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Transcript

Client Consultation: How to Ask the Right Questions to Close More Deals · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:01
  Hello and welcome to the show. Today's episode is also going to
• 0:04
  be a noisy 1 because I'm out and about.
• 0:06
  And today we're going to be focused on how to handle a
• 0:08
  client consultation or in this case it was called a pre
• 0:12
  inspection call. And that's because I'm currently
• 0:15
  training someone to work as a virtual inspection officer, kind
• 0:21
  of like a customer service role for a real estate firm that is
• 0:26
  trying to use lots of tech in its offerings.
• 0:30
  Basically, they're trying to use tech to show, trying to use tech
• 0:35
  to make it easier for people to inspect houses, to pay for
• 0:40
  houses, things like that. In Nigeria, of course, starting
• 0:44
  off with Lagos, which is the typical play for these sorts of
• 0:47
  things. You know, if you can make some
• 0:49
  of these ideas work in Lagos, then you can scale them to other
• 0:51
  parts of Nigeria. So yeah, today we're going to be
• 0:55
  looking at how to handle the client consultation process.
• 0:58
  Now, back when I started off in the law donkey years ago at the
• 1:03
  first one that I worked at, that is what we called it, Clank
• 1:06
  client consultation process. Now everybody needs to have a
• 1:10
  client consultation. Lots of people don't know what
• 1:13
  it is. They don't think it's important.
• 1:14
  Most business people just head straight up into a business
• 1:17
  scenario and start pitching, you know, buy this, this is the
• 1:19
  latest, this is the greatest, this is the best.
• 1:22
  But back from my Lord is my principal and that's what we
• 1:25
  call our OGA back in the day. So my principal said, look,
• 1:30
  young blood that doesn't know how you do it.
• 1:32
  You don't just come in and you try and sell this, transfer
• 1:34
  this, try and do that, try and recommend this like this is the
• 1:37
  law we're doing here. We're trying to solve problems
• 1:39
  here. Why you come and recommend this
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  and recommend that without actually knowing what the
• 1:43
  problem is. So what you do is you head into
• 1:46
  the situation, you say good morning, Sir, blah, blah, blah.
• 1:48
  You engage in some small talk, you let the person talk.
• 1:51
  The person will now tell you their life story and everything,
• 1:54
  how the quarrel started, how this person cheated this person,
• 1:57
  they don't like this, this happened, that happened, blah,
• 1:59
  blah, blah. And from all that story, you now
• 2:02
  as the lawyer, you can now decide that OK, based on all
• 2:05
  this grammar and all this story I've heard so far, this is the
• 2:07
  best course of action. It is at this stage that you can
• 2:10
  now lead the customer and say, oh, Olga, based on what you said
• 2:13
  so far, this and this and this I think is the best way.
• 2:17
  So excuse me. So excuse me, how much time here
• 2:22
  and Abuja saw my nose and throat, Everything is actually
• 2:24
  up. Yeah.
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  So back to all my principal told me.
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  So it's based on all this grammar that the person has
• 2:29
  spoken, you know, be able to tell them.
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  Sir, Madam, based on what you said, I think this is how we
• 2:34
  need to handle this, handle this.
• 2:36
  We handle it like this, we'll be able to achieve this.
• 2:38
  We'll be able to stop this. And based on our professional
• 2:41
  opinion, it will also require this and this and this.
• 2:43
  So based on that, what we're going to charge you is 5.6
• 2:47
  million. How soon can we get started?
• 2:49
  So in, you see, in this case, before you're able to make a
• 2:53
  proposal that we should go to court or that we should write a
• 2:55
  letter or that we should engage this service or engage that
• 2:58
  service or do this or do that, you actually have to listen to
• 3:01
  the customer repeat the whole story from the beginning to the
• 3:03
  end. Now, some parts of it are going
• 3:05
  to be boring because they will tell you some things that are
• 3:07
  relevant that actually are not relevant.
• 3:09
  Like for those of us who studied law, who did some years
• 3:12
  practicing law, the person might go into some detail about how
• 3:16
  when we were young, their moms used to treat my mom like this.
• 3:19
  Their mom used to treat me like that uncle, this person is this
• 3:21
  auntie, that person, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
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  Because for the client, they think all of that is relevant.
• 3:26
  But for you that the lawyer, you know that yeah, some things is
• 3:29
  just annoying stuff, but you know how your stepmother treated
• 3:32
  you is not really important to the matter at hand when it comes
• 3:35
  to settling estate or settling whatever it is that you need to
• 3:38
  settle. So it's the same thing no matter
• 3:41
  the business that you have. So in this case, they are a real
• 3:45
  estate firm that is using tech in their business.
• 3:47
  They have a proprietary algorithm and they're trying to
• 3:50
  use that to help their clients to select the right house,
• 3:53
  especially the clients who are based abroad and who don't have
• 3:56
  time to come and see every single house that they want to
• 3:59
  buy. So you just stay where you are
• 4:01
  in Miami or be in Lagos or be in Canada, Toronto, wherever.
• 4:05
  And they stay over here in Nigeria, they go and do the
• 4:09
  inspection on your behalf. And if you like it, then you
• 4:12
  pay, you know, you contact your lawyer, you pay your rent, you
• 4:15
  whatever it is that you want to do.
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  So that's what they do in this space.
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  So of course this firm, they wanted their staff to be trained
• 4:23
  to be able to handle these sorts of things.
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  And they came up with a, an SOP, standard operating procedure
• 4:28
  about how the inspection process was supposed to work.
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  And of course, they handed the SOP to me and they were like,
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  what do you think? Good or no good?
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  And I looked at it and I thought was pretty tight.
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  I thought was pretty good. I said, so, yeah, your SOP is
• 4:41
  cool. Noah Allah, when am I going to
• 4:44
  start training your staff? And it's OK.
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  You stand on so, so, so and so and so we started the training.
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  And the first thing I had to tell them was like, look, SOP
• 4:52
  that you've been giving very good, correct?
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  And you must follow it. But we cannot start talking to
• 4:57
  customers unless we hear their story.
• 5:01
  We know who they are, we know what they like, we know what it
• 5:04
  is that they don't like because that is what will determine the
• 5:06
  kind of houses we show them, the kind of features that we're
• 5:09
  going to emphasize or the things that we're going to de
• 5:12
  emphasize. That is how it was going to
• 5:13
  determine how we handle the inspection call.
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  So I told them that look, SOP is good, but it's something that is
• 5:19
  missing and we do not have a pre inspection protocol.
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  We don't have a pre inspection call and so I have been working
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  with the lady who's going to be responsible for drumming up
• 5:33
  sales and handling the inspection.
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  And we're coming up with the frameworks that she's going to
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  use and that they will also use to train subsequent team members
• 5:41
  on how to handle this thing. So if you I made a previous
• 5:46
  episode, I just can't remember the title, I'm assuming is
• 5:49
  within the last two weeks where we came up with the pre
• 5:52
  inspection protocol. We we came with the list of
• 5:56
  things that people should be paying attention to or that we
• 5:59
  think our potential customers, if we're in the real estate
• 6:01
  space, we pay attention to. And in bullet point, we came up
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  with location, we came up with amenities.
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  So location, you know, is it lucky?
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  Is it Bagada? Is it Auba amenities?
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  You know, is it 5 bedroom? Is it 2?
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  Is it one toilet? Is it 6 toilets?
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  What else also came up with, I can't remember the time, you
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  know, how close is it to work, to school or to church or to
• 6:27
  mosque? What else?
• 6:30
  Are they single or married? How many children do they have?
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  You know, that also determines the kind of property that they
• 6:36
  will be interested in. Then the purpose of the, of the
• 6:41
  purchase or sorry, whether they're buying or they're
• 6:43
  renting and then the purpose are they buying it to live in or
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  they're buying it because it's going to be, is going to be for
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  what's the word investment or speculation.
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  You know, buy it now at 7 million, give it two years, wait
• 6:57
  for the value to increase and then you sell it for, you know,
• 6:59
  18 or whatever. So in bullet form, we agree that
• 7:03
  those are the software things you'd be paying attention to.
• 7:06
  Now for those of you who are not in real estate, no matter what
• 7:08
  business you're involved in, even if you're like, who is
• 7:11
  involved in perfumes and baby oils and sorry, not baby oil.
• 7:14
  Forgive me, puff Daddy's still on my mind.
• 7:16
  Perfumes and body oils. Yes, you will find that there's
• 7:21
  a list of criteria or a list of things that your typical
• 7:25
  customers are concerned about. South for body oils.
• 7:28
  Now, for instance, your customers might be concerned
• 7:30
  about price. OK, yes, price.
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  That's an easy one. They might also be concerned
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  about the the nature of the fragrance.
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  You know, some people like water based sprays, some people prefer
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  oil based sprays. Don't ask me what the difference
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  is. I have absolutely no idea.
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  I have no expertise in this thing.
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  I just don't ask. Some people like one over the
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  other. Some people say I used the
• 7:51
  perfume, it was nice, but the thing was too oily and I'm
• 7:54
  looking I'm like, you know, it's perfume.
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  What do you mean it's oily? Because, you know, I can't tell
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  the difference. And then some people say, Oh no,
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  it's not real perfume. That is water based.
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  Life is water based is you do twile.
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  That is not perfume. And I'm looking, I'm like, which
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  one is you do twile again? Like does the thing smell nice
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  or it doesn't smell nice? So you know, there's a
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  difference. Is it a perfume?
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  Is it a UD trolley? Is it 2 millimetres?
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  Is it 5 millimetres? Is it water based?
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  Is it oil based? For the other products?
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  Is it, does it have sunblock? Does it not have sunblock?
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  You know, all these sorts of things.
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  So on all these key criteria, when we're having a client
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  consultation, these are the sorts of things that we're
• 8:30
  asking their opinions about. We're trying to figure out what
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  it is that they like, because it's when we know all these
• 8:35
  things, we now know what to recommend.
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  So for somebody like me who doesn't know the difference
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  between perfume and between Uditwale and between water based
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  and oil based or whatever, is by asking all these questions that
• 8:47
  you now know that, OK, this guy is a total novice, This guy is a
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  total virgin when it comes to perfumes.
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  So therefore part of the sales process means I have to educate
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  this novice before I can close the deal.
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  Whether for somebody else who is more sophisticated, who knows
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  everything and who knows that she prefers water based 300
• 9:05
  meals with SBV four and only has citrus based sense, you now know
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  that OK, I'm going to go and pick this product, this product,
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  this product because it already meets the criteria.
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  And then I can now start trying to get the sale closed.
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  So client consultation process really, really important.
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  If you're a lawyer, very important.
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  If you're a real estate, very important.
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  If you sell perfume, very important.
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  Even if you sell children's pyjamas, very important.
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  So we all need to have it. So after you're done with this
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  episode, if you don't have one of those things, sit down, get a
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  sheet of paper, and then ask yourself, people that usually
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  buy this thing, what are the results that they're looking
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  for? What are the kind of things that
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  they're concerned about? And then write it out in bullet
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  points, Price this, that, that that.
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  And then the client consultation is just you being engaged in
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  conversation with them, allowing them to talk so that they speak
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  their mind about these things. You will now know, OK, based on
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  what this person has said, it looks like they have paper.
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  It looks like they're broke. It looks like they like this.
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  It looks like they like that. I now know I can try and sell
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  this and this and that and go for the clothes.
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  So yeah, in this case, real estate, we've already come up
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  with the bulletin list of what people ought to be paying
• 10:16
  attention to. So my training with the next
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  training with the young lady, let's call her, what should we
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  call her? Let's call her Sasha Fierce.
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  Yes, because she's a former. She's a former model, by the
• 10:30
  way. I like working with models, and
• 10:31
  not because they're pretty, but because models know how to deal
• 10:35
  with rejection. Now, some of you don't like
• 10:37
  dealing with rejection in business, and you think it's
• 10:39
  hard that somebody told you no. But the life of a model,
• 10:42
  especially in Nigeria, is brutal.
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  Your model in Nigeria, you try to be a professional model.
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  You go to 5 or 6 casting calls, they say you go to six in five
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  of them. Half the board is made of men.
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  And so they're trying to toast, you know, to get your phone
• 10:55
  number and then you do the scouting and then you're
• 10:59
  rejected in a very brutal way. At least for me, if somebody
• 11:02
  rejects me in business, I know that they reject my value
• 11:04
  proposition. They don't think that the idea
• 11:07
  that I'm putting forward can solve that their business
• 11:09
  problem. So it's not really me that's
• 11:10
  being rejected. But for a model, they tell you
• 11:12
  straight to your face, you're too fat, you're too black,
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  you're too skinny, you're too tall, you're too round, you're
• 11:19
  too, it's the rejection is always personal.
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  And I've only really had a chat with two or three models in the
• 11:27
  business context. But I like them because man,
• 11:29
  models can take a hit because they've been rejected on all
• 11:32
  kinds of fronts before. So if you're a model listening
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  to this thing and you don't know, trust me, the amount of
• 11:39
  resilience that you have, mental resilience that you have is off
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  the scale. If you're a model, you've done
• 11:45
  some modelling. Believe me, you're stronger than
• 11:47
  half the population mentally, you're stronger than half of us
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  because the kind of abuse that you you you've chopped so mouse,
• 11:52
  I've never chopped it. I mean, I've not had anybody
• 11:54
  told me that my nose is too big and that I'm too black and I'm
• 11:57
  too tall and I'm too fat and I'm too whatever.
• 12:00
  But for the while that you guys try and get involved in this
• 12:03
  business, you guys get told these things constantly, you
• 12:06
  know, weekly. So you guys have mental
• 12:08
  resilience. It's a brutal profession, which
• 12:11
  is why personally speaking, I don't like it.
• 12:14
  If I had a daughter and she wanted to go into modeling, I
• 12:18
  would just make sure that she's aware.
• 12:21
  Like it's it can be tough. But anyway, for those of you who
• 12:24
  are already in the industry, just know you guys are tough.
• 12:28
  You guys have mental resilience. No matter what it is that you
• 12:30
  put your mind to, you will do it.
• 12:32
  So if you're a former model trying a sales roller customer
• 12:35
  service role, you're going to be fine because the way people have
• 12:39
  rejected you in the past, when people reject you in the sales
• 12:41
  context, it doesn't even feel like rejection.
• 12:43
  You know, a model just takes it and then just moves on because
• 12:46
  she's been through worse. So let's call her, what name did
• 12:51
  I come up with again? Sasha Fierce.
• 12:54
  Yes, so let's call her Sasha Fierce.
• 12:56
  So I told Sasha that. OK, cool.
• 12:57
  Now we've decided on what it is that we're going to do.
• 12:59
  So today what we're going to do, we're going to do a role play.
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  I'm going to pretend to be a customer.
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  You pretend to be calling me up so that we can have this pre
• 13:07
  inspection call. And the whole point of this pre
• 13:09
  inspection call or the client consultation is you're trying to
• 13:12
  figure out what kind of houses do I like?
• 13:14
  What kind of houses am I interested in?
• 13:16
  What am I looking for in the property?
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  So that when you get to the property and you're doing the
• 13:20
  inspection on my behalf, you will know what to emphasize.
• 13:23
  You will know what to point out, you know what to de emphasize,
• 13:25
  You know what kind of conversation to have and the
• 13:28
  kinds of questions to ask. So those of you who are not in
• 13:30
  real estate, you sell pajamas or you sell perfumes, I hope you
• 13:33
  see how the whole thing works. Now, that's the whole point.
• 13:36
  We're trying to get inside the customer's mind to know exactly
• 13:39
  what is it. Do they need self before we know
• 13:41
  which one are we going to propose?
• 13:43
  Which one are we going to present?
• 13:46
  So, yeah, we started it and the role play went OK.
• 13:51
  But first of all, she started off by saying, hello, my name is
• 13:54
  Sasha Fierce. I'm so, so company, blah, blah,
• 13:56
  blah, blah, blah. So I had to tell her like I had
• 13:58
  to tell her, hold up, hold up, hold up.
• 14:01
  When you call somebody, I say, oh, my name is Sasha fears I'm
• 14:03
  from this company that that that that that you already started
• 14:06
  off the conversation on the wrong footing.
• 14:09
  And the reason why is because this is supposed to be a
• 14:11
  conversation, a client consultation or a pre inspection
• 14:15
  call or whatever it is that you call.
• 14:17
  It has to be two way. You spend a lot of your time
• 14:20
  doing the talking. You will tire, you will get
• 14:22
  tired. So you don't just start off and
• 14:25
  launch into a conversation. I told her think of it as
• 14:27
  tennis, you hit the ball to the other person and then you wait
• 14:30
  for them to hit the ball back. So it's going to be long tennis
• 14:33
  or table tennis, you know, welcome, welcome, welcome.
• 14:35
  That's how it works. You serve the ball, they serve
• 14:38
  it back, you serve the ball, serve it back.
• 14:40
  It's a conversation. And then I told her that apart
• 14:43
  from that, First off, I prefer that we get the several going by
• 14:46
  even confirming that you're talking to the right person in
• 14:48
  the 1st place because it's possible that you pick the
• 14:52
  person picked up the phone and you think you're talking to Kuli
• 14:54
  Ajana. And by the time you do your
• 14:56
  whole blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, it turns out that wife is
• 15:00
  the person that is on the phone. Well, of course, that's not a
• 15:02
  problem, but it's nice to know whoever who it is that we're
• 15:06
  talking, confirm the identity of the person on the phone before
• 15:09
  we continue. So we introduce that.
• 15:11
  So hello, my name is Sasha Fierce.
• 15:13
  Am I speaking to Kunle Adigo? So that's all.
• 15:17
  That's how you started. And so we ran the role play
• 15:20
  again and we got that confirm identity part correct.
• 15:24
  By the way, in sales, we talk about the importance of
• 15:27
  role-playing. And I hope you guys see why
• 15:28
  role-playing is important. Sometimes the reason why your
• 15:32
  sales operatives, the your customer service people, the
• 15:35
  reason why they're fumble and the reason why they suck at
• 15:37
  their job is because they have not done enough role-playing.
• 15:40
  So each time they're talking to a live customer, it's scary and
• 15:42
  they don't know what to say. So we need to work out some of
• 15:45
  these things, as many things as humanly possible before we have
• 15:49
  these covers. They have these conversations
• 15:51
  with people on the phone. Now, it doesn't mean that if you
• 15:54
  do role play that they will fumble, you know.
• 15:56
  But The thing is, let's get all this fumbling out of the way
• 16:00
  with this stress less. I'll be a stress free
• 16:04
  environment because role-playing with me is stress free.
• 16:07
  role-playing with yoga is stress free because you can always stop
• 16:11
  and start again. You guys can laugh over
• 16:13
  something and start again. When you're talking to a
• 16:16
  customer live and direct on the phone, you can't stop and laugh
• 16:19
  things over and then start again.
• 16:21
  So role play really, really important.
• 16:24
  Do some sort of role-playing. So you sell perfumes, you sell
• 16:28
  body oils, you sell baby oil, you sell whatever.
• 16:31
  Once in a while just beg somebody like, hey Cami, you
• 16:34
  know my best friend, I beg, please, I need you for
• 16:36
  something. I'm trying out this new line
• 16:38
  that I want to sell. Please pretend to be a customer.
• 16:41
  Let me call you and let me see how I can sell this sort of
• 16:45
  thing, you know, blah, blah, blah.
• 16:46
  So try and do some small role-playing.
• 16:49
  It helps. Let me give you a live example
• 16:52
  that happened to me back when I started off in wedding
• 16:54
  photography conversations around how to handle price.
• 16:58
  I was talking to Mumsy and mumsy was like, just give me the
• 17:01
  price. And I told my mom, look, nobody
• 17:04
  will ever be that rude. I'm almost like, look, just just
• 17:08
  play with me here. What if somebody picks up my
• 17:11
  person says just give me the price and I can remember
• 17:14
  bluffing about how I would handle it something.
• 17:16
  So I didn't answer her, but I should have because one day
• 17:18
  eventually I was talking to somebody that's a young man.
• 17:22
  I don't have time, Just give me the price.
• 17:24
  And of course I fumble that conversation.
• 17:26
  But while I was talking with Mumsy, if we had done some
• 17:29
  role-playing back then, just give me the price and we had
• 17:32
  strategized like, OK, you can say this, you can say this, you
• 17:35
  can say this because Mumsy is in retirement now, but she was a
• 17:39
  marketing communications professional, so she could have
• 17:41
  one or two tips for me. So if I had done some other role
• 17:43
  play, then when I was now faced with the guy who now say young
• 17:47
  man, I'm busy, just give me the price and I've been able to
• 17:49
  handle myself. So role play very, very
• 17:53
  important. It's best if you role play with
• 17:55
  someone like me who has knowledge of the frameworks and
• 17:57
  where you should be paying attention to.
• 17:59
  But if you don't have someone like me in your life now and you
• 18:03
  can't talk with Mumsy, you can't talk to your husband, you can't
• 18:05
  talk to your friend, you can, you know, talk to whoever.
• 18:07
  So role play always helps. Some people say role-playing is
• 18:11
  not 100%. The goal of role-playing is not
• 18:13
  to 100% figure everything out. The goal is just to get you
• 18:17
  comfortable, get you relaxed, get you in the frame of mind,
• 18:20
  and to give you some ideas about how you can move the
• 18:23
  conversation forward. OK, so back to the role play.
• 18:26
  So we now did the confirm identity thing.
• 18:29
  And then she continued and I said, whoa, whoa, whoa, slow
• 18:32
  down, Slow down. You don't just confirm my
• 18:34
  identity and then just start talking about the product or the
• 18:38
  service. What you need to do is you need
• 18:41
  to give a previous context or a reason for why you are getting
• 18:44
  in touch. So in this case, I told her it's
• 18:49
  a matter of hey, hello, this is Sasha Fierce.
• 18:50
  Am I speaking to Kunle Adigun? So yes, this is Kunle Adigun.
• 18:54
  Why are you calling me? Or the reason why I'm reaching
• 18:56
  out is because you responded to our advert on Instagram for a
• 19:00
  three bedroom house in Leckey. Something, something, something,
• 19:02
  something. Do you recall?
• 19:04
  Do you remember? So it's over to the person.
• 19:06
  You let the person also talk quite a bit.
• 19:09
  So give previous context. It's a way of warming up the
• 19:12
  call. Confirm, am I talking to the
• 19:14
  person? Give previous context.
• 19:16
  Previous context is also not a bad way of setting the agenda.
• 19:20
  And then you also need to confirm in this case, if the
• 19:22
  person is still interested because remember, this is real
• 19:26
  estate and we're talking online and online people click on a
• 19:29
  whole bunch of stuff. So I told her, look, the person
• 19:33
  might have clicked on your service, but you're not the only
• 19:36
  service in the market. The other businesses who are
• 19:38
  doing these sorts of things. So my guy on a good day could
• 19:41
  have clicked on five or six links because of course he's
• 19:44
  looking for a house to rent or looking for a property to move
• 19:48
  into. So he clicked on five or six
• 19:49
  links. So you calling and saying I'm
• 19:51
  Sasha affairs from so does not mean that he is going to
• 19:57
  remember. So give a previous context.
• 20:00
  He might not remember. OK, well I might have clicked on
• 20:04
  something. And then you confirm if you're
• 20:06
  still interested. Oh, OK.
• 20:07
  Well, are you still in the market for properties around
• 20:10
  Lakey? So yes, actually I am.
• 20:11
  And then the conversation continues.
• 20:14
  Now, as the conversation went forward and the reason why I'm
• 20:16
  making today's podcast is when we got to that part.
• 20:20
  Now remember I told you that we came up with some criteria that
• 20:25
  potential customers might be interested in typical things
• 20:28
  that people were asked, price, location, amenities, no, blah,
• 20:32
  blah, blah. When it came to that part, she
• 20:35
  was now handling it as a like an interrogation.
• 20:40
  Are you single or married? And of course I asked, I
• 20:42
  answered married, how many children?
• 20:45
  I have two boys. This is not that you go to a
• 20:49
  stage where she started laughing.
• 20:50
  I said, what's wrong? Why are you laughing?
• 20:51
  She said I have hook. I said, of course you have hook.
• 20:53
  And this is the reason why you have hook because in handling
• 20:57
  this conversation, what you are doing is you were just doing an
• 21:01
  interrogation and you're asking questions that can be answered
• 21:03
  by either yes or no or one word. We call those close questions.
• 21:07
  close questions are not very good at all for moving the deal
• 21:10
  forward. If you're asking close
• 21:12
  questions, you will hang. It's only a matter of time
• 21:14
  before the person you know single or married single, this
• 21:17
  is yes, this is this, this is this.
• 21:21
  After a while, the conversation will seem stayed.
• 21:23
  You'll be bored out of your mind and the conversation will hang.
• 21:28
  So I told her, what we do is we open up the conversation, we
• 21:31
  keep the conversational. This is not an interrogation.
• 21:35
  And then we use the questions that they taught all of us in
• 21:37
  primary school back in the day, the W questions, The Who, why,
• 21:42
  what, where, when, how. Of course, how is not AW
• 21:46
  question, but for some reason they always add it to the group.
• 21:49
  So let's say that it's also AW question as well.
• 21:53
  So who, why, what, where, when and how.
• 21:57
  So I told her it's not a matter of asking what location are you
• 22:01
  looking at? Lucky.
• 22:03
  Then you keep quiet. How much is your budget?
• 22:06
  Then you keep quiet. Are you single or married?
• 22:09
  And then you know it's not the matter of degradation but look
• 22:11
  for ways of doing The Who, why, what, when and how.
• 22:15
  But I wanted it to be her own words.
• 22:16
  So I told her, based on the question you've asked me so far,
• 22:19
  let's go and start from the beginning.
• 22:20
  Now this is no more role play, but you on your own just redo
• 22:26
  some of these questions. Let's let's hear the flow.
• 22:28
  Let's see how it goes. And so she came up with a long
• 22:33
  sentence. I noticed you looked at social
• 22:35
  property and likely something, something, something, but still
• 22:37
  was a close question. So I told her, OK, you know
• 22:39
  what, no problem. We can just take the half, the
• 22:41
  first half of what you said with comma and then we can just put Y
• 22:45
  at the end and you can see that we have an open question.
• 22:48
  In this case, it will be I noticed you look looked at the
• 22:51
  property in Lucky. Hope you don't mind me asking
• 22:54
  why and then keep quiet. Now you see in that case it's
• 22:58
  open. The guy is supposed to talk.
• 23:01
  The guy can't answer the question by saying lucky.
• 23:04
  He can't answer by saying yes. He can't answer by saying no.
• 23:09
  He can't answer by saying he can't answer by saying he has to
• 23:14
  answer by actually giving you a sentence.
• 23:18
  It will have to be story that follows.
• 23:21
  So those of you who are lawyers, you see how you open up the
• 23:23
  conversation. You don't just say so, young
• 23:26
  man, you're fighting with your landlord.
• 23:27
  The person who said as a lawyer would make more sense to say,
• 23:31
  oh, so. So thank you very much for
• 23:33
  coming to the office. I hope we're going to be able to
• 23:35
  help you resolve this issue with your landlord, Your landlord.
• 23:38
  How did this quarrel start? And keep quiet.
• 23:40
  You can see how did this quarrel start W Ward, the person has to
• 23:46
  answer with your story. Seven years ago I moved into the
• 23:49
  property blah blah, blah blah. His wife said this, the children
• 23:53
  said this blah blah blah. My house girl slapped the house
• 23:56
  girl has in plenty story. But now you have all the
• 24:00
  information you need as a lawyer to determine whether you're
• 24:04
  going to go to rents tribunal to try and resolve this matter or
• 24:07
  whether you're going to go to High Court to say you can get
• 24:09
  the landlord thrown in jail. Right.
• 24:12
  So this is how it works. So same thing over here.
• 24:15
  Same thing if you sell baby oil or pajamas or you sell catfish.
• 24:19
  Who, why, what, when, how are trying to get the person to talk
• 24:23
  if it's catfish and you say how many catfish do you want to buy
• 24:26
  and they say 14, that doesn't help.
• 24:29
  What if you ask, Oh, welcome to the shop man blah, blah, blah.
• 24:32
  Hope we can able to take good care of you.
• 24:34
  Something, something, something. So why are you even buying this
• 24:36
  for yourself? Oh, my daughter is getting
• 24:38
  married. You see, it's a different thing.
• 24:40
  It gives you options to be able to say, oh, your daughter is
• 24:43
  getting married and instead of this kind of catfish, she's be
• 24:45
  looking at this or this or this or have you even thought of OPA
• 24:48
  Roku? OPA Roku might be much more cost
• 24:50
  effective. So I forgive you.
• 24:52
  I'm not sure what OPA Roku is, but my mother-in-law is Eboo.
• 24:55
  My wife likes fish mom, she likes fish.
• 24:57
  So and my my cousins, they like fish, especially the ones that
• 25:01
  grew up with us as like my sisters.
• 25:04
  So I know I hear OPA Roku, OPA Roku, but what the OPA Roku is I
• 25:07
  have no idea. So you can see that it gives you
• 25:10
  options. So that is why who, what, why
• 25:11
  where when, how is important. So back to Sasha affairs.
• 25:15
  Now I noticed you looked at the property in Leckie.
• 25:19
  Hope you don't mind me asking why the person has to answer
• 25:23
  with a story. Now the whole thing on single
• 25:26
  and married and blah blah blah. I told her that look, it's OK to
• 25:29
  make a couple of assumptions because of a young man is
• 25:31
  looking at properties and he's all looking at one bedroom or
• 25:34
  two-bedroom. It is safe to assume that he's
• 25:37
  married or that he wants to be married soon.
• 25:39
  But I told that, don't worry, you don't have to do that.
• 25:42
  You're new at this. So for you, you might feel
• 25:44
  somehow, but for me, I've been talking to enough people across
• 25:48
  different contexts, law, wedding photography, agro exports, and
• 25:52
  then plus the clients that I'm talking to.
• 25:53
  So it's safe for me to assume a couple of things.
• 25:55
  So for me, I'll be able to say, oh, how long have you been
• 25:58
  married? And that's not a problem.
• 26:01
  It's not an open question because the answer will be, oh,
• 26:05
  about 10 years or something like that.
• 26:08
  So it's not an open question, but it is much more
• 26:10
  conversational than saying are you single or married?
• 26:14
  So are you single or married person can say single person can
• 26:17
  say married. If you say how long have you
• 26:20
  been married? It's more conversational, but
• 26:22
  it's still closed. So I told her, look, you know
• 26:24
  what, let's pause here with this role play.
• 26:26
  So this is what we're going to do next week.
• 26:29
  You will sit down. You look at all these things,
• 26:31
  price, location, married, children, amenities and you will
• 26:36
  come up with who, why, what, when, how, ways of asking these
• 26:40
  questions and or rather or you'll come up with much more
• 26:45
  conversational ways of handling these things so it doesn't turn
• 26:48
  into interrogation. And so we ended our training
• 26:51
  session there and she now had assignment for next week.
• 26:57
  And this is precisely the reason why some of you don't like doing
• 26:59
  business with me, because I always give an assignment.
• 27:01
  I need to make sure that you understand what I'm telling you
• 27:05
  because I want to be sure that by the time we're done and I've
• 27:09
  spent the money that you paid me, I want to be sure that
• 27:12
  you're actually going to do something with this information
• 27:14
  that I give you. That's the reason why in my
• 27:16
  trainings and my coaching sessions, I don't just bring
• 27:19
  PowerPoint and then run you through PowerPoint from
• 27:22
  beginning to end and then you guys clap for me was a wonderful
• 27:26
  session and my head feels big and then I move.
• 27:28
  I want to be sure that you are going to do something with what
• 27:31
  we have discussed. So there will always be
• 27:33
  assignment. So all those of you who are
• 27:34
  considering engaging me for coaching or consulting services,
• 27:38
  just know there will always be an assignment because I'm not
• 27:41
  just trying to get paid here. I'm trying to make sure that we
• 27:43
  get results here. I'm trying to make sure that we
• 27:45
  get behaviour change because behaviour change comes first
• 27:48
  before night round Cobo change. If you start doing things
• 27:52
  differently or if your staff starts doing things differently
• 27:55
  first, it is then two weeks later, 3 weeks later, one month
• 27:59
  later that the naira and Cobo will start to reflect in your
• 28:02
  bank account. So as I, we ended that session
• 28:06
  and that's the main reason why I'm sharing this with you now.
• 28:09
  You guys, when you're having this pre inspection call, when
• 28:12
  you're having client consultation for law or to sell
• 28:16
  baby products or to sell catfish, remember the key things
• 28:19
  that your people typically are interested in this industry.
• 28:22
  Write it down the bullet point. Make sure those are conversation
• 28:25
  status, conversation point. When you're introducing those
• 28:28
  things in the conversation, you make sure that you keep it
• 28:33
  conversational. It's not an interrogation.
• 28:35
  So it's not a matter of single or married or how long have you
• 28:38
  been married or what does Madam think about this?
• 28:41
  You see, you are assuming that Madam is married in a
• 28:45
  conversational way that begs him to continue with the
• 28:47
  conversation. So keep the conversational, if
• 28:50
  you can, who, why, what, where, when, how.
• 28:53
  You don't know how to come up with who, why, what, when,
• 28:55
  where, how questions. Use ChatGPT and come up with a
• 29:00
  couple of couple of ideas. But remember that if you're in
• 29:04
  this kind of situation, in this case where you're talking to
• 29:06
  somebody over the phone because they might have done something
• 29:09
  on your website, remember that first thing is confirm identity.
• 29:12
  After that, give a previous context of the reason why you're
• 29:14
  calling. After that confirming the person
• 29:16
  is still interested. Then you can launch into the
• 29:19
  whole thing of my company this, my company this, my company
• 29:21
  that. But I'll prefer that you confirm
• 29:23
  my identity. Give the previous context,
• 29:25
  confirm if they're interested, then get permission, ask a
• 29:28
  couple of questions, open it up, get the person yawning, get the
• 29:31
  person talking. It is only after the person does
• 29:33
  that that you now know as a professional.
• 29:36
  Because you are the professional, you now know the
• 29:37
  range of opportunities that are available are open to you.
• 29:41
  Then one more thing that I pointed out, one more thing that
• 29:43
  I want you guys to know. Sometimes people drop things in
• 29:46
  conversation and you don't pick up on it and use it to build
• 29:49
  rapport. So I went while role-playing,
• 29:51
  when it came to the part about her children, I said, Oh yeah, I
• 29:54
  have two boys. So she just let it go.
• 29:58
  She continued asking other questions.
• 30:01
  These are situations where you build rapport and you show some
• 30:03
  humanity, you show some commonality with the person.
• 30:06
  Because this particular model in case I know that her sister just
• 30:10
  gave birth to a second boy. So this is the stage where I
• 30:15
  say, oh, congratulations, you have two boys, how old are they?
• 30:18
  This and this. My older sister just gave birth
• 30:20
  to a boy as well. Congratulations or blah, blah,
• 30:23
  blah. How do you cope?
• 30:25
  Or you know, just small talk. So when people drop stuff like
• 30:28
  this, it is an opportunity to build rapport.
• 30:32
  So me personally, I went to the greatest university in on the
• 30:37
  African continent or buffering at all over university.
• 30:39
  So whenever I come across a uni like person, I don't waste time,
• 30:43
  I dig in and I harass them because they went to UNILAC and
• 30:47
  I went to OAU. It's a way of building
• 30:51
  commonality. My wife says look, I'm not
• 30:53
  tired, doesn't he get old? I don't know, maybe he gets old.
• 30:57
  But The thing is, the person is probably just hearing it for the
• 30:59
  first time. And either way it's a nice way
• 31:01
  of building rapport, building commonality and it's a nice way
• 31:05
  of me becoming ingrained in that person's mind because if nothing
• 31:07
  else, the person will remember. Oh, that you fair boy.
• 31:12
  You see, these are ways that we're building commonality,
• 31:14
  building rapport, being more likeable and things like that.
• 31:17
  So when people drop things like this, now they have two boys.
• 31:20
  You have two boys in your family is ah, congratulations.
• 31:23
  How old are your boys? Oh, mine are so, so, so and so
• 31:26
  and this and this. Yeah, you people are still at
• 31:28
  the terrible two stage. How are you coping?
• 31:31
  And you have a small conversation about it.
• 31:32
  But, you know, just small. Don't waste 45 minutes talking
• 31:35
  about your children. It's just, you know, chitchat,
• 31:38
  small, small, 2-3 minutes and then you move on so that this
• 31:42
  person comes away from the conversation.
• 31:46
  The idea is commonality. Commonality is you're a
• 31:49
  reasonable person and you're just like me.
• 31:51
  So if this person comes away from the conversation feeling
• 31:54
  like he was interrogated by a lady on the phone, it's not,
• 31:59
  it's not a memorable conversation.
• 32:01
  But if he leaves the conversation like, oh, I'm such
• 32:03
  a nice young lady, good family values, you know, blah, blah,
• 32:07
  blah, articulate. That's what we're aiming for.
• 32:10
  So even if the guy doesn't store your phone number, but you call
• 32:13
  the next time the voice tells me and say, oh, oh, oh, OK.
• 32:16
  You're the one that your sister just gave birth.
• 32:18
  Abby. Oh, sorry, sorry, sorry.
• 32:20
  I did store your number. Oh, yes, yes, yes.
• 32:21
  How are you? OK, yes, that's true.
• 32:23
  I was supposed to have done this.
• 32:24
  I was supposed to have done this.
• 32:25
  Oh, my dear, sorry, I forgot. Call me back in two days time,
• 32:30
  you know, blah, blah, blah. So that's how we get that going.
• 32:33
  That's how we achieve that. So 30 minutes.
• 32:35
  So let me just wrap this up to a close.
• 32:38
  I hope this has given you guys ideas around you're supposed to
• 32:42
  handle the customer or client consultation.
• 32:47
  Are you supposed to handle the pre inspection call?
• 32:49
  Are you supposed to handle the qualification?
• 32:52
  Are you supposed to handle discovery?
• 32:53
  Are you supposed to handle? It's called different things
• 32:56
  according to different industries and different
• 32:58
  practices. But whatever you call it, these
• 33:00
  are some ideas about how you handle it.
• 33:02
  Now, if you would love a business audit where you and I
• 33:05
  sit down and chat, we run through your business, try and
• 33:07
  see a couple of problems, come up with ways that we can solve
• 33:10
  these problems, then call me. The number is 08064662140.
• 33:17
  The country code is lost 234. For those of you who are not
• 33:19
  Nigerian, it's my WhatsApp number as well.
• 33:22
  Or connect with me on socials on LinkedIn.
• 33:25
  I'm shutting down all other places, so you will only be able
• 33:28
  to find me on LinkedIn in another month's time.
• 33:30
  So that's it. Thank you very much for your
• 33:32
  time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next
• 33:34
  episode.