Latest / Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint / Decoding Sales Strategies for the Nigerian Market: From ICP Targeting to Outbound vs Inbound Tactics

Transcript

Decoding Sales Strategies for the Nigerian Market: From ICP Targeting to Outbound vs Inbound Tactics · Closing Sales in Nigeria - Sales For The Nigerian Business Person: The Sales and Marketing Blueprint

• 0:02
  Hello guys and welcome to the show.
• 0:03
  It's a very hot Friday morning in Abuja.
• 0:07
  OK, maybe it's not so hot, but it's hot because I'm outside and
• 0:11
  I'm sorry, but today is going to be a very noisy episode.
• 0:16
  And that's because it's one of those episodes that I'm
• 0:17
  recording from the fuel queue. So, yes, as at the time of this
• 0:21
  recording, for some reason, fuel queue seems to have cropped up
• 0:26
  in the central business district in Niger, in Abuja.
• 0:30
  So we're having to queue for fuel.
• 0:32
  Just one of those things. Now, I know that you guys have
• 0:34
  been listening to the podcast for a while.
• 0:36
  You guys know that this thing really, it really chaps my craw.
• 0:39
  You know, this whole thing that I started off this journey
• 0:41
  because I was on fuel cues and I figured it was the whole point
• 0:44
  of wasting time. And that's when I started
• 0:47
  creating content that would eventually become what is
• 0:52
  produced for the show. And yeah, so it's annoying that
• 0:56
  I keep finding myself in this situation time and time again.
• 0:59
  But I guess this is what we're going to have to contend with
• 1:03
  for a while, a while we Nigerians are trying to sort out
• 1:06
  these sorts of problems, you know, Anyway, so sorry for that
• 1:11
  rant, but just to say I'm on the queue.
• 1:13
  So, yeah, expect to hear people shouting, cars driving by, maybe
• 1:16
  the occasional quarrel or two, you know, when someone cuts
• 1:19
  through the line. So let me head straight to the
• 1:22
  question for today. And just like I thought
• 1:27
  yesterday when I made yesterday's recording, it turns
• 1:29
  out that today's question is also tied into the Nigerian
• 1:32
  market because the question is on effective sales tactics for
• 1:37
  the Nigerian market. So I'm going to start this off
• 1:39
  by saying the same thing that I did yesterday, which is that
• 1:43
  business good sales and business development principles are
• 1:46
  universal. So good sales tactics for the
• 1:50
  American market or for the UK market will also apply to the
• 1:53
  Nigerian market is just going to be contextual, depending on
• 1:57
  cultural differences, the industry, the products, the
• 2:00
  price, your ideal customer, ideal customer avatar, you know,
• 2:05
  the, the target base of people that you're chasing after.
• 2:07
  That's what is going to make us tweak things here and there.
• 2:11
  Now, the only change I'm going to make to the question is this.
• 2:13
  For those of you who are thinking of effective sales
• 2:17
  tactics, sorry, the question is on sales tactics.
• 2:19
  So for those of you thinking of effective sales tactics, the
• 2:23
  only thing I'm going to recommend is that you tweak your
• 2:25
  expectations a little bit. Instead of thinking about sales
• 2:28
  tactics, you should be thinking about sales strategy first.
• 2:31
  Now, what's the difference between strategy and tactics?
• 2:35
  Let's pretend we're going on the journey.
• 2:36
  Strategy would be, where are you going to?
• 2:39
  So if I'm travelling to Marco D because I have to go and see my
• 2:42
  mom because that's where she retired to, that's the strategy
• 2:45
  I'm heading to Marco D. The tactics will now be the the
• 2:50
  tax will now be the what will I say?
• 2:54
  The nitty gritty, the one-on-one, the everyday things
• 2:57
  that I'm going to do to get that go.
• 2:59
  So tactical questions will now be am I going to take a bus or
• 3:03
  am I going to fly? If I'm going to fly, which
• 3:06
  airline, how much the airlines cost?
• 3:08
  If I'm going to drive, should I fill my car or should I go to
• 3:11
  the park and should I rent a bus for me and the family?
• 3:14
  So all those will be tactical issues.
• 3:16
  So that's the difference between strategy and tactics.
• 3:19
  Strategy is the overall, the overall question that we're
• 3:25
  asking about where is this business heading to?
• 3:27
  What are we trying to achieve? All those big, big, big, big
• 3:30
  questions. And then tactics are the small
• 3:32
  questions that OK, if we have decided now this is how we want
• 3:35
  to grow the business. This is where we're taking the
• 3:36
  business to. These are the kinds of people
• 3:38
  that want to attract. Tactics will now be OK.
• 3:41
  So what should we do? Should we print Flyers?
• 3:43
  Should we go to trade shows? Should we run Instagram
• 3:46
  advertising? Should we do promotions in in
• 3:51
  the market? Should we buy our advertisements
• 3:53
  on the radio? You know, stuff like that.
• 3:55
  So the smaller questions, the everyday questions, the thing
• 3:58
  that somebody's going to do from a day-to-day basis, those are
• 4:01
  the tactical issues. Then strategy is the overall
• 4:06
  bigger issues, the bigger goals that you're trying to achieve
• 4:07
  with the business. So before you start asking
• 4:11
  someone what tactics should I be using to grow by business, you
• 4:14
  must have figured out the strategy 1st about where you
• 4:19
  want the business to go. That is because the tactics that
• 4:24
  you will use. Let's go back to this whole
• 4:26
  thing of Flyers versus Instagram advertising.
• 4:29
  Whether you should use Flyers to grow your business or whether
• 4:32
  you should use Instagram advertising to grow your
• 4:34
  business or whether you should go and walk into somebody's
• 4:36
  office to grow your business. It depends on what the larger
• 4:40
  strategic question is that you are trying to solve.
• 4:44
  So please. Well, those of you who are going
• 4:47
  around asking for tactics or who you go to Google and you ask for
• 4:50
  best sales tactics or something, no, you're putting the cart
• 4:53
  before the horse. Figure out the strategy first.
• 4:56
  What am I trying to do? Where am I going to?
• 4:58
  Who am I trying to attract? All these big, big, big
• 5:00
  questions. Figure out the big questions
• 5:02
  first. When you get the answer to that
• 5:03
  big question, you will now know what the small thing is to do.
• 5:06
  That is also the reason why there's no such thing as a
• 5:08
  perfect sales tactic because the tactic that will work for me and
• 5:12
  it's best for me in my own situation.
• 5:14
  If you try it because you're in a different industry, different
• 5:18
  product, different price range, different target audience, if
• 5:21
  you tried, it would totally mess you up.
• 5:23
  Likewise, the sum, the tactic that is best for you in your own
• 5:27
  given circumstance. If I tried that tactic, it would
• 5:30
  totally screw me up because of all these differences.
• 5:32
  So strategic concerns first. Only after you answer those
• 5:37
  questions can you now start asking people, OK, what tactics
• 5:40
  will work? Which tactic works for you?
• 5:42
  How do you do these tactics? How do you optimize those sorts
• 5:44
  of tactics? So summary for what we've said
• 5:48
  so far, strategic concerns first and then you the, when you get
• 5:55
  the strategic concerns down, your actual tactics will now
• 5:59
  depend on what industry are you in, what product do you do, what
• 6:03
  price is your products? Who are the ideal customers that
• 6:06
  you chase? So let's say industry, if you're
• 6:10
  in the wedding and the event, OK, let's say you're a caterer.
• 6:14
  If you're a caterer and you're trying to sell products to
• 6:17
  people online and you're trying to sell it to the everyday
• 6:22
  average man and woman, the tactics that will you use will
• 6:25
  be different. For somebody who is in the
• 6:27
  automobile industry. You sell cars, but you only want
• 6:31
  to sell high end cars like let's say Range Rovers, Porsche,
• 6:37
  Mercedes-Benz, you know, stuff like that or whatever the latest
• 6:40
  car is these days. So you can see how the tactics
• 6:44
  that you're going to do will be different depending on whether
• 6:47
  you sell food and you want to sell it online or whether you
• 6:50
  sell cars and you want to sell the cars to Abuja big boys and
• 6:52
  to Lagos big boys, big boys and big girls because girls buy cars
• 6:56
  too. So, OK, let me see.
• 7:01
  I was like, I lost my train of fault.
• 7:04
  OK. Yeah.
• 7:05
  So, so sales strategy, that's what we should be trying to
• 7:08
  figure out now. Sales strategy is also tied to
• 7:12
  marketing strategy because we try to answer the same
• 7:14
  questions. So people who are looking at
• 7:15
  strategy from a marketing standpoint, they're trying to
• 7:18
  answer these questions. Who is my target audience?
• 7:20
  How can I reach them? What is the best way to
• 7:22
  communicate with them? How do I let them know I exist?
• 7:25
  How do I let people know what I can do?
• 7:26
  How do I show people that there's benefits to doing
• 7:29
  business with me? Those are the larger kind of
• 7:32
  questions that we try to figure out in sales and in marketing.
• 7:35
  So those are the questions that you should figure out first
• 7:38
  before you start working on the tactics.
• 7:41
  So now if you start looking at things from this larger
• 7:43
  strategic concern, you are depending on the the way you
• 7:48
  look at it, you're going to boil down essentially to two options.
• 7:51
  There's what we call outbound and then there's what we call
• 7:55
  inbound. Those are two different methods
• 7:58
  for growing business, two different business philosophies,
• 8:01
  things of that nature. Oh, sorry, it looks like the
• 8:03
  queue is about to move. So let me crank up the car, all
• 8:08
  right, so that nobody cuts in front of me.
• 8:11
  As usual. When these things happen and we
• 8:13
  have such long queues, we have people acting a fool, you know,
• 8:17
  people trying to cut the queue. And that's where all the
• 8:20
  commotion comes from. Sorry.
• 8:24
  One moment. OK, It looks like the idiot in
• 8:29
  front of me. His car has broken down South.
• 8:32
  Try. OK.
• 8:34
  Well, anyway, let me try and continue.
• 8:38
  All right. So I was saying that, so excuse
• 8:41
  me, I was saying that. Where was I?
• 8:45
  Yeah. So the options available to you
• 8:46
  are outbound or inbound. Those are two different business
• 8:50
  methods, two different business philosophies or approaches when
• 8:54
  it comes to growing your business.
• 8:56
  So if you're looking at things from a strategic point of view,
• 9:01
  I might as well just turn off the engine.
• 9:02
  I don't think we're, yeah, I don't think we're moving.
• 9:07
  All right. So if you look at things from a
• 9:09
  strategic point of view, those are the two main channels that
• 9:13
  you can take. Those are the left and right
• 9:15
  that you can take. Remember the metaphor that I
• 9:19
  use? Let's say you're travelling to
• 9:20
  Makudi. So if you're travelling to
• 9:21
  Makudi, the options are, you know, car or flight.
• 9:26
  So you see, we have two big options.
• 9:28
  So in this case, two big options for growing your business.
• 9:31
  The kind of sales tactics that you can employ this either
• 9:33
  inbound or outbound. So let us define.
• 9:38
  Oh, OK, all right, finally we are moving.
• 9:46
  OK, so let us define what inbound and outbound mean.
• 9:54
  Sorry about that. I'm parked in a really awkward
• 9:58
  corner because we're having to go around someone, the idiot I
• 10:01
  mentioned earlier whose car just broke down.
• 10:02
  OK, well, I should be more charitable.
• 10:03
  He's not an idiot. It's just unfortunate that we
• 10:07
  have problems with our cars. So I was like, Oh yeah.
• 10:11
  So I'm trying to define outbound and inbound.
• 10:15
  Now, since I'm here fiddling with the car, I won't be able to
• 10:19
  do it justice if I want to give it a full treatment.
• 10:21
  And then plus, I've already spent 10 minutes of your time.
• 10:24
  So my suggestion is that you guys check out the older
• 10:26
  episodes on the podcast because right now we have over 820
• 10:29
  episodes where I have devoted a lot of time and effort into
• 10:34
  explaining the difference between outbound methods of
• 10:37
  growing your business and inbound methods of growing your
• 10:40
  business. This is your first time of
• 10:43
  listening to the show. What you can do is there's a
• 10:46
  website that I keep promoting to people.
• 10:49
  I'm not affiliated with them. So this is not an advertisement.
• 10:51
  I don't think it's a good learning resource.
• 10:53
  Now the website is called Listen Notes. 2 separate words, Listen
• 10:57
  as in LISTEN and then notes as in NOTESI can't remember the URL
• 11:04
  for the website, but if you just hit Google and you type listen
• 11:07
  Notes, I'm sure it's going to come up now.
• 11:09
  This is the reason why I recommend you guys use Listen
• 11:11
  Notes because it's a very good study tool.
• 11:14
  Listen Notes is a podcast catcher, podcast player podcast,
• 11:19
  whatever it is that we call it. OK Oh, looks like the car is
• 11:23
  moving. Sorry, one moment.
• 11:29
  OK, the queue OK, we're finally moving.
• 11:31
  I just hope another idiot hasn't broken down on the sorry one
• 11:40
  moment. Navigating through awkward
• 11:45
  situation here because we're having to drive around cars that
• 11:49
  are parked in front of the road. So we are also causing
• 11:53
  obstructions in traffic. OK, so listen Notes.
• 11:58
  Yes, that's where I was. So for listen Notes.
• 12:03
  Oh yeah. So it's a it's a website that's
• 12:05
  sort of like a podcast catcher. But the difference that listen
• 12:09
  Notes has with other kind of podcast catchers that since it
• 12:13
  tries to curate all kinds of So one moment, let me attend to OK,
• 12:22
  no, no, someone's trying to call my attention.
• 12:24
  He's he's trying to move on my car is in the way.
• 12:28
  OK, where was I yes. So listen notes yes.
• 12:35
  So the reason why I recommend listen notes is because what
• 12:38
  they do is that they curate all kinds of podcasts.
• 12:40
  They also provide transcripts and then they they also allow
• 12:46
  you to search within podcast episodes.
• 12:49
  So that is why I recommend that you guys use that when you're
• 12:52
  trying to consume podcast because it allows it to be a
• 12:57
  very helpful learning resource. So you can take a podcast, like
• 13:00
  my own podcast, for instance, look for it on Listen Notes.
• 13:04
  And then you can now search within my own podcast to find
• 13:07
  episodes where I've spoken about stuff before.
• 13:09
  So that's why I recommend Listen Notes now.
• 13:11
  It doesn't just have to be my own podcast.
• 13:12
  Let's say you're trying to grow as a Christian and you're one of
• 13:15
  these corner Corona people. What's his name?
• 13:19
  I can't remember his name about the Corona guy.
• 13:21
  So let's say you're one of the a fan of his, you can go to that
• 13:25
  coin an ear podcast and you can search specific episodes where
• 13:29
  he discussed maybe prophecies in the book of Isaiah, for
• 13:32
  instance, or something. So you can go and search
• 13:35
  specific episodes like that. So that's why I recommend listen
• 13:39
  notes. OK, we have a problems here.
• 13:47
  OK, so anyway, that's why I recommend Listen Notes.
• 13:52
  So when you're done listening to this episode, go check out
• 13:54
  Listen Notes. Look for my podcast there.
• 13:57
  And then you can search within the episodes to see where I
• 13:59
  discussed outbound and inbound business philosophies, different
• 14:06
  business approaches for growing your business.
• 14:08
  But summary, what outbound and inbound are is this.
• 14:12
  Outbound is the philosophy of growing your business that
• 14:14
  involves you going out to go and chase customers down.
• 14:16
  If you've been listening to my podcast for any length of time,
• 14:19
  you know that I'm an outbound guy.
• 14:21
  For me, if there's any business that you're trying to get off
• 14:23
  the ground for me, the first thing I think about is, OK, who
• 14:26
  is? Who are we chasing?
• 14:27
  Where can we find them? Let's go and see them, let's
• 14:29
  talk to them. Let's say we can get a sale.
• 14:31
  The reasons why for me, that is my preferred, but outbound
• 14:34
  doesn't mean that is the best. It's not the best.
• 14:37
  It's just the best way for you to build relationships with your
• 14:40
  customers and start getting qualitative and quantitative
• 14:43
  data. As in you'll be able to know
• 14:46
  because you can see your customer face to face.
• 14:48
  It gives you a sense of this is who the person is, this is what
• 14:51
  they're dealing with. This is how I should be vibing
• 14:53
  with them, you know, blah, blah, blah.
• 14:54
  Not too much guesswork. So that is outbound.
• 14:57
  Now inbound, on the other hand, it's a different business
• 14:59
  philosophy. That business philosophy means
• 15:01
  you want to stay where you are in your office and you want to
• 15:04
  do things that will make people come and start chasing you.
• 15:08
  So back to the wedding photography example, outbound
• 15:11
  means like I used to do, I'm going to wedding shows.
• 15:14
  I book a space, I get a table, I dress it up.
• 15:17
  I beg some of my relatives or friends to come and stay with
• 15:20
  me. And we're talking to people
• 15:22
  like, hello, you're getting married, blah, blah, blah.
• 15:25
  When's your wedding date? This is what we do.
• 15:27
  Look at albums, you know, when can I come to the office?
• 15:30
  You can come to my studio. You know, all those
• 15:32
  conversations that's outbound. I'm going out into the world and
• 15:34
  I'm doing stuff. Inbound now means I will stay in
• 15:38
  my in my studio back when I had a studio and then I try and see
• 15:43
  how I can do stuff to get people to hunt me down.
• 15:47
  So in the old days that would have involved billboards and
• 15:50
  Flyers and things like that. But nowadays inbound has
• 15:53
  migrated mostly online. So that means content marketing.
• 15:57
  I'm trying to put out pictures, put out blog posts, put out
• 16:00
  YouTube videos, put out all these sorts of things.
• 16:02
  And the goal being that people will see what they will like,
• 16:06
  they will engage and then they'll be motivated to pick up
• 16:08
  the phone to call me. I say, hey, boy, how far I saw
• 16:11
  your something, something, something.
• 16:13
  Are you free? How much does it cost?
• 16:15
  So that's the difference. Outbound means I'll carry my two
• 16:18
  left legs and I'll walk out into the street and I will see how
• 16:21
  much business can I generate. Inbound means I will stay in the
• 16:24
  coolness of my studio under the AC and I'll think, how can I get
• 16:27
  people to see me, find me, like me, get attracted to me, and
• 16:33
  then we end up doing business to me.
• 16:35
  Oh, sorry, the line is moving and Oh yeah, the idiot was
• 16:40
  finally able to get his car up and running, so we have to
• 16:47
  adjust accordingly. Man, this sucks.
• 16:52
  It really sucks. You know what, if I was making a
• 16:55
  YouTube video, I think this would actually be really good
• 16:58
  material for the YouTube video, you know, for you guys to see me
• 17:02
  stuck in traffic and trying to handle all this madness.
• 17:06
  And so yeah, that's the difference between outbound and
• 17:08
  inbound. So like I said, scroll past the
• 17:11
  over 820 episodes that we have on the podcast so far.
• 17:14
  You'll get more details. If you're up to it, go and check
• 17:17
  out Listen Notes and you'll be able to use Listen Notes as a
• 17:21
  study guide, not just to study my own podcast episodes, but any
• 17:25
  other person as well. So if you're like Grant Cardone,
• 17:27
  you can use it. Study his episodes if you are
• 17:30
  trying to grow spiritually and you want to listen to Professor
• 17:34
  Sam Ademi and maybe some Adami. Yeah, some Adami.
• 17:37
  He's a power store, but he also talks about productivity and
• 17:39
  things like that. So if you want to hear what some
• 17:41
  Adami has to say about time management, just go to listen
• 17:44
  notes, open listen notes. Look for some Adamis podcast.
• 17:47
  Find it and then search within some Adamis podcast for episodes
• 17:51
  dealing with time management and productivity.
• 17:54
  And then only those episodes will show up and then you listen
• 17:57
  and it's a good study episode. So that's difference between
• 17:59
  outbound and inbound. Outbound I use my legs, I go and
• 18:03
  chase market. Inbound, I sit down, I try and
• 18:05
  see how I can get other people to use their legs and come to me
• 18:09
  or pick up the phone and then come to me.
• 18:11
  So which is better outbound or inbound?
• 18:14
  The big question everybody likes to ask, but like I said and I
• 18:17
  hinted at at the beginning of the show, which is better?
• 18:20
  There's no better. It's contextual.
• 18:22
  It depends what is your industry, what is your product?
• 18:25
  What is your price range? Who are the people that you are
• 18:27
  trying to chase? If you're a wedding photographer
• 18:31
  in Abuja or Lagos trying to enter into a high end market,
• 18:36
  you're trying to get a high end clientele.
• 18:40
  It will determine the kind of outbound or inbound you do and
• 18:43
  whether you do outbound or inbound or not.
• 18:46
  But you're waiting photographer in a small town like Makudi
• 18:50
  where Momsi is. Makudi is the capital of Benguin
• 18:52
  state where I'm from. So you're a small town
• 18:54
  photographer in in Makudi or in Lokoja or in Lafia or you know,
• 19:00
  all those, all those towns are on our side.
• 19:03
  Then the quality of outbound that you do will be different.
• 19:08
  If I can those places, I wonder if you can do any kind of
• 19:10
  inbound. OK, yeah, you can do inbound
• 19:12
  because Instagram is still inbound.
• 19:13
  Yeah, brides in Makoode and Lafayette and local Jar and all
• 19:16
  those places. Yeah, they will still use
• 19:17
  Instagram. So you can also do inbound
• 19:20
  strategy as well. So which one is better?
• 19:24
  It depends on your context. So how do we decide on whether
• 19:29
  we're going to do outbound or whether we're going to do
• 19:31
  inbound? Now remember, the reason why
• 19:33
  this strategic question is important is because if you lock
• 19:37
  down the strategic question first, outbound versus inbound,
• 19:41
  after you've answered the other larger questions of who is my
• 19:44
  customer? How can I reach out to them?
• 19:46
  What's the best way to communicate with them?
• 19:49
  You're not able to figure out the individual tactics that
• 19:51
  you're going to do. So whether you should do
• 19:53
  outbound versus inbound, it depends your products, like I
• 19:57
  said, or your service is going to help you to decide.
• 20:01
  So there are some products now let me guess.
• 20:04
  Oh, OK, we're about to move. Sorry.
• 20:06
  Let me crack up the engine. Hopefully another idiot is not
• 20:11
  going to break down in front of the road and cause havoc for all
• 20:14
  of us. OK.
• 20:22
  All right. So we are moving.
• 20:26
  So I was, I was. OK, let me park properly first.
• 20:33
  It's not a good idea to keep driving with only one hand, even
• 20:40
  though it used to be a cool thing to do back when I was in
• 20:41
  university, you know, driving one hand, you know, reflecting
• 20:44
  like you're a big boy. Yeah.
• 20:48
  OK. Yeah.
• 20:49
  So I was talking about how to decide on whether outbound or
• 20:51
  inbound. Now the product is going to help
• 20:53
  you to decide and I was going to give an example of TomTom,
• 20:57
  TomTom and Choco Milo for those of us who were born in the 80s
• 21:01
  and let's say 80s, nineties. I don't know if those of you who
• 21:04
  were born in the 2000s, if you guys experienced the the wonders
• 21:07
  of chocolate Milo, but chocolate Milo was this little sweet
• 21:12
  confectionery type thing was the cube like cubes of sugar but
• 21:16
  nice and brown. So it's like you take milk and
• 21:19
  Milo and mix it together and then you just make a cube out of
• 21:22
  it. So that was Choco Milo and Oh
• 21:25
  my, my son, they did old school day in their school and somebody
• 21:30
  bought Choco Miller as an old school snack.
• 21:32
  So I had to educate my son that Choco Millo is not old school.
• 21:36
  Like old school is actually 70s disco ended in like 60s after
• 21:41
  disco was now like old school. I know Richie uncle.
• 21:44
  So I'm trying to educate him that you can't say Choco Millo
• 21:46
  is old school because Choco Millo is, you know, late 70s,
• 21:51
  eighties. That is not old school.
• 21:52
  That is actually a different kind of culture.
• 21:54
  That is 80s culture. But for some reason you have
• 21:58
  youngsters these days. OK, the queue is moving again.
• 22:02
  So for some reason you have youngsters walking around
• 22:04
  thinking that 80s is old school. And then they tell me I'm old.
• 22:06
  I'm like, no, I'm not old school. 80s is 80s.
• 22:09
  That's his own culture. Old school is old school.
• 22:12
  Old school is is different. Old school is 60s into 70s.
• 22:17
  So Lionel Richie, N.W.A with attitude, you know, hardcore,
• 22:22
  the real hardcore, gangster rap and all that stuff, you know, so
• 22:25
  that is that is old school. So so how did I went to old
• 22:32
  school now? Yeah.
• 22:34
  TomTom So seeing how the product is going to help you decide if
• 22:38
  what you sell is TomTom Sweets and what you sell is Choco Milo,
• 22:42
  then I don't see how in the world you can do an inbound
• 22:47
  strategy. I don't think you can use
• 22:51
  Instagram engagements and targeting people online and
• 22:55
  stuff like that to get people to buy your TomTom sweet or to get
• 22:57
  people to buy your Choco Melo sweet.
• 22:59
  So if the business you're trying to get into is that you're
• 23:01
  trying to launch a new suite into the Nigerian market.
• 23:04
  So let's say I'm trying to invent my own suite and I call
• 23:07
  my own suite Tav Tav or Tavi sweetie.
• 23:12
  So if I'm watching Tavi Sweetie into the market, I maybe I'm not
• 23:16
  using enough creativity, but I don't see how I can do any
• 23:19
  inbound strategy. I don't see how we can be doing
• 23:23
  e-mail campaigns, advertising campaigns and stuff like that.
• 23:26
  So if I'm launching Kavi suites, launching Kavi Suites, my new
• 23:29
  branch of suites will have to be an outbound thing.
• 23:32
  I have to first of all manufacture the suites, be sure
• 23:35
  that the suite is nice and everything, get my NAV DAC
• 23:37
  approval. Then when I'm NAV, DAC, Top and
• 23:39
  CAC and the Ministry of Health or whoever it is I need to get
• 23:43
  my permissions from, the next thing is I have to use my legs
• 23:45
  and I have to hit the streets. I have to go into the shops and
• 23:48
  they say hey spa will you stock tap tap suites, the newest, the
• 23:52
  latest, the greatest. This is how much it costs, you
• 23:54
  know, blah, blah, blah. Then after I leave spa, I now
• 23:57
  have to enter Wuse Market or Kara Market and talk to
• 24:03
  individual people. These are my suites.
• 24:05
  Will you sell them? These are the terms, you know
• 24:07
  you take 1005 for everyone that you sell.
• 24:11
  Recommended retail price is 10 naira per suite.
• 24:15
  For everyone that you sell, you keep 8 naira.
• 24:17
  You give me two naira, you know, whatever.
• 24:20
  But you see that for this kind of business, it's going to have
• 24:22
  to be outbound. I'm going to hit the streets,
• 24:25
  enter shops, enter market, talk to distributors, try and get
• 24:30
  people to sell my stuff. Sorry, the queue is moving, so
• 24:33
  I'm going to have to try and get people to sell my stuff.
• 24:36
  So that is what I mean by your product or your service.
• 24:39
  It's going to determine whether you do outbound or inbound.
• 24:41
  So with my uneducated guess, because I'm not in the
• 24:44
  confectionery space, in the sweet space and all that.
• 24:47
  So with my my guess as a layman, if you want to start a new sweet
• 24:50
  brand, I don't think inbound is an option for you.
• 24:55
  It will have to be outbound. So those are one of the things
• 24:58
  that help you determine. Then your level of comfort is
• 25:01
  also a significant factor because there are some
• 25:04
  industries where you can use an outbound.
• 25:06
  Sorry, let me crank the engine off.
• 25:10
  So there are some industries where you can use either an
• 25:12
  outbound or an inbound approach and wedding photography, that's
• 25:15
  an example. Being a cake Baker, that's an
• 25:17
  example. Both approaches will work.
• 25:19
  So if you want to bake cakes or you want to sell food or you
• 25:22
  want to or let's see what else, or you want to be a tailor, a
• 25:28
  fashion designer or whatever, both approaches will work.
• 25:31
  Using your legs, going to people's office, it will work.
• 25:34
  Going to business Expos, it will work.
• 25:38
  Going to go and book appointments, it will work.
• 25:40
  Going to go and talk to your cousin and your auntie that
• 25:42
  yeah, I mean business as a fashion designer will work.
• 25:44
  Well, an inbound will also work. You staying at home in your
• 25:47
  studio, open up an Instagram page, try and put up fancy
• 25:51
  designs, try and run advertisements, try and
• 25:53
  whatever, it will work. So for some people outbound,
• 25:55
  inbound, either of them will work.
• 25:57
  Now, what will determine whether you choose one versus another in
• 26:00
  this case will be your level of comfort.
• 26:03
  Some people, like me, are more comfortable going out and
• 26:06
  talking to people. That is why I always start with
• 26:08
  outbound, no matter what it is I'm doing.
• 26:10
  It's just because it's an area of personal comfort.
• 26:12
  I go out and I talk to folks. If you don't like talking to
• 26:15
  strangers, you can try the inbound thing.
• 26:17
  But here is something that we need to pay attention to.
• 26:20
  For those of us who love outbound, we also need to do
• 26:24
  inbound because there's a limit to how many people you can walk,
• 26:28
  how many offices you can go to, how many trade shows you can go
• 26:30
  to. Eventually you have to start
• 26:32
  running those advertisements. The good thing is if you spent a
• 26:35
  lot of time doing outbound talking to people, when is now
• 26:38
  time to run the advertising campaign?
• 26:40
  OK, queue is moving again. So the good thing is if you have
• 26:44
  been doing outbound and doing outbound very well, talking to
• 26:47
  people very well, when it's time to do inbound, you now have the
• 26:51
  the skills to determine what kind of advertising copy should
• 26:55
  we use? How should we craft the
• 26:56
  advertisement? What picture should we use in
• 26:58
  all these sorts of things? Because you know the customer
• 27:01
  there. For those of you who are on the
• 27:02
  inbound front who want to stay at home or stay in the office,
• 27:05
  stay in the studio, stay in the canteen and you advertise and
• 27:08
  then people come and come into your business.
• 27:11
  Eventually you have to Start learning outbound tactics
• 27:14
  because your business will get to a stage where like for some
• 27:17
  big deals, OK, let's say the catering thing, you're selling
• 27:22
  food online and stuff like that. By the time somebody calls you
• 27:26
  and says, I love this, your food.
• 27:27
  Do you do weddings? And it's OK, let me try it and
• 27:29
  say, OK, yes, I do weddings at that stage where somebody's
• 27:33
  going to have 2000 guests at their wedding, they're going to
• 27:37
  have 2000 guests. So let me turn the car off.
• 27:41
  So at that stage where they're going to have 2000 guests at
• 27:44
  their wedding, most people are not going to feel comfortable
• 27:46
  just staying online based on Instagram handle.
• 27:49
  And then they will now transfer millions of naira to you.
• 27:52
  I think that everything is done. The average Niger bride, if I
• 27:56
  forget the bride, the average Niger mother of the bride will
• 27:59
  want to see. So you want to just transfer
• 28:02
  2M3M to this caterer just like that.
• 28:05
  Like who is she? Where is she?
• 28:08
  Can I see her food? Can we do tasting?
• 28:10
  What has she done before? So there are some mothers of the
• 28:13
  brides that they would actually want to see someone.
• 28:16
  So if you have been trying to grow your catering practice by
• 28:19
  doing inbound, by the time you'll start moving, by time you
• 28:24
  start moving to this bigger orders and stuff, you will have
• 28:27
  to go out and see somebody and say good morning, Ma, good
• 28:30
  morning, Sir. If you shake somebody's hand,
• 28:32
  you sit down and you should be able to have a competence
• 28:36
  capable, casual, comfortable conversation with these people.
• 28:39
  So whichever way you are, if you're starting off on outbound,
• 28:42
  you need to learn inbound. If you're starting off on
• 28:44
  inbound, you need to learn outbound.
• 28:45
  So both of them are important. So your level of comfort is also
• 28:49
  important. So the product determines if
• 28:51
  you're selling Choco Milo or launching a new suite, Sorry, it
• 28:54
  has to be outbound. Your level of comfort also would
• 28:59
  also determine. So what I know, like I said, the
• 29:03
  beauty of doing things in sales is that nothing in setting
• 29:06
  stone. So start experiments, get
• 29:09
  feedback and then iterate and then change your plan
• 29:11
  accordingly. So summary of what I've been
• 29:13
  trying to say on a few queue today, this past 30 minutes is
• 29:17
  just don't ask what the effective sales tactics are for
• 29:21
  the Nigerian market. The effective tactic depends on
• 29:25
  a whole bunch of other contextual things.
• 29:27
  Figure out the strategic questions first.
• 29:30
  The strategic questions are who is my target audience?
• 29:32
  How can I reach them? What's the best way to
• 29:34
  communicate with them to let them know I exist?
• 29:37
  This is what I can do. This is the benefit for them.
• 29:39
  By the time you start asking yourself these questions, you
• 29:41
  will now start thinking in clear terms of either outbound or
• 29:43
  inbound. And then whether you're going to
• 29:45
  be outbound or inbound would also be contextual.
• 29:48
  What kind of product is this? Does it make sense to be
• 29:51
  slapping up and down and talking to people or would it make more
• 29:53
  sense to actually get somebody who runs e-mail campaigns and
• 29:56
  let's give this person, I don't know, 50K and let's see how
• 29:59
  much, how many leads we can, we can generate out of that.
• 30:05
  So you start asking yourself all those smaller, smaller, smaller
• 30:07
  tactical questions. And then summary, please stop
• 30:10
  using Google to say what is the best sales tactics for this?
• 30:12
  What is the best sales tactics for that?
• 30:14
  There is no best sales tactic. It's going to depend on the
• 30:17
  circumstance. When you figure out what the
• 30:20
  larger strategic questions are, you can now use Google or Gemini
• 30:24
  or ChatGPT to say, I am a wedding photographer in Abuja.
• 30:30
  I've been in the business for three months.
• 30:31
  My sales are struggling. This is my target audience.
• 30:34
  This is my, this is my that I think an inbound approach would
• 30:37
  be the best way of doing it. Give me sales tactics that
• 30:40
  should help me in this scenario. And then you hit enter pop, and
• 30:43
  then whatever it is that Google gives you or Gemini gives you,
• 30:46
  OK, no, you can't run that session on Google.
• 30:48
  So you have to run it on Gemini. Gemini is owned by Google.
• 30:51
  So you run on Gemini or ChatGPT or Perplexity or you know, the
• 30:55
  different AI versions out there, then the AI will now give you a
• 30:58
  bunch of options and you know that.
• 30:59
  OK, these are things that I can try.
• 31:02
  So yeah, let me just bring it to a close here.
• 31:06
  Let me just leave it. Leave it at this within 30
• 31:08
  minutes. So connect with me on WhatsApp.
• 31:10
  The phone number is 08064662140. Country code is +234.
• 31:16
  For those of you who are not Nigerian, then also connect with
• 31:19
  me on LinkedIn. My name is Tavishima Ayede, I'm
• 31:23
  the host of the show. You can confirm the spelling of
• 31:25
  my name from the link. We're currently listening to
• 31:28
  this episode. So thanks for your time and
• 31:29
  attention. I'll catch you guys at the next
• 31:31
  recording. And please, Nigerians, I was
• 31:35
  going to say, let us pray that we should be able to get through
• 31:39
  all this crap soon. But I guess there's no way out
• 31:42
  of it. Those of us who are involved in
• 31:44
  the private sector, I really think we ought to start giving
• 31:48
  you some serious thought about how we're going to start being
• 31:51
  involved in larger policy discussions.
• 31:54
  I'm not saying everybody has to run for president or whatever,
• 31:57
  but whether it's on a local level or a national level, those
• 32:00
  of us who have expertise in problem solving and those of us
• 32:03
  who depend on a Nigeria that works because let's face it,
• 32:06
  these politicians have stolen money.
• 32:08
  If everything goes to shit, they will just move to another
• 32:10
  country. You know, they have houses all
• 32:12
  over the place in UK and America and all whatnot.
• 32:14
  So those of us who are here or those of us who have decided to
• 32:17
  remain and we have to find a way of getting involved in the
• 32:20
  larger policy discussions to make sure that this country
• 32:24
  works for us and for our kids. Either that, or let's decide to
• 32:29
  Japan and run away and let this whole thing fall down like a
• 32:32
  pack of cards. So sorry if I'm sounding
• 32:35
  pessimistic, but then I'll catch you guys in the next recording.