  certain ways and you can make it work, OK, yes.
• 11:18
  What if you think and you think and you try and you spend money,
• 11:21
  you try like this, you try like that, you can't make it work,
• 11:23
  then man, this thing is not feasible.
• 11:24
  Maybe somebody else can work it out, but not you.
• 11:28
  Then we went to the whole thing of creating a minimum, minimum
• 11:30
  viable product. That's the MVP.
• 11:33
  That's just is the smallest version of your idea to see how
• 11:36
  you can make this thing work. So for you, who is into this
• 11:39
  whole fungi art thing that you've now learnt because you
• 11:41
  went to New York Academy of Art or Birmingham School of Modern
• 11:47
  Art or whatever, you're back in Niger.
• 11:50
  You want to see these things at work.
• 11:51
  You know before you go and spend maybe like 5 M you buy a studio
• 11:56
  then you spend like 2.5 you to shop with studio and maybe you
• 12:00
  spend another 5 M. You put solar in the studio then
• 12:05
  you now spend another like 3 M you go and get supplies and then
• 12:09
  you now budget maybe like one M to go and start doing Instagram
• 12:12
  advertisements. Before you spend all that money
• 12:16
  just try and make one small fungi painting 1st and then try
• 12:20
  and sell it. Call your friends, your family
• 12:23
  members, your associates. See if you can sell small.
• 12:26
  After that, maybe try maybe like Abuja, the different art
• 12:30
  communities in Abuja and art markets, go there, try and see
• 12:33
  if you can sell small. If you make like 456, are you
• 12:36
  able to sell them within moves? You now know that OK, maybe
• 12:39
  there's something here. You now throw small money again.
• 12:41
  It is only after you validated it like that with a minimum
• 12:44
  viable product. You now know that.
• 12:45
  OK, you know what, let me now take 5 M go and rent studio, you
• 12:50
  know, three M go and do solar, six M go and do supplies and,
• 12:54
  you know, small, small, small, small, small minimum viable
• 12:57
  product. What is the smallest idea that I
• 13:02
  can use, that I can ship, that I can send, that I can sell, that
• 13:05
  I can show that I can test out to see that this thing is going
• 13:09
  to be a workable idea? Then of course, is this thing
• 13:14
  feasible? You can also do research through
• 13:16
  that quantitative research, you know, go online, check Google
• 13:19
  for some of these ideas that people have been calling me
• 13:21
  about, you know, ministry of our Greek Cocoa Institute, Institute
• 13:25
  of Tropical Agriculture and Ibadan, you know, stuff like
• 13:27
  that. And when Jack from duty Alarge,
• 13:30
  when he called back because he's the one who wanted to rear
• 13:32
  chickens, you know, it's happy to hear that he actually had
• 13:34
  done some studies in Ibadan. So you can see that some of
• 13:37
  these things I'm saying is not, is not theory.
• 13:39
  You know, his life is practical and yes, if you want to make
• 13:45
  this business succeed that much, I guess it's not too much of a
• 13:49
  problem that you are based in Abuja.
• 13:51
  But then you go all the way to Ibadan because that's where the
• 13:54
  specialists are to now learn how to do this thing.
• 13:59
  So this real life, you know, these are not just fancy ideas.
• 14:02
  And for those of you who are in Abuja who listen to the radio
• 14:06
  show, excuse me, I'm glad you can see that.
• 14:09
  For those people who call back, you can see that people are
• 14:11
  actually applying these principles, whether they heard
• 14:13
  it from me or they heard it from someplace else, they're already
• 14:15
  applying these principles and I just need to start their
• 14:18
  businesses. Excuse me, you just need to
• 14:21
  start their businesses and sorry about that and making it work.
• 14:26
  So yesterday was a long day. I recorded 2 podcast episodes,
• 14:29
  then I was on the air and then had some phone calls to make
• 14:32
  sure yesterday was a tough day for my voice.
• 14:36
  So anyway, making a living by talking, it's not an easy thing.
• 14:40
  I guess there's no profession that is an easy one.
• 14:42
  Everyone has his own advantages and disadvantages.
• 14:46
  OK, then the final thing, can you build selling frameworks
• 14:49
  around it? That just means, can I sell the
• 14:51
  damn thing? Do I know how to sell?
• 14:53
  Can I do this myself? What selling framework am I
• 14:55
  going to use? What channels am I going to
• 14:57
  explore? Am I going to get a team to sell
• 15:00
  on my behalf? How am I going to train these
• 15:01
  people? What distribution networks are
• 15:04
  we going to use? You know, stuff like that.
• 15:08
  So for MOG, those are some of the issues.
• 15:11
  OK, no problem, you can make the chocolate.
• 15:13
  You have bought the space in Cross Rivers, you have started
• 15:15
  producing, OK, no problem. But how are you going to get
• 15:18
  this thing to market? How are you going to recruit
• 15:20
  distributors? How are you going to get retail,
• 15:24
  retail market chains to stock this thing when you get into a
• 15:27
  store, how are you going to be able to negotiate the right
• 15:29
  shelf space? Because you know, if you get
• 15:32
  into a store and your chocolate is there, but your chocolate is
• 15:35
  at the back of the store and it's on the last shelf and also
• 15:38
  on the ground floor, nobody's going to be buying your
• 15:40
  chocolate there. Because I think for chocolate,
• 15:42
  what they do is I think, you know, at the, the till before
• 15:46
  you pay, I think that's a good spot.
• 15:48
  And then I think like when you enter the shop, either you know,
• 15:50
  the first shelf on the left or the 1st on the right, you know,
• 15:53
  based on how I've been seeing people stock it, you know, so
• 15:57
  you have to ask yourself those questions.
• 15:59
  So these are the sorts of frameworks that people need to
• 16:03
  start their business, whether you're rearing broiler, you're
• 16:07
  running chicken, you want to sell aluminium products, you
• 16:10
  want to do beekeeping or you want to do chocolate.
• 16:13
  So select the right idea. And we started talking about
• 16:15
  subject matter expertise. So the question for Jack was,
• 16:19
  you know, do you have subject matter expertise?
• 16:21
  And the answer was, I've gone to a battle to go and learn this
• 16:24
  thing. And good congratulations for
• 16:27
  Emmanuel. He also had been taking lessons
• 16:29
  from someone who was in the aluminium space, but he didn't
• 16:33
  finish. I'm one of the listeners of the
• 16:35
  show called in to say, oh boy, you best finish that thing.
• 16:38
  And that was my recommendation too, because you wanted
• 16:41
  recommendation on what would be the ideal capital to start the
• 16:44
  business. And the truth of matter is,
• 16:45
  since I'm not involved in aluminium business, I have no
• 16:48
  idea what the optimum initial investment is supposed to be.
• 16:54
  So is the person who is teaching you, the person who has been
• 16:56
  doing that business of 34567 years, That's personal.
• 17:00
  Know that. OK, look, when you're starting,
• 17:02
  don't go and this is the amount you need for this kind of
• 17:05
  aluminium or that kind of aluminium.
• 17:07
  And this is where you sell, this is where you find these kind of
• 17:10
  customers. This is where you find that kind
• 17:11
  of customers, you know, subject matter expertise.
• 17:14
  So for Mary, it was the same thing, beekeeping.
• 17:17
  You better go and learn this thing.
• 17:18
  If you spend money and go and buy bees, but ND bees don't
• 17:21
  survive Abuja son, then like what's going to happen to your
• 17:24
  investment or the survivor Buddha son?
• 17:26
  But then it turns out that there's some parasites in Abuja
• 17:28
  that kill certain kinds of bees. You know you've lost all your
• 17:32
  money or the bees survive and then they produce the honey.
• 17:36
  But maybe Abuja weather or some other kind of pollen or
• 17:39
  pathogens make the, the honey to become spoiled after two days or
• 17:44
  something. You know, then what?
• 17:47
  And then for Jack and for Mary, do you, do you know where the,
• 17:51
  what are they called animal doctors now?
• 17:53
  Vet, veti, veterinarian, veterinarian clinic?
• 17:56
  Do you know where the doctor is? So when the bees are sick, you
• 17:59
  know who to call, or when the chickens are sick, who to call.
• 18:04
  You know, all those sorts of things.
• 18:06
  Mog OK, making chocolate. Do you know the proper
• 18:10
  fermentation procedures? Which species of cocoa?
• 18:13
  What kind of milk are you going to?
• 18:16
  What did he call it? He called it a tempering.
• 18:18
  Uh huh. Are you pro when it comes to
• 18:21
  different tempering techniques? I think tempering is when you
• 18:25
  smash the cocoa, you melt it and then you mix it with the other
• 18:28
  thing and you get some nice sweet chocolate.
• 18:32
  So subject matter expertise really, really important at this
• 18:35
  stage because to be successful in sales, it's something I keep
• 18:38
  saying, it's not just even me. Lots of people said subject
• 18:42
  matter expertise is the beginning of being successful in
• 18:44
  sales. You can all say what it is that
• 18:46
  you don't know. And the way I explain you on the
• 18:48
  show is when I started off as a photographer, if I didn't know
• 18:52
  how to handle camera, how to expose, is the picture too
• 18:54
  bright or too dark? How to pose?
• 18:56
  Did I pose them well? Are they looking fine or not?
• 18:58
  How to edit? Did I make the babe too black?
• 19:01
  I did I make her 2 yellow? How to frame, How to produce the
• 19:06
  book? How to?
• 19:07
  If I didn't know all of that, then selling my craft would have
• 19:10
  been a lot harder. So subject matter expertise, we
• 19:13
  have to pay attention to that. You can see how there's plenty
• 19:16
  that is involved under this. Select the right idea then is
• 19:20
  this thing feasible? The question that people have to
• 19:22
  ask and you know the whole thing about MVP minimum viable
• 19:25
  product, what's the smallest version?
• 19:26
  Now Mog, he says that chocolate is going to move in Niger
• 19:29
  because he has been seeing the way that certain Mars, certain
• 19:32
  brands like Mars and everything have been moving.
• 19:34
  And one of his friends for excuse me, brought some
• 19:38
  chocolate and I was able to sell some some things very fast.
• 19:42
  So yeah, that's, that's a way of validating the idea.
• 19:44
  But for me, I consider that anecdotal.
• 19:47
  Anecdotal just means, you know, them say, them say, you know,
• 19:50
  that somebody brought it in and did it.
• 19:52
  Yeah, that's just the, as far as I'm concerned, that's them say
• 19:54
  them say did you carry the specimen and try and sell it
• 19:58
  yourself? Because sometimes some people
• 20:04
  don't want us to know how truly how hard something is or maybe
• 20:08
  truly how easy something is so that we do won't come in, you
• 20:13
  know, but don't rely on them say themselves anecdotal evidence.
• 20:15
  You know, it's good to give you courage.
• 20:18
  But don't rely on anecdotal. I need evidence.
• 20:21
  So that was my own take. You know, produce a small batch,
• 20:24
  see if you can sell or import a batch.
• 20:28
  See if you can sell. See how The thing is moving.
• 20:31
  Get a sense of how you move chocolate in Niger.
• 20:36
  Minimum viable product, the smallest version of the idea
• 20:41
  that you can ship, that you can test, that you can sell, that
• 20:44
  you can show people that people can see that somebody can say
• 20:47
  yes or no too. So same thing with Mary with the
• 20:50
  beekeeping. Before you go and buy the whole,
• 20:54
  is it hive? I think they call them hive.
• 20:56
  Before you go and buy the whole hive, maybe you buy a small
• 20:59
  portion first. I see how much money you can
• 21:00
  cultivate. Does he think it won't taste
• 21:03
  nice? I really think they sour.
• 21:04
  OK, the thing tastes nice. How are you going to package it?
• 21:06
  How you bottle it after you bottled it, You know, why are
• 21:09
  you going to sell it? So all these kinds of things
• 21:16
  then, OK, well, of course, building, selling frameworks
• 21:18
  around it. I think you know, all of that is
• 21:20
  all of that is obvious. So I won't go over that again.
• 21:23
  But basically you can see how there's a simple process,
• 21:27
  there's some simple ideas, simple frameworks that you can
• 21:29
  run through when it comes to starting your business.
• 21:32
  Number one, you need to make sure that you're in the right
• 21:33
  vehicle, that you're in the right idea.
• 21:36
  Because somebody like me right now, let me see what's the most
• 21:40
  observed thing ahead. Dance.
• 21:43
  So now, Mia, I believe that I'm a correct step up because as I
• 21:46
  hear the music, you know, my body just moves.
• 21:48
  You know, I just, you understand, I just go with the
• 21:52
  flow and with the rhythm. I believe I have rhythm.
• 21:55
  But everybody else, my children, my wife, my mom, my friends, as
• 21:59
  far as everybody's concerned, you know, I don't know how to
• 22:01
  dance. But me in my spirit, I know I'm
• 22:03
  a good dancer. So if somebody's opening a dance
• 22:06
  studio now and I'm the one who's going to be selling the dance
• 22:09
  services, forget I will flop because I know nothing about
• 22:14
  dance. How will I advise the person
• 22:16
  what kind of dance they should be doing?
• 22:17
  Because based on interest or body type, I don't know whether
• 22:20
  somebody should be learning salsa or tango or artilogo or
• 22:24
  break dancing, I have no idea. So is the person who either
• 22:28
  loves dance and has learnt a lot on YouTube or the person who
• 22:31
  studied theatre arts in undergraduate.
• 22:34
  That is the kind of person I know how to sell a dance studio
• 22:37
  because remember qualification and discovery, the park where we
• 22:39
  sit down with the customer while asking them questions.
• 22:42
  It's not just that somebody comes and says I want to learn
• 22:44
  hip hop. I say OK, no problem, I'll teach
• 22:46
  you hip hop. You have to ask the person some
• 22:47
  questions. Do you even like hip hop?
• 22:49
  OK, why are you here? Oh, health and fitness.
• 22:52
  OK, for health and fitness, we take a look at things that are
• 22:54
  up tempo. What kind of music do you listen
• 22:56
  to or what type are you from? What kind of music do you like?
• 23:02
  OK, based on your body shape, do I recommend this?
• 23:05
  I recommend this. I recommend that I'm not
• 23:07
  involved in dance, but I'm assuming that if you own the
• 23:09
  dancing school, these are conversations that you should be
• 23:12
  running people through. Because if somebody has
• 23:16
  arthritis, I doubt you can get the person to be dancing at the
• 23:19
  logo, no matter how the person loves at the logo and wants to
• 23:22
  use at the logo to lose body weight.
• 23:25
  Oh, by the way, at the logo is like one of those traditional
• 23:29
  Igbo dances because I want to I heard the CKC crash the King
• 23:34
  college. That was my first secondary
• 23:36
  school and some of the marriage brothers who run the the Academy
• 23:40
  back then, a couple of them were Ebo.
• 23:42
  So we, you know, just picked up some Ebo culture along the way.
• 23:49
  So subject matter expertise is the beginning is the
• 23:52
  cornerstone. There's know how I'll be able to
• 23:55
  sell in the dance school, except if I now go and learn, I go and
• 24:00
  watch YouTube videos or I go and learn on somebody who learnt how
• 24:03
  to do the thing well, or I go to New York Academy of Dance and
• 24:07
  something, something, something. So I'm missing.
• 24:15
  OK, so that was the first batch. But next week there's something
• 24:18
  I want to take these people through because now.
• 24:21
  So let me get my notes now that I've been talking about subject
• 24:28
  matter expertise. Uh huh.
• 24:30
  Selecting the right person to learn from now becomes a problem
• 24:36
  because if we're going to learn how to do chocolate, if we're
• 24:38
  going to learn how to rear chickens, we're going to learn
• 24:40
  aluminium work and we're going to learn beekeeping, it doesn't
• 24:43
  necessarily mean we'll just go and pick the first person that
• 24:46
  we see. Now for another radio caller who
• 24:50
  called in much, much earlier who wanted to know about investing.
• 24:54
  Even though investing is not my thing, I say, Shia, let me help
• 24:57
  this guy out. So I gave him some resources,
• 24:59
  some online resources for the Security and Exchange
• 25:02
  Commission. They are the Regulatory agency
• 25:04
  in Nigeria that are responsible for making sure that four and
• 25:07
  nine people don't swag you. So I gave him some of those
• 25:10
  resources and then I forgot that we're supposed to have had a
• 25:13
  conversation about how you select a good stockbroker.
• 25:15
  So let me just run through some of these things and you will now
• 25:18
  see that how to select a good stockbroker can also be a good
• 25:21
  framework for how to select somebody that will teach you how
• 25:24
  to raise chickens or teach you how to mix chocolate or teach
• 25:29
  you how to enter beekeeping or teach you how to do aluminium.
• 25:33
  So when I address this guy's question, I'm going to tell him,
• 25:37
  well, first of all, I have to look through my notes and then
• 25:40
  find out the guy's name. So now you know on the air, I
• 25:43
  will tell him that yo you that called on social.
• 25:46
  So did you know this is the answer to your question?
• 25:49
  Where's my piece of paper? So I came up with some
• 25:54
  conversation points that you have to go through before you
• 25:59
  can select the right professional service provider to
• 26:02
  teach you the thing that you want to do.
• 26:06
  So First off, experience, you have to ask questions on around
• 26:11
  the person's experience. You know, respectfully because
• 26:14
  you know why in Niger, if you want to learn raising chickens
• 26:19
  and you're asking the person in a way that sounds like an
• 26:21
  interrogation, the person will feel like, you know, who is this
• 26:24
  idiot? What do you know?
• 26:26
  You're asking me a question, you're testing me when you, you
• 26:29
  know nothing. So you have to ask questions,
• 26:32
  but you know, no interrogation manner so that you won't cause
• 26:35
  quarrel, so that people will say that you're being disrespectful
• 26:39
  for some reason. You want to know how long the
• 26:40
  person has been walking in the field.
• 26:42
  However it is. You want to ask, ask and get a
• 26:44
  sense of how long they've been walking in the field.
• 26:49
  The kind of chickens that they have been working with, the kind
• 26:52
  of chocolate that they temper, the kind of stalks that they
• 26:56
  prefer, that they've been selling, the kind of aluminium
• 26:58
  that they work with, all the species of bees that they've
• 27:01
  been keeping. What kind of clients have they
• 27:03
  been working with in the past? Or is it that they've been
• 27:06
  working, you know, for 10 years, but they haven't done any
• 27:09
  teaching or training? We also want to find out their
• 27:12
  credentials and their licensing. Of course, we ask in a
• 27:15
  conversational way, not in an interrogational manner.
• 27:19
  So what kind of certificates do they have or licenses or that
• 27:24
  they're members of professional organizations, all those kinds
• 27:26
  of questions. So for emojis, now with the
• 27:29
  chocolate thing, you know, because tampering chocolate is
• 27:34
  like a standardized kitchen, something I'm assuming, I don't
• 27:38
  know, but I'm assuming maybe you need to be certified before you
• 27:41
  make that kind of thing, before you go and take milk that has
• 27:45
  expired and mix it with the cocoa and then people eat your
• 27:47
  chocolate and then they die, you know.
• 27:49
  So I'm assuming that for the chocolate thing that there's
• 27:51
  going to be some sort of licensing and credentials are
• 27:54
  involved. So in that case, you know, you
• 27:56
  have to ask, you know, what licenses they have, what school
• 28:01
  did they go to, which professional organization are
• 28:03
  they a member of? Remember Northern interrogation,
• 28:06
  simple governance conversational with OK, I've already mentioned
• 28:10
  that you have to ask questions around their specialization.
• 28:14
  You need to know. So for the guy who wants to know
• 28:16
  about stockbrokers, you need to know where their speciality is.
• 28:22
  What kind of industries or stocks do they specialize in?
• 28:25
  What kind of investment strategies do they specialize
• 28:27
  in? What kind of financial planning
• 28:30
  do they specialize in? Is it for young people,
• 28:36
  financially, upwardly mobile people, high net worth
• 28:39
  individuals, Abby people in retirement?
• 28:41
  So we have to ask all these questions.
• 28:43
  So it applies when you're looking for somebody to teach
• 28:45
  you chicken and broiler and everything.
• 28:47
  What do you specialize in? Because if somebody wants to
• 28:50
  teach you about rearing chickens, you you want to do
• 28:52
  broilers. But the person specializes in
• 28:54
  layers. Layers are the ones that lay
• 28:56
  eggs. Broilers are the ones that are
• 28:57
  for meat. Maybe this might not be the
• 29:00
  person to teach you, maybe I don't know, I'm not in that
• 29:03
  space, but it's just my guess. Then you also have to ask them
• 29:08
  questions to see if they understand what your needs are.
• 29:15
  You also need to ask questions to try and get a sense of their
• 29:17
  general, so excuse me, the general business strategy, you
• 29:24
  know, all those sorts of things. Yeah.
• 29:27
  Because some people are very, some people are more aggressive,
• 29:31
  some people are more laid back. Some people are ethical, some
• 29:33
  people are unethical. You need to know what's up
• 29:36
  before you put money down. Because there's some people who
• 29:39
  want to hammer fast, fast, sharp, sharp, sharp, sharp,
• 29:41
  sharp. And if you go and pay somebody
• 29:44
  like me to be your teacher, you know, you, you miss Rd. because
• 29:47
  me, I want to be sure that look, you understand the fundamentals
• 29:49
  of what we're doing here and we have a framework that we're
• 29:52
  following and we're going to try and keep things ethical.
• 29:55
  So you need to understand the general philosophy.
• 29:57
  You tease this thing out in conversation.
• 30:01
  Of course, eventually we're going to have ask money about
• 30:04
  their fees and compensation. So the questions of how much
• 30:11
  part payment deposit? Can you give me a breakdown?
• 30:16
  You try and figure out if there are any hidden fees because I
• 30:20
  mentioned that my brother and I used to be in the charcoal
• 30:22
  business and in fact the charcoal businessman don't want
• 30:26
  this. Plenty of hidden fees.
• 30:27
  Somebody would say they're doing seminar, they teach you how to
• 30:30
  do charcoal and they think cost only 250K.
• 30:34
  No problem, you will go and you pay the 250 and you sign up.
• 30:38
  Day one, they give plenty of information and be happy.
• 30:41
  Day 2, you said this is the best thing in the world.
• 30:42
  Day three, that is practical. It's OK, you need to now bring
• 30:46
  another 250K because I have to do expulsion to the Bush.
• 30:50
  Like you didn't tell me about that one before, you just said
• 30:52
  250K. Now day three you're telling me
• 30:55
  I should bring another 250K. So in the charcoal business that
• 30:59
  they used to do that, he didn't feasting a lot.
• 31:04
  So you need to ask, let's see what else.
• 31:08
  OK, then just get a sense of their communication basically.
• 31:12
  So how we going to do this thing?
• 31:14
  Physical zoom, will you be sending me a summary?
• 31:17
  Are you going to give me what's this thing called university
• 31:20
  that they used to give us? What is it called Handout.
• 31:23
  Are you going to give me a handout?
• 31:24
  You didn't give me a handout. Nigerians seem to love
• 31:27
  certificates. So this is the point where you
• 31:28
  ask them about certificates. Are you going to give me a
• 31:30
  certificate or not and all those sorts of things.
• 31:34
  Now this is the rationale of asking all these questions.
• 31:36
  If you ask all these questions, it's a very good way of starting
• 31:39
  your due diligence and it means that you will now be equipped to
• 31:43
  pick the right professional that is going to help you.
• 31:47
  So without you selecting stocks, you'll pick in the right
• 31:49
  professional that'll help you pick your stocks.
• 31:52
  If you want to learn how to do chicken business, you'll be able
• 31:54
  to pick the right professional to help you with the chicken
• 31:56
  business, help you with the beekeeping business, help you
• 31:59
  with the aluminium business, help you with the chocolate
• 32:02
  business. So that's all, that's what I
• 32:05
  came pretty much to share here today and I think this will be
• 32:10
  part of the conversation that I have with my people on the radio
• 32:14
  show next week Tuesday. My show is on Tuesdays, 7:00 PM
• 32:18
  to 9:00 PM. So again, Abby, sorry, 7:00 PM
• 32:21
  to 8:00 PM and that's Radio Maria, that's 91.3 FM, Abuja.
• 32:27
  There is a Radio Maria play app. So that for those of you based
• 32:30
  abroad, based in Maiduguri, based in Banner Republic, you
• 32:33
  know you can or based in Australia, OK, 1% of you are
• 32:37
  based in China. You know my Chinese people, I
• 32:39
  would have said something now, but I don't want anybody to call
• 32:41
  me racist. So my Chinese people.
• 32:45
  Radio Maria, play app, iPhone, Google store, download it,
• 32:52
  you'll be able to listen or you can live stream on the app.
• 32:55
  That's Radio Maria Dhabi. Is it Radio Maria dot Ng or
• 33:00
  something like that? I think it's Radio Maria dot Ng.
• 33:02
  You'll be able to live stream from the app.
• 33:05
  So that's how you guys can catch my show if you happen to be
• 33:07
  listening now and you're in the Antarctic or if you're in
• 33:11
  Greenland or if you are in Syria.
• 33:15
  So that's how you can listen to the radio show.
• 33:18
  So this part of some of the stuff that I'm going to talk to
• 33:22
  them about next week. Bottom line, thank you very
• 33:25
  much, Emmanuel, for calling in. I'm glad that you listened to
• 33:27
  the podcast and I'm glad that you called in on the radio show.
• 33:31
  If nothing else, you reminded me that I should be telling the
• 33:33
  radio people about my podcast on my YouTube channel because I
• 33:36
  forget about that. Let's see what else?
• 33:40
  OK, that's all pretty much. So thank you very much for your
• 33:42
  time and attention. For those of you who would love
• 33:44
  to connect for a strategy session for a business audit or
• 33:47
  you want me to answer some questions, then the number to
• 33:50
  reach me on is 08064662140. The country code is +234.
• 33:57
  For those of you who are not Nigerian, it's my WhatsApp
• 33:59
  number, so you can shoot me a WhatsApp message as well and
• 34:02
  then I'll connect with me on LinkedIn.
• 34:04
  The name to look for is Tavi Shima Aidi.
• 34:06
  For the YouTube channel, it's the same name, Tavi Shima Aidi.
• 34:10
  You'll find all the videos there.
• 34:11
  So thanks for the time and attention.
• 34:13
  I'll catch you guys at the next episode.