From Ignored to Engaged: How to Personalize Festive Messages for Business Growth

Hello and welcome to the show. Before we begin, I'd like to give a shout out to Abiola Urun Bemi. I hope I pronounced the name correctly. She's a podcast listener who reached out to me on Instagram. Well, actually she followed on Instagram and I tried to strike up a chat with everyone who follows. Because right now, on my business journey, my followership is still that small, but I can actually have a conversation with most of you.

And I try to have conversations with everyone because I'm trying to figure out what questions you guys have, the episodes that you found to be impactful, questions yet to be unanswered, follow up questions, those sorts of things. So if you do follow me on any of the handles, Instagram, LinkedIn, TikTok, or wherever, chances are you will be receiving a message from me. Although the reason why I handle my LinkedIn handle all the time is because that's why I'm most active.

So anyway, shout out to Abiola Orung Bemi. She's a writer, a lawyer and an entrepreneur, so thank you very much for reaching out. Yeah, I asked her if she had any follow up questions from episodes she's listened to in the past, and if she does, then we will be devoting podcast episodes to the questions that she has. And for those of you who've been curious about questions that we deal with over here on the podcast, this is how they come up.

So I have my own list of questions that I'm running through that I've come up with in the past, you know, from different ways, maybe just random conversations or things that I think you people should know. But some of these questions are actually questions that people tell me, you know, when we meet in person or we are exchanging DMS and things of that nature. Now, today's question. OK, well, it's not really a question.

I want to examine how we can use follow-ups or felicitations, how to do that for business purposes during celebrations and during festivities. Now the reason why I'm doing that is because right now at the date of this recording, it is Eid Mubarak. I'm assuming it's world over, but I suspect that Eid Mubarak is going to be a big thing in countries like Nigeria, Ghana, you know, Western African nations, the Muslim nations.

Let's see, where else India, Pakistan, you know, places where you have significant Muslim communities. But I doubt that in the UK or in the USA it's going to be that much, that big of a deal because I've been chatting with my brother who is based in the UK and you know, apparently Eid Mubarak is not a big deal over there. So here in Nigeria people are rejoicing because we have three day public holidays. That's for those people who are involved in the civil service or maybe corporate sector and in the UK, life is just going on as normal.

Anyway. So bottom line is today is the Eid Mubarak. I think today is the second day and I've noticed a trend, the usual thing that I complain about over here on the podcast, business owners have been sending goodwill messages. Now unfortunately, a lot of these messages are going to be ignored. And let me repeat it again and let me tell you point blank, if you're one of the people who has been sending these messages, a lot of these messages are going to be ignored, maybe even deleted as some people are probably going to move your messages to archive.

Now the reason why this is going to happen is because a lot of business owners who are sending these messages are sending broadcast and non personalized messages. Now let's say the average person knows a couple of business people, like I know a couple of business people. It's a pain in the butt to wake up and see 25 messages, and the 25 messages are all broadcast stuff from business owners, Not personalized, not unique to you.

And then plus, this is the only kind of messaging that they send out anyway. So you look in your inbox and then you see IBU Barack messages broadcast, the one before that Easter messages broadcast because Easter was I think was about two weeks, two weeks back then before that you see Ash Wednesday broadcast. Then before that you see Valentine's broadcast and before that you see Christmas broadcast and then before that you see what's it called Halloween broadcast.

You know, you guys, I hope you're getting the you're getting the point. Now some people will just swiftly move you to the what's it called in WhatsApp? What's it called Archive, Archive in Broadcast. Those are for messages you want to ignore because they know that from this particular business, this is all the kind of messaging that I will ever receive. Now you on the other hand, the business owner, you would have sent out this message to 2500 of your contacts and you think,

hey, I'm doing a good thing I have reached out 2500 people and I'm remaining top of mind. But actually that is not the case. You are being ignored by a bunch of folks like me. I'm just ignoring those messages because I know it's a broadcast, but and I have to keep in touch with these guys. So I just leave the message And a couple of people are archiving your messages, just deleting it. So it is not helping you achieve the effect that you think.

Now, if you remember, as I started off reeling off the kinds of messages that people are going to send, if you look at it, you see that you can't really be remaining top of mind because worst case scenario, there are only like 5 holidays that you can send these messages too. I'm saying 5 because, you know, we'll remove Halloween 'cause that's really an American thing. But Nigerian businesses are beginning to send broadcasts on Halloween.

So once you remove the the American holidays, you know, Thanksgiving, Halloween. What else? International Women's. OK, Well, let's leave International Women's Day. Once you've moved all the American stuff, I mean, you're looking at 5 tops, maybe seven of these holidays or occasions that you can send messages around annually. And believe me, 7 WhatsApp messages or seven SMS messages a year is not enough for you to remain top of mind.

So this is not a strategy that is working. If you doubt, I want you to go through your phone. If you've been sending these messages for the past, let's say 5-6 years that you've been in business, try and track one business inquiry or one business deal that you go through this kind of messaging. Now, I'm not here to just complain all day, but I'm here to give you a solution and this is my solution. Number one, get a keyboard.

Keyboards. OK, well I was going to say keyboards cost 5K, but now as before the elections, until we came into power. But back then I told someone you could get a keyboard for about 3K. Because my first keyboard, one of those white plastic ones from China, actually was 3000 Naira. But the last time I told someone was 3K, the person went and actually got it for 5K5000 naira. So I'm not sure how much it cost now, but let's just guess that maybe it's about 10 grand.

But believe me, it's worth it. And for some reason these Chinese guys know how to make things that last forever. The current keyboard that I have right now, I think the last time I charged it was maybe three or four months ago and that thing is still working. I mean, who knows what kind of jazz these Chinese guys come up with? So these things last forever. So even if it's 10K, it's worth it. I can assure you you will use it for a year, maybe even 2 years until you get married and have children.

And then the children start pulling out the keyboards and they smash it or something like that. So number one, get the keyboard but you don't have to because I've seen some people. What they do is there's something called I think it's called WhatsApp Web or something like that. You scan the barcode on your phone and then your WhatsApp appears on your keyboard. Now the reason why I'm saying sorry no keyboard applies will show up on your desktop or on your laptop.

Now the reason why I'm saying this, get the keyboard or do that WhatsApp Web thing. If you haven't heard of WhatsApp web before then just Google WhatsApp Web. Follow the instructions. You'll get caught up to speed. The reason why I'm recommending this is because we need an easy system to copy and paste. Well you of course you can copy and paste on the mobile phone by doing long press select, but you know that looks like a long thing.

So that's why I say keyboard or WhatsApp Web. So why get a keyboard? You find out as we go later on. Now I'm asking you to get these things, to get these kind of setups because the goal is we want to try, remember, we want to try and make it look like we are delivering personalized messages. And after that we want to be able to continue with individual conversations that are going to arise from these messages. Because if you make them semi personalized, there are some people who will respond and we'll get to what kind of responses though might be later on in the episode.

So if you try and form activity like you are delivering personalized messages and some people do end up responding, it helps you to continue a conversation that helps you nurture relationships and to genuinely remain top of mind. Because if someone opens and looks like he was sent to me, the person can respond and there might be a conversation and the person will remember you. You will make an impression rather than you open up.

You see 25 messages and then you just select, select, select, select, move to archive or select, select, select, delete. So let me use an example of a sample that I received today. I'm ignoring the messages that I received yesterday and I'm going to ignore the messages that I'm going to receive tomorrow. So this is a sample I received and it goes like this. On this special occasion of Salah, we extend our warmest wishes to you and your family.

May this festive season bring you joy, peace and prosperity. Eid Mubarak. This was sent by one of my guys who is a wedding photographer. Now this message is irrelevant to a lot of people and non personalized. It assumes that the people this person receiving it has the family. But what if this was sent to me 5 No, let's say 10 years ago when I didn't have a family. No. OK, twelve. I've been married 12 years. So let's say this thing came 1213 years ago when I didn't have a family.

Clearly I would know that this was not written to me and apart from that, I'm a Christian, so should I be receiving this kind of message? I mean, it's no harm, but it's not a Christian first of all, so should I be receiving this message now? If you start looking at it in particulars like that, you can see why. If a 65 year old Christian woman receives this message or an 18 year old atheist boy receives this message. Can you see how these messages are irrelevant to them, not personalized and the reason why people are ignoring, Especially if as wedding photographer you send this and one of your homies receives it and both of you know that this guy, even though he was raised in a Muslim family,

he's an atheist and you know, he just knows that, well this message is not for him. So this one of the reasons why a lot of people are ignoring your messages, they're irrelevant, they're non personalized. And plus, WhatsApp does this thing where if it's a broadcast, the colour is different. So you don't even have to open it. You just look at it, just see, you just know it's a broadcast. And then there's this thing that WhatsApp also does where it says forwarded multiple times or forwarded lots of times or something.

So the person can open it, see that there's a broadcast and also see that this thing has been forwarded hundreds of times. So these are the reasons why our messages are being ignored. So I want to recommend a different or a slightly targeted approach. Remember I said get a keyboard or hook up your computer, do the WhatsApp web thing? This is just so that we can do control X, control V that is copy and paste. If you're micro, sorry, I know Microsoft.

Well those are the guys people that feel like they have money. Apple users. Yeah, if you're an Apple user, figure out what the command is. But the approach is still the same copy and then paste. So I'm recommending a slightly different approach now. First off, let me come up with some new copy because this copy assumes that this person is a family person and we know that some of these people that receive this message might not be family people.

So I decided to come up with some new copy that would apply whether you have a wife and kids or a husband and kids or not. So the kind of message that you can send to an 18 year old single person or a 65 year old grandma or a 47 year old man who is married with two children or a 26 year old woman who is married with six kids, if that's possible. So this is the kind of copy that I came up with. Hopefully you'll be able to apply to all those scenarios.

So I left a space for the name. And then what follows is wishing you a joyous Eid Mubarak. May this celebration bring you peace, prosperity and happiness to you and your loved ones to you and your loved ones. You know, that's open enough. Vague enough to cover people who have children or people who don't have children but who have the wife but no kids. Or you're single but you have a boyfriend or a babe or you're a grandma.

I mean, it's open enough. I think it's open enough to cover all these scenarios where if you disagree with me, the goal is the same. Come up with this kind of copy that can seem to address a number of scenarios. So let me repeat, I left space for the name. Because remember, we're going to be doing control, copy, control paste now. So name wishing you a joyous Eid Mubarak. May this celebration bring peace, prosperity and happiness to your loved ones.

Now the next thing we're going to do is to open WhatsApp. You are now going to copy and paste this message individually. If you do it individually, then it's not going to show as a broadcast. Some of you are going to complain that you want me to copy and paste 2500 messages. And the answer is no, do not copy and paste to 2500 people or 4000 if you have them on your phone. You are only going to copy and paste this message to people that you know are Muslims.

And since we're talking about a wedding photographer, people you know who are Muslims who have done photography business with you in the past, that cuts it down just a little bit. So I know of course there'll be plenty of scrolling, so your finger might be tired. But you know, sometimes I have to work hard to build relationships and make money, develop relationships on the back end. So we're only going to look at previous customers, photography related, wedding related, who are Muslims.

So you will ignore the 18 year old atheist who is your friend. You will ignore someone like me who is a Christian and you will ignore someone like my mom who is almost 70 and who is a Christian. So you will ignore all those folks. You will now copy and paste this message in the inbox, the part that says name. This is why I said use a keyboard. You will select and delete and you will now put that person's name. Now it is not just the name you will put.

We're trying to appear personalized here. You can put a Monica, you know, Monica is like a nickname or whatever. Or you can put your usual greeting at the head of the message because there's some of these people they are putting the message to who? If it's wedding photography and you had a good relationship with the groom, let's say like now the groom is one of your guys. So maybe let's say you call him who stars Ahmed or something.

So instead of putting the guy's full name, you can just type who stars there. Now when the guy opens it, this is what he's going to see, Who starts. OK, well try and personalize so you can say who stars, how far. Question mark. Wishing you a joyous Eid Mubarak. May this celebration bring peace, prosperity and happiness to you and your loved ones. Now the approach is the same. I mean you get, you get how you can personalize this message just by leaving that space in the beginning with name.

And remember, it's not just the person's name, whatever the Monica is or usual greeting. So there'll be some people, let's say, you know, OK, let me just guess that, you know, a Muslim who is IBO, Because when I was in Kano, I ran into an IBO Muslim and I thought that was odd. Never seen an IBO Muslim before. Some people say his conversion was not genuine, but let's just assume that he genuinely converted. So with you, so you copy, you paste, instead of putting the guy's name, you write a Buffy.

How far? Now Wishing you a joyous Eid Mubarak, blah, blah, blah. So you see, it seems like this is much more relevant and much more personalized. And then plus it's not going to have that funny broadcast color so that the person ignores and it's not going to have that tag at the top where it says message forwarded many times and so they won't ignore. Now if you take this approach, the number of responses, the number of responses that you're going to get will go up because it does not look like a broadcast.

Now I send out these sorts of messages a lot. I don't do the holiday thing because personally I know that during holidays people's inboxes are overwhelmed and all my messages to stand out. So me, I ignore holidays or I send the messages ahead if you've received a Christmas message from me before. Those of you are listeners of the show and we've been lasting one-on-one. You know that I've never sent any of you guys a Christmas message on December 25th.

You'd have received it 18th, 19th, 20th. And it's just me shouting out how far, how preparations respond. Small chit chat, you know, Merry Christmas, God bless us, we enter into the New Year, you know, that sort of thing. The reason why I'm sending you these messages and we're doing this chit chat December 18th, 19th, 20th is because I want my messages to stand out. You will remember that you received a message from me, host of the show, that you enjoy and be personalized.

Unlike let's say you listen to other shows. You're on their what's it called? e-mail list or broadcast list or whatever? And then December 25th, they just blast the message out to everyone you know you just ignore. So the number of responses that you can get will be varied. There are some people who are going to ignore and do nothing. That is not a problem for now. In the future we can worry about people who ignore. But for now, you've done your best.

You shot your shot. Have you how do you say yeah you shot your shot or shoot at your shot Oh however it is you said so. You've done your bit. People who ignore do nothing. Some other people are going to respond. Some people will say thanks because Nigerians are polite. Some people respond and say same to you. Some people respond and say how are you. Some people respond and say cool now long time some people respond and say have you jappa because you know people leaving for Canada, Western Europe,

Wales, North America. So that that thing is still going on. So some people respond, have you have you left the country? Some people will say ah, so you still Remember Me, why you sending me a message today? Some people are going to respond, are you still in photography business? They're going to be loads of responses. But this is the kicker here. This is the most important thing. The goal is to try and carry on some sort of human conversation.

This is what helps you remain truly top of mind, because you can now respond to several of these messages. Yeah, I do. I'm good. How's work? How's Madam? How are your twins? They must be six months old now. Abby. Oh, so you you left. You went to Canada. How are you guys enjoying Ontario? How is Prime Minister? Have you met up with Megan and Harry? How are the kids? I heard you got promoted. Congrats. I mean, you you get the point.

You're going to be able to carry on human conversations and this is what helps you remain top of mind. Somebody will now know that we now remember Coonley photography because three or four times in a year, these are the kinds of conversations that you are having. You're a real person. So that next time somebody reaches out and say, please, I need a photographer, Do you know anyone who say, ah yeah, I know this guy Coonley.

Let me send you his number now. Now versus Somebody says I've been paid. You know photographer. And they're like yeah, I know this guy. He did my wedding. It was like 4 years ago but I can't remember how did I store his name and my worry. And no problem I'll. I'll, I'll remember shall I? Just remind me. Remind me. I'll send it to you. Remind me. And then of course they can't remember how you stored. They stored your number because you're not top of mind.

You take this approach. You saw some of these problems. Now is this hard work? The answer is yes. It is very hard work. Is it going to yield results? The answer is yes. But let's be realistic. It's not going to yield results today. It's going to yield results month ahead because some of the guys who roll with me who once in a while I get inquiries from my British Council people. I used to do some work for Sigma Pensions before they got acquired by I think Access Bank and things like that.

And people, some photography guys who work with me or video guys like how come you have all these contacts. This is how I have all these contacts. Not because I'm doing broadcast messages all the time saying they're happy IDIOM or Barack, but it's because these messages are targeted and personalized. I don't wait until December 25th from 18th. I'm ready sending people these messages. It's a little generic, but there's a space.

There's a space for me to personalize at the beginning of the message and then when they respond I have a conversation long time say yes. So my sister it is you know how it is now we're all chasing that money. They say ah you that you're enjoying. I'm like enjoying how easy people that pay my school fees now and Congrats I hear that you are you have been promoted to so so, so and so and then we have that chat and if this is the kind of chat that I'm having with let's say Chiniri who is in procurement department of course when something comes up end of year party or something Chiniri will Remember Me because it's how we've been chatting.

It's not been broadcast message in December or broadcast message in Easter was because in Easter we had a friendly chat her birthday we had a friendly chat Christmas we had a friendly chat not this copy copy and paste broadcasting that all of you are doing. That's the reason why itinerary will Remember Me when they are putting out RFP. Call for photographer request for this, request for that. That is how these people remember you.

So please, for those of you who are doing this copy and paste thing, this broadcasting stop, it's not working. However, can you build a business out of copy and paste and without personalizing? Yes, it can work, but for that to work, realize that it is a volume play. So let's look at people who do that very well. These are sport betting agencies. They do it very, very well. I don't know how. No matter how many times you block them, they still seem to get access to your phone number and they send out this message maybe once a month.

You know, things like that. But you're not the one receiving this message alone. It is millions of Nigerians who are receiving this message every two weeks or every month. Now think about it this way, they're sending this message out to millions of people, maybe once a month. How many million Nigerians are we? And let us pretend that 90% of the people who receive the messages, or let's say 99%, ignore, but then 1% take action.

You can see how he gets them results. You sending 5 messages, or rather sending messages 5 or 6 * a year to 2000 people is not going to give you any result. If you must play this kind of game, realize that it is a volume game and start playing accordingly. Get yourself a list that has thousands of people, or millions of people on it, 10s of thousands of people or a few 10s, millions or whatever, and start messaging them relentlessly every week or every month.

Then yes, it will yield results. But if that's not the kind of game you want to play, this is how you go about doing it. It's a little bit of hard work, but the investments are not that much. The keyboard should not be that expensive. If the cost of keyboards have gone up, maybe now keyboard is like 20 K OK, no problem, get your laptop. If you're like me, you don't have a laptop. Commandeer your wife's laptop. You just had to look big.

This for this for the hostel. You know we will enjoy it. So instead of waiting for December 25th or Ydil Mubarak Comedia laptop two or three days before start doing the copy and paste and everything, give yourself two or three days to work through your phone book and to send all these messages. So this is what you do. Or if Wi-Fi says I'm not giving my laptop, I'm using it for office work, Go on Comedia, your children's laptop, the one that you use for homework.

And then do the Microsoft turn on Microsoft what's it called? what's app web thing. And then give yourself two or three days, execute these campaigns, and then your children will complain. But I tell them that, look, it's for your benefit. I'm trying to make some money. And then, of course, you know, it all applies the other way around too. So if you're a woman, come and get your husband's laptop. If your husband says, look babe,

I'm not giving my laptop, come and get the children's laptop and get it done. If nobody's giving you a laptop, then learn how to copy and paste using your fingers. And instead of giving yourself two or three days, maybe give yourself one week. Because if you're going to do copy and paste using your thumbs, it's going to take a long time. But anyway you guys get the get the picture. So thank you very much for your time and attention.

Remember to keep up with me on LinkedIn. My name is Tavishima Ayede, I'm the host of the show. You can confirm the spelling of my name from the link where you're currently listening to this episode. Then also connect with me on WhatsApp. The phone number is 08064662140. The country code is +234 for those of you who are not Nigerian. And please don't send me these kind of messages because those of you who are members of my community and you send this kind of messages, you know, I'll harass you.

And if you don't take dressing two or three times, you know I'll block you. And it cannot defeat the whole purpose of following me on WhatsApp anyway, because the reason why I gave my phone number is so that we can have direct communications. You guys have a question, you reach out. So thanks for your time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next episode.