Conversations with a Tech Bro: Hiring Your First Salesperson

Today on the podcast, we're going to continue with our conversations with the tech bro. And the scenario that we're going to be looking at is situations where there is Someone Like You, for instance, listening to the podcast, you consider yourself great at building a product or building a service. You're good at product development, but you don't think you are good at selling. And so the question now becomes, should I hire a salesperson?

I repeat, today we're continuing with our conversations with the tech bro. And I'm giving my own comments on the video that was sent to me about the guy in the tech space, really legendary guy in Niger who at a conference where there was lots of tech Bros and tech sisters, discussed a number of things related to sales and marketing that people ought to know before you start your startup. And so I'm just running commentary to see what did he get right, what did he get wrong?

What do you guys need to know more about or what do you ladies need to know more about? If you are considering starting a startup now, if you love these sorts of things, then subscribe to the podcast on Spotify, YouTube, Apple, or any podcast player of your choice. My name is Tava Shima Ayede, I am the host of the podcast. And if you'd love to connect with me, maybe you have questions, comments, queries or collaborations, then the number to call, send me a text message or WhatsApp message is 08064662140.

I'm recording today's recording at home. So there's going to be noise in the background. Also, it's a Tuesday. And of course, regular listeners, you know that the house gets cleaned on Tuesday, so you're going to hear some noise in the background from that as well. So yeah, conversations with the tech bro. I am great at building, but I am not good at selling. Should I hire a salesperson? That's the main question we're going to be looking at today.

So excuse me, still trying to recover from small gold because the Hamilton is picking up over here. So if you're good at selling, you're good at sorry, if you're good at building the product, good at creating the app with a product development, good at all that technical jazz, but you don't think you are good at selling, should you hire a salesperson? It's one of those it depends answers. But for today, let's just assume that the answer is yes.

And let's run with me. Let's unpack the implications of that. Now, if you've listened to yesterday's podcast episode, you're going to be already familiar with some of the stuff that I've heard. But if this is your first time listening to the podcast, no holla, just keep on listening when you're done listening to the prior episode so that you get the fuller context. So should you hire a salesperson even though you think you're not good at?

Or rather, hire a salesperson because you think you're not good at selling? The answer is yes, you should. Even though yesterday I said that you should take responsibility for selling, for promoting your idea, for inspiring confidence in your product, in your service, and in your company. So yesterday I said it was your responsibility. Today we're going to look at things from the second angle where I say, OK, you don't want to do it, put the other responsibility on someone else.

Now, before you put the responsibility for on selling to someone else, there has to be a certain foundation and there has to be some prerequisites before you hire a salesperson. I repeat, it is a mistake for you to say I am good at building, I am good at coding, I'm good at designing, I'm good at product development, I'm good at whatever. But I'm mad at selling. Therefore, from day one let me just hire a salesperson. BA error is wrong.

Before you do that, you need some foundations in place. You need some prerequisites in place. Prerequisite as in some teams don't suppose they on ground before you call somebody else. That's just what prerequisite means. So what are these prerequisites? What are these things that you should have arranged before you call an outsider to come and say why our boss or babe? Why go and sell on my behalf? The first thing for those of you who listened to yesterday's podcast episode, you won't be surprised is you must have achieved some level of market validation or product market fit.

For those of you who listened yesterday, no need to explain Abby, but of course we know that there's some people who this is their first time listening to the podcast. So market validation just means you have gotten some signals from the market that people like this, your app, they like this, your idea, they like this, your service, they like this your, whatever it is that you're doing, you must have achieved that. You shouldn't be calling a salesperson to come when you have achieved 0.

Nobody has seen your product, nobody has seen your service, nobody has sampled anything, nobody has tried anything. You're bringing in a sales guy fresh to come and sell. What When even you, you don't know whether this thing can be sold, whether people like it, whether there is a demand for it. Even if they like it and there's a demand for it, you haven't even established whether people like it at the price that is enough for you to put something in your pocket and even to pay some other people.

You haven't done this kind of work and you're calling the salesperson to come myself for you, my friend, you are committing an error. You must have achieved some level of market validation. Take this your product, take this your app, take this your whatever. Try and push it small. Talk to a few people. You're trying to answer a few basic questions. Is there demand for this thing? Do people like this thing? Does it solve a problem?

Does it solve a problem at a price? That makes sense? Because there are sometimes when yes, there's a problem and people like the thing. But honestly speaking, people are not willing to pay beyond X amount. And The thing is, at X amount, it is not worth your while. You haven't done that work. You can't bring in a salesperson yet. Now, who's responsible for all this? In my own opinion, we should be you. If you want to know why you're responsible for figuring out market validation at this stage,

then after you're done listening to this episode, go and listen to yesterday's episode just so that we don't rehash too many things so that this podcast episode isn't too long. Then before you calling the salesperson, you ought to have figured out who the ICP is, the ideal customer profile, your ideal customer audience, the ideal target, the segment, the people that you should be chasing after, the use case scenarios, under what situations, under what context the people use this product or the service.

You need to have figured out these things out and mapped out some basic. All I put is now mapped out some basic answers to this question before you call in someone to sell on your behalf. Some of you are wondering why should I be doing all this work? It's very simple. You can't bring somebody to sell on your behalf without giving the person clear matching orders or not giving the person a clear scope of engagement or you don't give the person a clear target.

And I'm telling you, you will not have clear targets, you will not be able to issue a clear scope of engagement if you have not done these things. You don't know if there's demand for this thing. It's the salesperson that you want to go and figure out the demand. How do you even know that the targets that you people are setting are realistic, are possible when you haven't done all these things? You just hire, get a salesperson and say go and sell on my behalf.

You can't give the person guidance. Who is the ideal person that uses this app, that uses this product, that uses this website, that uses this service? What are the use case scenarios? How do people use this product? How do they use this app? How do they use the service? You can't even give the guys on small guidance. You want to send them out into the wilderness to go and be selling and they're answering all these questions.

Selling is hard. You want somebody to be able to sell effectively on your behalf. At least lay this groundwork before you bring the person into the picture. Then another thing you ought to have figured out some prerequisites is distribution channels. You suppose you should have mapped out some of these things? Distribution channels just means. How did I define it yesterday? Distribution channel, channel channel. Waze I'll be yesterday.

Did I say Waze, I'll be avenues, OK, waves or avenues through which people are exposed to your product, exposed to your service, They get to use your product, get to use your service. Yeah, I think that's the way I explained it yesterday. And the example that I gave was, you know, for an app you need to figure out are you going to be in Apple istore, I be you're going to be in Google Play Store or, you know, how are you going to promote this app that you're creating on this website.

So those are distribution channels. The market is over there. We were over here, which pipeline, pretend it's a tap, which tap are we putting this thing into so that when somebody just turns the tap on the other end, they get to experience your idea, they get to experience your product, they get to experience your service. So if you have figured out all these things, you figured out that there's demand for this product or service, that people actually like it.

You figured out the different contexts under which people use it ideally to get results. You figured out what the adequate price is as the thing makes sense for you to continue in this business. Because believe me, if you do market validation, by the end of the day, the money you collect no makes sense then like what's the point? You're already starting at a loss, already starting with frustration then yeah, you figured out distribution channels.

Now you can bring somebody in and you can tell the person, OK, welcome to the team. What we are selling is X, what we sell to is YY. People who buy these products use it for Z&A and we have found that we can sell it for the amount of DEF and the distribution channels or the ways that we have been promoting these things so far is HIG. You can have the person now tell the person go for our sell. The person is starting with a very clear road map about where he or she is heading and who they are pursuing.

And the person most importantly, will be starting with some structure, some traction. I mean traction as in like progress because you, you don't lay the groundwork, you've made some progress. The person is coming here to amplify some progress now that the person is coming to go and start answering all the questions from the get go. So yes, you're good at building, you're good at coding, you're good at product development,

you're good at whatever it is you're good at, but you're bad at selling. Should you hire a salesperson? By all means, hire a salesperson, but before you do that, lay the foundation first before you call the person. Now, who should you call? Some things to note or some qualities to look out for #1 Even though we're going to lay some kind of foundations here like that I've mentioned, you know, market validation, product market feed, the ICP, ideal customer profile, distribution channels.

Even though we lay that foundation, still the kind of person that we want to hire for this, your startup is somebody who's a systems builder or somebody who is capable of some strategic thinking person is strategic partner. You're not hiring a houseboy, you're not hiring just an executor, You're not hiring somebody that when you say go, they go drop. They ask you how high. The person needs some kind initiative, some cognitive functions.

The person needs to be able to be a self starter and do some things on their own. And the person should know that they're building systems because when you come in at this level as the first salesperson who's going to be selling the product, the service, the app, the fintech, the whatever it is that you're doing, the person is going to be an integral part, a very, very important part of setting out your standard operating procedures, coming up with your sales scripts, what else?

Coming up with your playbooks for how you deal with objections. You know, when people object based on price or when people have all kinds of concerns, whether technical concerns or whatever. This person who you've called as the first salesperson is going to be an important part of building those systems for the salesman and women that will come after him, that will join the team and now be selling for this, your fintech.

So when you're hiring people, don't just be looking at who you can get for cheap. You need to shine your eyes. You are looking for a systems builder. You're also looking for a strategic partner. This person is not just a first salesperson. It's not just anyway, let me overflow it. I think you guys get the point. Then you're also looking for somebody who has empathy and listening skills. Empathy just means being able to put yourself in the mind of another.

Well, it's important because this person is going to have to be able to slot himself into your own mind to figure out what it is that you're thinking, what the vision is, where you guys are moving the company to you and your Co founders. But apart from that, it's also going to be an important skill because when he is talking to the next set of customers that are going to come from the business, he needs to be able to put himself in their own shoes and listen to them and figure out the problems that they have either personally or in their business.

That your product, that your fintech idea, that your app, that your whatever can solve that is what will make this person effective in selling. So don't just look at somebody who has sweet mouth, somebody who is a sweet talker. You're looking at somebody who has listening skills, first and foremost, listening skills, empathy. Then unfortunately, you also should be looking for somebody who has some kind of interest in process documentation because there are lots of sales people who they love selling, but they hate paperwork.

I won't like I'm leaning in that direction. So I mean, I'm accusing myself would just hate paperwork. But at this stage, it's important because remember, this first salesperson for your fintech is going to help create your standard operating procedures. That means they're going to be writing things down either on a sheet of paper or in the diary or in the Google note or whatever shadow be writing things down. Process documentation is also important because in the early days, in fact, whether early days, middle days or later days,

CRM is really important. CRM is a customer relationship management tool. That is what helps you to keep track of who are you who, who are the people that you're talking to? Which prospects are you talking to? How many of them are you talking to? For the ones that you're talking to currently, what stage of the relationship are you in? For the people that are supposed to get back to next week, what are you supposed to talk to?

What are you supposed to when you get back to them next week? What are the agendas? What are the stages? What are the things that you guys are supposed to talk about? The CRM is the tool that helps you keep all these conversations on track. Now, the reason why this is important is because in the early days when you're trying to validate your business idea to show that your app indeed works, that you know people like your idea, you'll be talking to a few people 3 or 4.

Now, when you're talking to three or four people, it's OK to run things based on memory, because if you're talking to Chief here, Natural and Chief here Natural says call me back next week Tuesday, it's only three or four people you're talking to. Chances are you will remember to call him on Tuesday because after all, how many people are you talking to? But then you bring a sales person on board. Before you know it. Last week you were talking to four people.

This week you're talking to 12. Next week you're talking to 18. The week after that you're talking to 32. You cannot remember off memory alone which of the 32 people are serious, what the next step is for each of the 32 people, the meeting times that you scheduled with each of them. What it is that you're supposed to do before the next meeting, or what the other person is supposed to do for you before the next meeting is just too much to handle.

So whatever it is that you bring in to sell on your behalf, the person has to be comfortable with process documentation. The person has to be comfortable writing it down in the CRM. Not today, September 1st. We had the meeting with Chief Henna Draw with Chief Ian not sure this is what we discussed in the meeting. ABCD possible outcomes DEF next point of call, next action item on the agenda. Chief Ian not sure And I agreed to do a demo session next week Friday, 8:30 AM on Google Meet.

You now put a small note there, send meeting link the day before. You know something like that. The person that you hire should be comfortable doing this creating. SO. PS Writing down all these things in CRM, setting notifications, setting reminders, scheduling alerts so that you do not miss track, You don't lose track of the conversation with Chief Henna Shaw and any other prospect that you guys are talking to. If you hire somebody and the person has a golden mouth,

person has a sweet mouth, the person can't toast, you know, anybody to buy a product or service, but then you guys start slipping up when it comes to CRM and data hygiene. Serious wahala. Good day, serious wahala. There are some companies, well more established companies anyway, who just hire support for people like where are you? You only just to go and sell. OK, this person, this person is your secretary or this person is your BDR or this person is your whatever.

But sure, this is the person who is responsible for putting in all the information into the ZRM. But sure, it has to be done. So when you are hiring someone to sell for your startup, this is also one of the things that you will consider. Does this person have small respect? He doesn't have to love process documentation, but at least does this person understand process documentation and do they know why it is important?

And do you think they will go ahead and do it? Because it will be rough if you have somebody And in the last month, the person spoke to 86 contacts. But then for the 86 contacts, the person is just running from memory. Where are you at with this person? Or he can't remember. What is the next step? He's not sure. What meeting did you set? He doesn't know. Then you're also looking for someone with a bit of resilience because since you guys are new in the market, you know your household name, you will hear plenty of, no, you haven't built your Unicorn yet.

You know, like Pay Stack and all these companies. So right now everybody knows who Pay Stack is. So the last time that I was trying to travel to Baker State and I wanted to chatter the bus online. So when I went on the website now and it was time for payment, one of the options there was pay stack. So right now everybody knows pay stack. So it's not a big deal. Pay stack no problem. You select, they will pay stack. In the beginning, nobody knows you you want to be a new payment processor unless you're calling your company a golden fish.

It's a payment option. Golden fish say, which has golden fish say pay stack I know or pay by GTB virtual card. GTBI know pay stack. I know golden fish. Who are you? So in the beginning there's going to be lots of no. So whoever you hire needs to be able to have some resilience. So 1 moment. OK, sorry about that. A notification came from my phone. You know, I make all these recordings on my phone. I just wanted to be sure that there wasn't anything important or rather than time bound.

So you're hiring someone who has small resilience. So we would put up with all the Nos because you guys are on a known quantity. Then you also want to hire someone to be your first sales person and you want the person to have a problem based philosophy or a problem based approach when it comes to selling versus features. Features are when people keep talking about what is the features of a feature is a part of something.

I'll explain it. OK, let's just say a feature is a part of something. For those of you who are in the tech space, you guys come up with these wonderful ideas and then you fall in love with this thing. Like for instance, my clients who is in the real estate space and they have this app and the website that's supposed to help with buying and renting property and also validating, verifying property before you rent or before you buy.

You want to be sure that the CEO is on point. You want to be sure that you know there are no problems here or there now, because all these people have a technical background, any small thing, they'll be talking about the algorithm, the algorithm, the algorithm that is just a feature of this service. You guys are proud of the algorithm because you guys are tech oriented and you know the work that went into creating this algorithm.

But The thing is, ordinary people like me who are going to be using the app, we don't care about an algorithm. We care about an outcome. Is this house good enough to rent? Is this house good enough to buy? Is this plot of land safe enough to buy? Is the outcome that customers care about? So you should be hiring a salesperson who knows how to talk in terms of outcomes that people will receive or problems that will be solved and they won't be talking about features.

If you're selling mobile phones before, yes, whether the mobile phone is black or is pink or is gold, yes, that's important. But before you get to that level of whether it's black or pink or gold, you need to be able to know who is buying these headphones. What is the person buying these kind of headphones for? What is this person kind of what is their lifestyle? What are their needs? People who want to listen to music while jogging need different kinds of headsets from people who need something so that they can make calls comfortably without touching the phone during the work day.

Hope you guys are understanding where I'm going from. Somebody who is a feature seller will be able to see will be saying that this earphone has 10,000 blah blah blah decibel. It has so, so, so, so resistance. It is blue, it is pink, it is black. It is made in China, it is made in Taiwan. It is highly flexible resistance, something, something water resistant, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, all kinds of things. But you need to be focused not on the features, but on the results and on the outcomes that they think helps people achieve.

If this person is not going to be using these headphones for workouts, you know jogging and there may be small rain will baptize the person or maybe walking out in the gym and then small sweat is dripping on the headphones. If the person is not using the headphones for that, then what is the whole point of playing up the fact that this thing is water or moisture resistant? So you need to be able to get someone to sell for your startup, sell for your fintech and the person should have a problem based or solution based or outcome based approach of selling instead of features.

Because somebody come in and saying that your app, your website, your whatever your fintech idea is the best because it is ISO, these are dot dot dot and it is web 3 compliance, something black, you know and all that jazz. It's not going to help you. Then you also need to make sure that the person that you're going to hire to sell for this, your startup, the person must have a qualification process or qualification philosophy.

Qualification just is the stage of the business relationship where you're talking to a potential customer and you're asking them questions about the problems that they face or the vision that they have that this product or this service is going to is going to help them solve. The reason why qualification is important is because it is from asking questions like this. Let's go back to the headphones, to the earphone things is by asking them the sorts of questions now, OK, what do you need earphones for?

OK, for workouts, What kind of workouts do you do? Are you a runner or you spend most of your time in the gym? OK, when you're in the gym, what kind of exercises do you do? You know, these are the kinds of things when you go through qualification it is then you're going to now be able to know whether you will recommend in ear headphones, earphones or the headphones that are big and go across somebody's head and covers the ears from the outside.

It is from asking these sorts of questions and engaging in qualification that you will be able to make an adequate recommendation, an adequate proposal, a convincing sales speech. So the person that you're hiring, you need to be able to know what their qualifications philosophy is when they're having conversations with customers. What are the kind of conversations, what are the kind of questions, What are the kind of issues that they typically put customers through?

For those of you who've been listening to the podcast for a while, you already know that I've spoken a lot about qualification frameworks like Band, which is a budget budget authority, budget authority need, and then timeline. It's like, it's the best, but it's only four things. So it's easy to remember so that when you're talking to a customer, you remember that, oh, I guess bring up these money issues that the problems that we solve typically fall within the X amount to social.

And so amount, you know, where do you fall within that range or are you comfortable with that or which level of investment were you considering? You need to be able to have that budget conversation. Then E authority, you want to be sure that you're talking to someone. You know, as I say, nowadays they are talking to someone in power because you want to be sure that the person can authorize the purchase. Because if you're selling something that requires the MD

and somebody in in a procurement to to buy, then it doesn't help you that you're talking to the head of department for security, for instance. That person has no a authority to get this purchase going or to move your agenda along. So you want to be sure they're asking questions about people's authority. And let me stop there. Let me not go into that in more detail, but if you're interested, I've made lots of podcast episodes around conversation frameworks,

qualification frameworks. So just search within YouTube, just use my name, and you'll find all those podcasts episodes come up. Then of course, you also want to hire someone to sell for your startup who has good verbal and communication skills. You also want to hire someone who is willing to roll up their sleeves and get work done, not people who delegate all the time. And the reason why is because in the early days, first hand insights is required.

And that's the reason why for my clients, I get my hands dirty. I make one or two phone calls because I want to be sure, are we the advertising campaign that we ran? Are we talking to the right kind of customers? I will talk to the right kind of prospects rather. And I want to verify a couple of things. The salespeople, they're complaining that these and these are the issues. Is this in fact the case? So hire somebody who's not afraid of picking up the phone and making calls or going to go and visit people in the office,

not somebody who will delegate all the time. Then you also want to look into the experience of someone who you're hiring because some people have experience in big corporations, but not necessarily in startups. Somebody who has been successful selling for you know, stamping IBTC, for instance, might not might not. I'm just saying might might not be successful selling for your startup because stamping guys IBTC, you know those ones,

they're big now they don't get a reputation. Everybody already knows them is easy. Let's just assume that your in the fintech space and you're trying to create a new way of processing payments and let's say Stambic Apple case. No, Stambic is not the right and let me just go ahead with Stambic given those Stambic is not the right example. So let's say Stambic is also coming up with its own form of payment processing. Of course, Stambic couldn't do that because it's the bank, but let's just pretend that, you know, they had, it'll be easier to sell for Stambic IBTC because when you go to some places and I

say I'm from Stambic IBTC, there is name recognition, there is brand recognition. It will be easier to get some meetings. It would not be the same where you're selling the payment processor for a new startup and you know, they're called, what did I say again? Golden fish, Golden fish. So you need to look into the experience. Is it only big players that have sold for before? Are they comfortable selling in the startup also because people who have sold in, you know, the big space, you know, they have some kind support that you might not be ready to give, you know,

for now. Like people who sell in bigger corporations have had a BDRA business development Rep or somebody who does some small grunt work, you know, who calls ahead of time to try and fix appointments and things like that. You know, some people who have been, who are big boys and big girls who have been selling for a long time, you know, they've, they've outgrown some things. All the amount of you know, I don't think you should ever outgrow menial tasks in quote when it comes to selling, we should be able to handle everything from the beginning all the way to the end.

We should never outgrow it anyway. So these are some of the things that you should be looking at when you answer the question. You say that you are great at coding, you are great at building, you're great at product development, but you're not good at selling. Should you hire a salesperson? And the answer is yes. We've looked at the prerequisites and now we've also looked at some qualities, some things to consider before we hire a salesperson.

Now the final thing is incentives. What does incentive mean? Incentive just means what am I dropping so that you can stay around the gas to be some incentive. Very, very important, especially when we're talking about sales people. People in the accounting department, so long as they receive their salary, they're fine. People in the marketing department, so long as they receive their salary, they're fine. Sales is a very difficult job.

You drop lots of abuse, you drop lots of rejection. So sales people only stay if it's worth it. How you going to make it worth it? There are different kind of compensation structures. The traditional thing is a base plus a high, a base salary plus a variable for all I put it. Now you give them a flat amount, maybe like a flat salary, you know, maybe 200 K. Then they now have high rewards for performing. So your flat salary is 200 K.

However, if you sell a deal of 700K, you will collect 10% of that. If you sell deals worth 1.5, you will collect 12% of that. If you sell deals worth, you know, 800 M, you will collect 8% or whatever. So that is 1 traditional way of keeping sales people encouraged then put it that way. That's how you sanitize them to stay and keep doing a good job. Give them a base. That base is just security. Security as in how I put it.

The base is just for basic stuff, you know, transport fare, transport for what else, you know, just some basic stuff. People should be able to go from place to place. They should be able to make phone calls and they should be able to really eat about once in a while. That's what the that's what the the basis for security and the rest is performance. You perform well, we summer you bonus, you perform very well, we throw money at you.

So that's the idea. So base plus a higher variable then another one that can be explored. But in my own opinion, if you must do this, make sure you talk to a lawyer with some startup expertise. Some of you say those lawyers do not exist in Niger, that's not true. They exist. Unfortunately, it's like all the ones I know happen to be based in Lagos. But you know, today with modern technology, with Zoom, with WhatsApp, with Microsoft Teams,

with you know, whatever location is not a problem anymore. You can be based in Abuja and your accountant can be based in a Korea. It happens like now I'm fighting with the Inland Revenue Service and the accountants I'm talking to, one of them is in Ondo, another one is in Lagos. So you want to consider this option, make sure you're talking to a lawyer with expertise in startups and you can get salespeople to stay by equity and ownership.

What we're trying to do there is we're trying to make something work long term. Equity just means the gag. We have a share in the company. That's what equity means. You've come in, you're new, you're doing all this kind of work, no problem. Your base is 200K whenever he said that so, so, so, so amount to correct extra, extra percentage, but made this in his sweet self. You may you become an owner of the company. Now if you talk to a lawyer with startup experience, they will tell you about what's it called vesting period.

Yeah, I think it's called the vesting period. That's a period under which somebody gets to work for the company or gets to contribute in some way, whether contribute about effort or contribute money. But the ownership, the clock for ownership in the company doesn't begin to run until something else happens in the future. So the reason why they use all these vesting clauses is just to avoid the situation where somebody comes in and you promise the person, you're our first salesperson, we'll give you 10% of the company.

The person, how come I work for three weeks and the person will say I beg and I'll do and then they'll go away. And then when you hammer The thing is big, the person will say, hey, he will promise me 10%. You'll now be saying 10% of what? You only stayed here 3 weeks. The person will say and so and So what the hell, you told me 10% when I don't hammer, give me my 10%. So it's to avoid all these kind of issues. That's why the harvesting clauses.

And This is why when it comes to this level, you talk to lawyers with startup expertise. So yes, I have a previous background in law but this was not my area of specialty so I can't advise on this. So pay attention. Then there are also some other incentives that keep people around. Non money incentives #1 access salespeople. We don't like working for companies where we don't have access to the orga. If there's a problem or while satisfied about something, it helps if we can talk to one or two Orgas to just say what's on our mind because the salesperson is not like the accountant or it's not like with the human resources person.

Accounting, so long as they're receiving their salary, they're fine. Marketing as long as they're receiving their salary, they're fine. If the salesperson has a lot on his chest, he's trying to send message to Orga, the message is not reaching Orga. The average Nigerian salesperson will just say what the hell is this? And then those also, they won't even submit letter of resignation. You just wake up one day and say I wish you could, you know, is that too good?

The income you're not becoming too good. He won't answer his phone, does it too good, has resigned. Now, I'm not endorsing that kind of behavior. I'm just saying that's what happens in this part of the world. The salesperson has the thing that is on his mind. He has been trying to signal Orga. Those of you who have access to the Orga, you've not been sending the message, one that you could just say to help with this and then he will just leave.

So that is also a non money incentive. Whoever it is you're hiring to be your first, your first salesperson, the person should be able to have reasonable access to you. I'm not saying give the person your personal phone number, but I mean like there's a problem. Person should be able to say, you know, we need to talk. I'm concerned about this disease. I have noticed this is this. It is my opinion that this that, that that kind of access.

Therefore, some people it helps with the clear career path. OK, now you've come in, your first salesperson. This is what we're going to do when we hit this milestone will now make you sales manager. When we hit this milestone, you will now like this. This is how you know for some people career progression, they like that sort of thing. And then another way of, excuse me, incentivizing your first, your first salesperson for those of you who want to start, want to create your startup.

So excuse me. I don't quite agree with it, but I see the wisdom in it. And that is where you give the sales person some budgetary control. You say, you know what, yes, you're starting now and now it's just you. But by the time we hit social and so milestone, we'll need to have more sales people. You know you'll be in charge of. We'll be in charge of recruiting your team or you'll be in charge of budgetary spend. When it comes to sales, you know, you'll be in charge of authorizing these kinds of expenditures, authorizing those kinds of expenditures.

You know, I'm not a specialist when it comes to business management, so I can't advise you on, you know, which is good and which is not good. But there are people who incentivize salespeople to stay by offering these sorts of things. OK, so it's 40 minutes. Let me bring it straight to a close. So summary. What I've been trying to say is all these whole things of, you know, you're the person who is running the startup.

So Oh well, light has come back where I stay, even though it's band A, the things that we're suffering, even though this this place I'm staying is band A this their feeder, their feeder packs up every two weeks. We go through this major drama. So if I my wife was laughing this morning just before, you know, I took out because I had to turn off the turn off the inverter. So why went to go and drop her the office. She was not laughing, said this feeder.

That is as if they're not feeding this feeder enough so our 16 hours with our license wouldn't assure us shaky. So I've been telling Mumsy that now I know the way forward, that the way forward, the way to live in this country is you need to be paid off. Seriously. Solar panel. Solar panels, Hook yourself up. Correct installation that can last you 48 hours straight. Then you need to sink your own borehole because we can has been showing off Shaggy in Abuja small time you know this water shortage.

So solar panel then borehole then what Again security. You need to have your own private mobile. That's where I'm heading I'll build my own palatial residence. Solar panel everywhere, Borehole AC tight. I park my my Tesla Cybertruck. Of course that's buy cars for my kids too, you know. Then also I need to have my mobile outside. All of them with their guns and with their jeeps protecting me and my millions. That's all we need to stay safe in this country.

It's unfortunate, but they don't mind me. What was I I lost train of thought. That's all. Wrapping, wrapping things up since we've already been here for 40 minutes. So it's not that simple. Should you sell on behalf of the company, Should you not sell on behalf of the company? It's not that simple. But any which you will be responsible for some kind of sales motion because you need to be able to validate your idea before you bring some other person on board.

So there's no how, no how that is the founder of the company, the person who is starting this idea, the person who is starting this fintech, the person who is starting this. Whatever it is that you're trying to do, whatever startup it is you're trying to do, in my opinion, there's no version where you get this thing off the ground, where you don't get your hands dirty. You do have to get your hands dirty. You do have to get involved in the beginning before you retire to see your quarters.

Then if you're bringing the salesperson on board, you need to make sure that you hire the right kind of person. Make sure the person has the right kind of attitude, especially that process documentation, documentation or really important. Don't worry, hire a salesperson who the person is very good and the person can't toast the gods. But at the end of the day, the person doesn't write anything down. When you need information, the only way you get the information is if you want to ask him personally as a recipe for disaster.

Then you also need to look for ways to make sure that the salesperson that you hire in the beginning or your initial sales team meeting, incentivize them to stay for a while or to stay for the long haul. So that's it. And that is all for today. Remember, if you'd love to connect with me, I'm your host, Tavi Shima IED, and you can call, send me a text message or WhatsApp message on 08064662140. So thank you very much for your time and attention.

I'll catch you all some other time.