Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / Navigating the CRM Landscape: A Guide for Businesses of All Sizes

Transcript

Navigating the CRM Landscape: A Guide for Businesses of All Sizes · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome to the show. It's available on YouTube, on
• 0:04
  Apple Podcasts, and on Spotify. I'm your host, Tavishima Ayede.
• 0:09
  Today is going to be a noisy episode because I'm out and
• 0:11
  about. I'm on the road, so expect to
• 0:13
  hear some interruptions in the background.
• 0:15
  Now, if you'd love to connect and explore opportunities with
• 0:18
  me, then call me on 08064662140 or WhatsApp me on the same
• 0:24
  number. The country code is +234.
• 0:27
  For those of you who are not Nigerian, if you'd rather reach
• 0:29
  out to me on socials, then look for me on LinkedIn.
• 0:32
  If you check me on other places, you'll probably hear back from
• 0:35
  me in a month. But LinkedIn?
• 0:37
  I'm there almost every day. So today we're going to look at
• 0:42
  what kind of CRM system is a bet best fit for your business.
• 0:46
  I'm going to explain what the CRM is for those of you who are
• 0:48
  newbies. This is your first time
• 0:50
  listening to the show then don't worry, we're going to get into
• 0:53
  that. But before I go into the meat of
• 0:56
  the matter, I'd like to apologise because I was gone for
• 0:58
  a couple of days and that's the reason.
• 1:00
  And the reason because is because my crew and I were
• 1:05
  providing media services for the British Council.
• 1:08
  They had an event, which is an annual thing, the Inclusive
• 1:11
  Education Conference, and that is where they bring stakeholders
• 1:16
  in the education industry, you know, teachers, principals, what
• 1:20
  do you call them? Local government chairman,
• 1:23
  commissioners of education, you know, all these sorts of things.
• 1:26
  And it's all about making sure that education is accessible for
• 1:31
  people living with disabilities. So, you know, people with
• 1:34
  cerebral policy, people who are hard of hearing or totally deaf,
• 1:38
  people who have different kinds of visual accommodations or
• 1:41
  people who are totally blind, people who are wheelchair
• 1:43
  bounds, people who have mobility issues, all those sorts of
• 1:46
  things. So this conference is just
• 1:48
  around making sure that our children and our colleagues who
• 1:52
  suffer from any of these issues are able to have access to a
• 1:57
  wholesome education, you know, the same sorts of education that
• 2:03
  lots of us were able to receive growing up in Nigeria.
• 2:06
  So all these sorts of conversations.
• 2:08
  And so it's always nice hanging out at these events just to see
• 2:12
  the kind of strides that we're making in Nigeria to try and
• 2:14
  solve all the challenges that we face.
• 2:18
  I mean, of course, you know, we Nigerians, we know that our
• 2:22
  country has problems and every day we're inundated with the the
• 2:25
  problems of the country. So it's just nice to be exposed
• 2:28
  to different corners of Nigeria here and there where people are
• 2:34
  trying to make a debt and to solve some things.
• 2:38
  So, yeah, that was a good event that took up the last two days.
• 2:42
  And yeah, really interesting. So I guess the reason why I'm
• 2:46
  sharing that is just to say that, yes, Nigeria has problems,
• 2:49
  but everything hasn't gone to the dogs just yet.
• 2:52
  And there are people who are dedicated and trying to make
• 2:54
  sure that we leave behind a greater country.
• 2:56
  So it's OK to be frustrated, but don't lose hope.
• 3:00
  I mean, things can get better. And there are people who are
• 3:03
  dedicated to making the country better one step at a time.
• 3:07
  So today, let's head straight into the question, which is
• 3:09
  which CRM system is the best fit for your business?
• 3:13
  And of course, the reason why this topic is up here today is
• 3:15
  because I do meet business people who run into me and who
• 3:19
  want to know what kind of CRM system should I be using for my
• 3:23
  business, Especially since I spend, I devote some time in
• 3:27
  some of the podcast episodes to saying that every single
• 3:30
  business should be using ACRM. Now, the best CRM for your
• 3:34
  business is contextual because it depends.
• 3:38
  It depends on your industry. It depends on whether you sell a
• 3:41
  product or a service. It depends on whether you have a
• 3:43
  sales team or not, how many people there on the sales team
• 3:47
  and what you want that CRM to integrate with.
• 3:49
  Integration just means working with something.
• 3:52
  So you have a CRM, but then you plug it into something else.
• 3:54
  Like for those of you who run shops, maybe you know, Mumsy has
• 4:00
  just opened up a shop, a shop on, in Lagos Island, you know,
• 4:05
  in Leckie or something. And you guys have a CRM where
• 4:08
  all the customers data is. But then that also has to
• 4:11
  integrate with your, you know, that thing that when you guys
• 4:15
  scan something, it will now put the price up on the computer
• 4:19
  just so you so you can issue the bill to the to the customer.
• 4:22
  So you need to make sure. So for people in that situation,
• 4:27
  you know, you want to know how your CRM is going to integrate
• 4:29
  with that thing, you know, that used to scan the barcodes and
• 4:32
  issue prices to everyone. So integration just means how
• 4:36
  well is this software working with all the other software.
• 4:39
  So these are the things that determine what kind of CRM is
• 4:41
  best for your business. So please do not fall prey to
• 4:45
  all these people online who are saying use HubSpot.
• 4:48
  HubSpot is the best CRM for your business.
• 4:51
  You can't just say HubSpot is the best CRM for business, full
• 4:54
  stop. It depends.
• 4:56
  So whether you're going to use HubSpot, whether you're going to
• 4:59
  use Begin or whether you're going to use Zoho or Audio or or
• 5:06
  to ignore them altogether and use your phone, it's it all
• 5:10
  depends. So there's a whole lot of
• 5:11
  factors that we need to look into.
• 5:13
  Now for those of you who are newbies to the show, let's
• 5:15
  define CRM so that they're not, you know, so they won't loss.
• 5:21
  So CRM basically just means customer relationship management
• 5:25
  tool. Some people say the C stands for
• 5:27
  clients. So whether you want to call it
• 5:28
  customer relationship management or client relationship
• 5:31
  management, some people say it's contact relationship management,
• 5:34
  any wish are all join. Whether you want to manage your
• 5:36
  contact, manage a client or manage a customer, that is what
• 5:41
  the CRM is there for. It is that tool that you look at
• 5:44
  so that you know who exactly you are talking to.
• 5:47
  Who are your clients or who are the people that you're chasing
• 5:49
  to close business? What stage are you at at the
• 5:52
  relationship with them? What is the next step that you
• 5:56
  need to take or that the other people need to take to close the
• 5:58
  deal? And then also need to make sure
• 6:01
  that you have your customer info.
• 6:02
  So that is the tool that you open up and it's going to tell
• 6:05
  you that you're currently having a conversation with Missus
• 6:07
  Ogdenbe, that Missus Ogdenbe lives on, lives in Marina in
• 6:13
  Lagos, and that Miss Ogdenbe wants ABC and XYZ.
• 6:17
  And that this is where you're going to record that you already
• 6:20
  had two meetings with Mrs. Rogeny.
• 6:22
  So far? So far.
• 6:23
  And I just looked at samples and that the next meeting is
• 6:26
  supposed to be on July 15th where you guys are going to
• 6:29
  start talking about the proposal.
• 6:32
  Yeah. So that sort of thing.
• 6:34
  So, of course, by the example that I've given, I hope that it
• 6:37
  is obvious why you need the CRM, because if you do not have ACRM,
• 6:41
  it is going to be very hard for you to wake up today and know
• 6:44
  exactly how many conversations you've had with Mrs. Rogeny.
• 6:48
  What you are Mrs. Will Getting we are supposed to do next
• 6:51
  because you agree that we'll have a meeting and you've agreed
• 6:54
  to the agenda of the meeting. But Mr. Getting is going to get
• 6:57
  busy and I bet you she will forget.
• 6:59
  After all, you're the salesperson, you're the person
• 7:01
  who is trying to collect money from Mrs. Will Getting.
• 7:03
  But The thing is, you're also having conversations with five
• 7:05
  or six other people. So you're talking to Mrs.
• 7:08
  Ogdenbe, but then last week you also spoke to Mr. Bayo, and then
• 7:11
  today you're going to speak to Malam Tanko, and then next
• 7:15
  tomorrow you're going to speak to Alhaja Risika.
• 7:19
  So by the time you're talking to Ogdenbe and Risika and Tanko and
• 7:24
  all these things, if you don't have ACRM, you just wake up one
• 7:27
  day and you get all your stuff mixed up.
• 7:29
  Because like, I was having a conversation with one guy and I
• 7:31
  told the guy how in the past I was talking to two potential
• 7:37
  brides because I came from the wedding photography space and
• 7:40
  they both had the same name. Now these things happen, you
• 7:42
  know, for your people, because your people, well, this
• 7:45
  generation of your people have very common names.
• 7:48
  So it's not strange for you to run into Chemi Adebayo.
• 7:51
  So I can be talking about Chemi Adebayo and you as you're
• 7:53
  listening to the show, you know, a Chemi Adebayo, but we're both
• 7:57
  not talking about the same person.
• 7:58
  These things happen. It's like Ayo Ademi, that's also
• 8:01
  another popular one because there are lots of Yoruba boys
• 8:04
  who are named Ayo Deji and who choose to use the short form
• 8:08
  Ayo. And then Ademi is also a popular
• 8:11
  surname. So as I'm here, as I'm I'm
• 8:13
  saying Ayo Ademi, you probably know two or three Ayo Ademi's,
• 8:16
  but we're not talking about the same person.
• 8:18
  So this thing happened when I was talking to bride, let me
• 8:20
  just say Cami Adebayo, well that's not her real name.
• 8:22
  So I was talking to two Cami Adebayos, both of them potential
• 8:27
  brides because I didn't write it down anywhere, which Cameo I was
• 8:31
  talking to and what we agreed, that is how I accidentally
• 8:34
  swapped their wedding dates and swapped all the important
• 8:37
  details. So these are the reasons why you
• 8:39
  need a CRM because even if you're not in that situation
• 8:43
  where you're talking to two cameo DE BIOS or two IO are DM
• 8:49
  ES, you just, you know, you talk to Ogadenbay today, Tango
• 8:54
  tomorrow and Alimi next tomorrow and you just forget that, OK,
• 8:59
  who am I supposed to see on Wednesday?
• 9:00
  Is it Mrs. Alimi or is it Mrs. Ogadenbay?
• 9:04
  So if you don't have ACRM, the thing will cause serious trouble
• 9:07
  for you. So you definitely need the CRM.
• 9:10
  Now let's look at the concrete example now, because what we're
• 9:13
  trying to talk about is which kind of CRM is best for your
• 9:17
  business. But just remember what it is
• 9:19
  that I said that you can't answer this question in
• 9:21
  absolute. You can't say there is a best
• 9:24
  CRM because some people will say, see sales force is the
• 9:27
  best. It depends.
• 9:30
  For small and medium scale or nano business person here in
• 9:34
  Abuja, sales force, sorry in Nigeria, sales force is too
• 9:37
  complicated for you. Forget the fact that it's
• 9:40
  expensive. Even if you had the money and
• 9:42
  wanted to use it, it's just too big.
• 9:44
  It's just too expensive. So for one person who has one
• 9:47
  small business where you have only 10 salespeople as as your
• 9:54
  employees, sales force is overkill.
• 9:56
  It's just too much. So we can't just say sales force
• 9:59
  is the best go and buy sales force or that hot spot is the
• 10:02
  best go and buy a hot spot. We have to ask ourselves a
• 10:05
  couple of things. Who am I?
• 10:07
  What industry am I in? What is the product or what's
• 10:10
  the service? What's the size of my sales team
• 10:12
  ABI, am I the only person and does this thing need to
• 10:15
  integrate with someone else? So we're done with the
• 10:18
  definition now that this over the CRM is and how it helps us
• 10:22
  track who we're talking to, who our client is, who our contact
• 10:25
  is, who our potential customer is, what stage are we at in the
• 10:28
  relationship? What is the next step that we
• 10:30
  need to do? What is all the customers
• 10:33
  information and Oh yeah, you can also use it to track who is
• 10:37
  owing you money. So by the time you're down
• 10:39
  misses, we're getting there and you guys agree on the proposal
• 10:43
  and then she transfers you 50% deposit.
• 10:48
  You also put it down there in the CRM.
• 10:50
  OK, today by the we're getting there, we agreed she transferred
• 10:53
  50% deposit which equals to 2.5 M, therefore she's owning us 2.5
• 10:58
  M and she says she's going to pay the remaining 2.5 staggered
• 11:01
  over three months and she will pay 3030.
• 11:05
  So 33% each month. So you noted that in the CRM
• 11:10
  when you get back to the office you update your organ or orga,
• 11:13
  this is what happened blah, blah, blah.
• 11:15
  And then you know organ knows how he and accounting are going
• 11:17
  to reconcile that and you know or what not.
• 11:20
  But bottom line is you use the CRM to track all of these sorts
• 11:23
  of things in the relationship that you and this contact has or
• 11:27
  you and this client has or you and this customer has.
• 11:32
  So don't get into many arguments about whether CRM is customer
• 11:36
  relationship management, contact relationship management, or
• 11:40
  client relationship management. For those of us who all want to
• 11:44
  just want to sell or join, you can call you whatever you want
• 11:47
  to call it. Bottom line is we're going to
• 11:49
  use it. We're going to use it whether
• 11:52
  we're dealing with contacts, whether we're dealing with
• 11:54
  customers or whether we're dealing with clients.
• 11:56
  So, so I was going to give you a contract, sorry, I say contract.
• 12:01
  What's that word? Concrete?
• 12:02
  Yes, I'm going to give you a concrete example now.
• 12:06
  There is someone that I'm talking to right now, someone
• 12:10
  that I'm training right now on boarding, who is going to be
• 12:13
  part of the sales team for a real estate company that is
• 12:17
  selling tech solutions. So I'm handling their, I'm
• 12:21
  handling training their sales people.
• 12:24
  And so they've gotten the first person and it's now time to get
• 12:27
  her on board. Now I love this client, this
• 12:30
  candidate. I well, when I say I love, I
• 12:33
  mean lovers in like not lovers in love.
• 12:35
  You know, I'm happily married. And besides, it will be
• 12:37
  unethical As for me, a sales trainer, to start putting eye on
• 12:42
  an employee in somebody's company, you know?
• 12:44
  So anyway, I was like, yeah, So what I love about this candidate
• 12:48
  is that she has previous selling experience because sometimes
• 12:53
  people come into a sales role, they've had no selling
• 12:56
  experience before. They haven't tried running a
• 12:58
  business before. They haven't tried doing
• 13:00
  anything, no matter how small. Because even if you've tried
• 13:02
  selling Indo me before, it's good.
• 13:04
  You might be wondering, how is selling Indo me going to make
• 13:07
  somebody good at selling insurance?
• 13:10
  Well, at least you've tried, at least you've spoken to
• 13:14
  strangers, at least you know what rejection feels like.
• 13:17
  And at least you know the frustration of trying to talk to
• 13:19
  one person, two people, three people, 10 people because you're
• 13:22
  trying to sell something. So she has, she has some
• 13:26
  previous experience. She sold perfume in university.
• 13:31
  For her final year, she sold a perfume.
• 13:34
  I'll be body oils or something. So I'm not in that space.
• 13:36
  So I don't know the difference between the perfume between a
• 13:39
  scent and between a body oil. So for me, I just say all of
• 13:44
  them are the same. But yeah, I know those of there
• 13:46
  are some of you who say, look, young man, these things are not
• 13:48
  the same. Perfume is this body scent is
• 13:51
  this deodorant is this body oil is this.
• 13:55
  So yes, they all smell fresh, but it doesn't mean that the
• 13:57
  same thing. So in talking about her previous
• 14:01
  history selling perfume as a final year student undergrad for
• 14:07
  her, we didn't use the term CRM, but I was trying to find out how
• 14:11
  issue with CRMS. So for her, the way that she
• 14:13
  kept a record of her stuff was she had a small diary that she
• 14:16
  used to use. And see those of you listening
• 14:19
  to this podcast who are starting off new into the game, you can
• 14:23
  see how when I say that we need a CRM, it doesn't have to be
• 14:28
  tech. It'll be nice if it's tech
• 14:30
  because tech or digital means that it can be cloud based and
• 14:35
  it can be shared with other people.
• 14:36
  But The thing is, if you start with a diary, it's not bad.
• 14:39
  Especially those small Diaries that you know, if you're female,
• 14:42
  the ones that you can just put inside your back pocket.
• 14:44
  Even that size of diary is not bad, which is what she had and
• 14:48
  this is how she used it. In her diary.
• 14:51
  She had a list of people that she needed to talk to and I
• 14:54
  thought that was fantastic. It's very nice to start off the
• 14:57
  day or the week with a list of people that OK, among my
• 15:00
  classmates. I'm going to talk to this person
• 15:03
  after this person. I'll talk to this after this
• 15:05
  person. I'll talk to this after this
• 15:06
  person. I'll talk to that.
• 15:07
  Because if you just leave it up to how you wake up, you might
• 15:11
  wake up today and you say, oh, I wanted to talk to my classmates,
• 15:15
  but man, today I'm not feeling it or the weather is cold or I'm
• 15:18
  afraid or whatever, or I have headache.
• 15:21
  And so I'm not going to talk to anybody.
• 15:23
  But if you open your diary and you see that you wrote in your
• 15:25
  diary that today you are going to talk to Bio to see how he can
• 15:29
  buy 5 body oils for his girlfriend, then you're going to
• 15:32
  talk to BC to see how she can buy 2 body oil for herself.
• 15:37
  Then after BC we're going to talk to Chinedu.
• 15:43
  This is how you can get him to buy 3 body oil for his mumsy.
• 15:47
  And then after that you're going to talk to Dauda to see how they
• 15:50
  can buy 3 body oil so that they can use in their incense burner
• 15:55
  at home or something. So if you wake up and that's in
• 15:58
  your diary, you can see that. Well, there's a plan.
• 16:00
  Now you have to come up with with the course of action.
• 16:04
  Who am I going to talk to 1st? Will I will, are we going to
• 16:06
  talk before this lecture or before that lecture?
• 16:08
  How do I branch this person in all these sorts of things?
• 16:11
  But at least you have a list of people you're supposed to talk
• 16:15
  to. That's a prospecting list.
• 16:16
  And then that was in her diary. By the way, she didn't meet any
• 16:21
  sales trainer. This was just her trying to be
• 16:23
  proactive and trying to get things done.
• 16:24
  But you can see how it works and you can see how even the diary
• 16:28
  can be ACRM because the list of the customers, or rather in this
• 16:33
  case, potential customer is there, potential client is
• 16:36
  there, contacts are there, because these are people that
• 16:39
  she goes to class with. So these are just contacts.
• 16:43
  So everything is there. So in her diary that she'll put
• 16:45
  in her back pocket, not that big Diario, the small one that fits
• 16:49
  inside your back pocket, the jeans of your back pocket, list
• 16:52
  of people to talk to, That's what she put.
• 16:54
  She also put inside that diary people that were owing her
• 16:57
  money. So we put it there that she
• 17:00
  closed the deal with Bio Bio eventually bought 5, but she
• 17:04
  only had money for four. So he gave her cash for four.
• 17:08
  He said he's going to do the transfer.
• 17:09
  The remaining ATK, he's going to do it after Philosophy five O 1
• 17:13
  exams. So you put it down there in your
• 17:16
  diary. On the day of Philosophy five O
• 17:18
  1, you put it there, go and chase bio, he's owing ME80K.
• 17:24
  He agreed to do bank transfer, you know that sort of thing.
• 17:27
  So list of people was in her diary.
• 17:30
  People owing her money was in her diary.
• 17:33
  She also put next appointments in the diary.
• 17:36
  So you spoke to Dauda. Dauda thinks this is a good
• 17:40
  thing, but he's broke right now, Mom.
• 17:43
  She's going to send him money next month, January 20th.
• 17:47
  So let's talk after January 20. She will now put it down in the
• 17:50
  diary so that she can send Dauda a reminder, a text reminder
• 17:56
  January 18th. And then so that January 21st,
• 17:59
  you can start chasing him down, knowing that transfer would have
• 18:03
  entered January 20th. So yeah, she also put people
• 18:09
  owing her money. Yeah, next appointments.
• 18:12
  So scheduled next appointments. And then in the diary, she also
• 18:15
  put down people's preferences because you also need to know
• 18:18
  Dauda, which kind of oils does he like?
• 18:22
  Bio. Bio is one who's buying for his
• 18:23
  girlfriend. What kind of body oils does
• 18:27
  girlfriend like? And then Professor Alimi, which
• 18:32
  kind of oils does he like? Let's say you're bold enough to
• 18:35
  sell to your professors. Maybe Professor Alimi buys it
• 18:38
  because maybe he has small arthritis, so he's looking for
• 18:40
  body oil that doesn't just smell good but also helps with
• 18:43
  arthritis. So it's inside that diet.
• 18:45
  I write everything down so you can see how for someone who is a
• 18:49
  final year student in a university selling perfumes and
• 18:53
  body oils, you can see how a diary is adequate for this
• 18:57
  stage. When she's ready to scale up and
• 19:00
  to get other people to sell perfume on her behalf, then a
• 19:03
  diary would be inadequate. But for now, the diary that
• 19:09
  folds neatly into the back pocket so that she never forgets
• 19:12
  it, whether she's going to church or for lecture or for
• 19:16
  prayer meeting, it is always there.
• 19:19
  You know, because you know now that you need lifestyle.
• 19:22
  You know when you're hustling, you're trying to sell something,
• 19:24
  you have to be ready. You can finish prayer meeting
• 19:27
  right now and it is a potential customer.
• 19:30
  And then you, you know, you do your thing, you swing into
• 19:33
  motion. I say you can't close that deal.
• 19:35
  So at that stage, the diary was adequate.
• 19:38
  Now that she has left that world, she's no longer selling
• 19:42
  perfume. She's no longer in university.
• 19:45
  She has finished university. And right now she has an
• 19:47
  employer who wants her to sell tech solutions for real estate
• 19:52
  companies. Her own suggestion this was just
• 19:57
  normal interview banter was that you can use Trello as ACRM.
• 20:01
  Once I describe what the CRM was, because this company
• 20:04
  actually does not have ACRM right now.
• 20:06
  So that's a conversation I need to have with the company owner.
• 20:09
  So she wants to use Trello as ACRM now.
• 20:11
  Trello. Trello is a project management
• 20:16
  tool. There's a mobile version, so
• 20:19
  it's available on your phone. There's also a computer software
• 20:22
  web. Version.
• 20:24
  So whether laptop, desktop or phone, you can use Trello.
• 20:27
  Now Trello actually is not a CRM, it is a project management
• 20:33
  tool. But however, like I keep saying
• 20:36
  on the podcast, you might decide that you want to do CRM but for
• 20:41
  now you are broke and you cannot pay for CRM using these tools.
• 20:46
  Trello, a project management tool, you can use that as a CRM.
• 20:51
  Evernote is a note taking tool, but it has scheduling functions
• 20:54
  and has a calendar. You can use that as a CRM.
• 20:57
  And I've always said that if you don't use any of these things
• 21:01
  for now, you can use your phone, the Google Suite, Google Suite
• 21:06
  as the CRM. You can use the calendar to be
• 21:09
  scheduling stuff. You can use the Google notes to
• 21:12
  be writing down stuff. You can use what else?
• 21:15
  What else? But I hope you guys are getting
• 21:18
  the picture to see how all these things work.
• 21:20
  So even if the employer does not get ACRM for her, I'm impressed
• 21:28
  and I'm glad that she's looking at Trello as ACRM tool.
• 21:33
  Even though it's for project management, we can use it now.
• 21:36
  Trello has 2 features. There's a list feature, you're
• 21:39
  creating a list of things to do. And when she said Trello, that's
• 21:42
  the reason why that's what she was thinking of.
• 21:44
  The list feature where you list activities for the day and then
• 21:46
  tick, tick, tick, tick, tick. So you can use the list feature
• 21:51
  to come up with based on what she was doing before, a list of
• 21:54
  contacts. And as you approach each
• 21:56
  contact, you take off, you take off, you take off a list of
• 21:59
  contacts or a list of leads. Then you can also create a list
• 22:03
  to show the number of qualification meetings or
• 22:06
  conversations that they need to have this week for potential
• 22:09
  clients. And then you can also use the
• 22:11
  list noting list function to track the quotes that you've
• 22:15
  issued or proposal that you've issued.
• 22:16
  So you can use Trello lists. Now, Trello also has a feature
• 22:20
  that is called cards. Cards is like, how would I say
• 22:24
  like a file, you know, like back in the old days, how you enter
• 22:28
  into your office. That's for those of us who
• 22:29
  parents works in the civil service.
• 22:31
  You know, you enter Popsy's office and then you just have
• 22:33
  files on the desks. So that's kind of like what the
• 22:36
  card is just the digital version.
• 22:38
  So you can create a Trello card for an individual client or an
• 22:42
  individual contact or an individual person that you're
• 22:45
  chasing to try and close the deal.
• 22:47
  And then in those cards you have the contact information, you
• 22:49
  have notes about the conversations.
• 22:51
  Last week I saw the person December 1st, you write it down,
• 22:55
  this was what the meeting was about.
• 22:57
  This week I met the person December 7th, this is what the
• 23:00
  meeting was about. The next meeting is supposed to
• 23:02
  be December 23rd, and this is what that meeting is supposed to
• 23:06
  be about. Everything will go down there in
• 23:09
  the travel card. And then you now use the
• 23:11
  scheduling function so that the card keeps pinging you on the
• 23:14
  important date so that you wake up, you're going about your day,
• 23:17
  then your phone does zoom, zoom or ping him or whatever the
• 23:20
  notification sound is. And then you look and then you
• 23:23
  see the Trello meeting with Mrs. Ogdenbee, 11:00 AM at her
• 23:28
  office. And you know, remember that it's
• 23:30
  true. I haven't buffed yet.
• 23:32
  Let me buff and let me hurry up and go for this meeting.
• 23:34
  So that's how you use Trello. So these are just examples.
• 23:41
  It's not exhaustive, but you can see how before Diary was fine
• 23:46
  for her. Now it's a new industry, it's a
• 23:49
  new product, it's a new service. She's going to be working with
• 23:53
  other people, but she happens to be salesperson #1 and right now
• 23:58
  she's exploring Trello as a CRM. So this is how you're supposed
• 24:02
  to think about it when you're answering the question, which
• 24:04
  CRM is the best fit for your business?
• 24:07
  So don't just say HubSpot is the best go and buy HubSpot or
• 24:11
  Salesforce is the best go and buy Salesforce or say, OK, I
• 24:15
  don't have money. So let me only look at free
• 24:17
  audio is free. Zoho is free, which was, you
• 24:20
  know, it's not, it's not that simple.
• 24:22
  OK, well, it's simple, but it doesn't have to be that
• 24:24
  complicated. So this is how we narrow
• 24:26
  everything down, small, small, small, small.
• 24:28
  And this is how we can use different things as CRM options.
• 24:32
  So my own recommendation for those of you who are small and
• 24:37
  medium scale business people, especially if you think you're
• 24:40
  going to scale anytime soon. Right now you're selling by
• 24:43
  yourself like this real estate person.
• 24:45
  Next year you want to get one person to sell and hopefully in
• 24:49
  two years you won't have like 5 people selling for you.
• 24:51
  My recommendation is just out with a dedicated CRM.
• 24:54
  So auto is free. They also based in they also an
• 24:59
  African company so I think they have like Niger offices and
• 25:02
  stuff like that. So maybe customer support should
• 25:04
  be easy, I don't know but that's just a guess.
• 25:06
  That's my own guess. But I know that auto is is an
• 25:08
  African thing and the auto is ODO.
• 25:11
  That one is free. It's not just CRM.
• 25:14
  They also have human resource solutions.
• 25:17
  They also have accounting something, you know, like when
• 25:20
  you send invoices, you know, how much money do you have in your
• 25:23
  bank account, blah, blah, blah, all those sorts of things.
• 25:25
  Audio does that as well. Sorry, excuse me, the Qatar is
• 25:30
  still there. So audio ODOO, that one is free.
• 25:35
  Zoho is also free. That's ZOHO.
• 25:39
  Zoho, that one is free. What problem is over is for your
• 25:43
  free account, I think you're limited to only three users.
• 25:45
  So if you have two people selling for you, that's fine.
• 25:49
  You will have one account. The other people have one
• 25:51
  account. If you have four people selling
• 25:53
  for you or then there's a problem because you can only
• 25:55
  have 3 users. Maybe what you do is you remove
• 25:57
  yourself and then you you give access to the other three
• 26:01
  people. Then maybe we need to cross
• 26:03
  check something. You collect somebody's phone and
• 26:04
  you start looking inside. That's how you get overview
• 26:07
  function. So Zoho limited for, although I
• 26:10
  don't know if there's any limits on their free on the free.
• 26:14
  What's it called on the free package.
• 26:18
  Then there's also begin, which is in the same family as Zoho as
• 26:22
  in the same company that makes Zoho that makes begin.
• 26:25
  Begin is there begin. You can now pay for beginning in
• 26:30
  naira. So you don't have to look for
• 26:31
  hard currency, you don't have to pay in dollars.
• 26:33
  I've noticed that Begin has been doing lots of advertising.
• 26:37
  I've been seeing lots of their billboards in Abuja.
• 26:39
  So I don't know about Lagos, what accords all those other
• 26:42
  parts of Nigeria. But at least in Abuja, Shah in
• 26:45
  central area in Abuja, the advertisements are popping up
• 26:48
  everywhere. So Begin, it looks like Begin is
• 26:51
  here to stay. Like they really want to enter
• 26:52
  this Nigerian market. So you can now pay in naira, you
• 26:54
  don't have to pay in USD. And that's also another thing,
• 26:57
  some of these softwares, I know people who do what you call like
• 27:03
  computer coding and things like that.
• 27:04
  So some of the problems that they have is some of these
• 27:06
  things that they need to pay for, they need to pay in
• 27:08
  dollars. And then you know how our
• 27:12
  banking sector is today you can use your GT bank card, but then
• 27:16
  tomorrow CBN chairman will wake up and say something and then
• 27:18
  they now discontinue it. And then you don't have access
• 27:21
  to the thing to do your job. So that whole thing of whether
• 27:23
  you're paying in naira or paying in dollar, it actually does make
• 27:26
  a difference. So we begin now that you can pay
• 27:29
  in naira, you don't have to use your GTB dollar card or
• 27:33
  whatever. But my recommendation is, bottom
• 27:36
  line, you should be using something, some sort of
• 27:38
  dedicated CRM system. However, if you choose not to
• 27:43
  use any of these or you don't have a choice, there are other
• 27:48
  things that can be done. You can use diary like this
• 27:51
  lady. When you graduate to something
• 27:54
  much more sophisticated, you can use Trello.
• 27:56
  She's familiar with Trello. You can use Trello.
• 27:59
  So bottom line, what I'm just trying to say is the answer to
• 28:04
  the question, which CRM system is the best fit for your
• 28:07
  business? There's no one answer.
• 28:09
  It depends. If you're selling perfume, it's
• 28:11
  just you. You're a final year student
• 28:13
  diary, absolutely fine. If you're about to be employed
• 28:17
  by a real estate company and it's a startup, you guys should
• 28:20
  be looking at something that is a bit more tech oriented, a bit
• 28:25
  more cloud oriented so that when you update your thing like
• 28:29
  Trello. Now, if she uses Trello, as this
• 28:32
  babe puts in any information into Trello, all of her team
• 28:35
  members will be able to see this information, you know, wherever
• 28:38
  they are, if it is a shared list or a shared board.
• 28:40
  So that's the advantage. You know, you don't have to be
• 28:42
  with her. That's why I like some of these
• 28:44
  cloud based solutions. So I can be here in Abuja doing
• 28:47
  my thing. I update Trello.
• 28:49
  You can be where you are right now in Port Harcourt listening
• 28:51
  to this podcast as I update the file.
• 28:55
  Just give you like 2-3 minutes, you'll be able to see all the
• 28:57
  updates there. You now know how to follow up so
• 28:59
  that if the company sucks me today and I leave and tomorrow
• 29:02
  are the one that's supposed to continue.
• 29:04
  All you have to just open up Trello.
• 29:05
  All the details are there. You know how you can continue
• 29:08
  that conversation, miss or getting way and close the deal.
• 29:11
  So yeah, so that's the bottom line.
• 29:15
  Bosha, try and be using something.
• 29:18
  The person that is in the worst situation is the person who
• 29:22
  decides, you know what? Let me just run this thing.
• 29:25
  Let me freestyle this thing. Let me run it from my brain.
• 29:27
  The person that is running from your brain, that's the person
• 29:29
  that is in the worst possible situation.
• 29:31
  You will definitely forget something.
• 29:34
  And the moment you forget something, you forget to push
• 29:36
  the deal. And that's how you wake up one
• 29:38
  day in three months. And like I was talking to Madam,
• 29:42
  if I had closed that deal would have been worth 2.5.
• 29:46
  The reason why you're now saying had I known it should have been
• 29:48
  worth and you know, all of this, all of that, and here.
• 29:51
  Yeah. And looking into the past is
• 29:53
  precisely because you did not have a CRM.
• 29:56
  So please, please, please, please do not try on Freestyle.
• 30:00
  If it's a diary, get a diary. If it's Trello, use Trello.
• 30:03
  If you have money, go and get begin or get Salesforce or get a
• 30:07
  hotspot. If you're looking for something
• 30:09
  free, Zoho is there, Auto is there, and I'm sure that there
• 30:12
  are other alternatives. If you just do a quick Google
• 30:14
  search, you will find out the stuff.
• 30:16
  So thank you very much for your time and attention.
• 30:19
  That's all for today. Remember that you would love to
• 30:21
  connect and explore opportunities with me.
• 30:23
  You can call me on 080 64662140 or WhatsApp me on the same
• 30:30
  number. The country code again is +234.
• 30:33
  For those of you who are not Nigerian and for social media,
• 30:36
  connect with me on LinkedIn. I'll catch you guys at the next
• 30:39
  episode.