How Nigerian Businesses Close Deals with Clear Audio

Today on the podcast, we're going to look at how to set up for your Zoom meeting rights or your Google meeting. And the reason why is because I've been working with a new set of clients. They're really fresh, very, very fresh. Actually. Olga has been in business for a while, maybe like 2530 years. And in his business, he has created a new team, a new like Commando team that's supposed to launch a new set of products. And so because of that, I'm working with this fresh team to be able to bring their new business ideas to the public.

And so I was able to hook them up with a potential customer, hook up a meeting and I was going to be a zoom session and we had ready agreed on how everything was supposed to wrong. You know, how introduced the meeting, what the agenda is, how hand off to them, how do we hand off to themselves? You know, we orchestrated everything nice, correct. But then we started the meeting and I started hearing audio feedback, you know, that's, you know, like when you're on the Zoom meeting or maybe even on the radio show and somebody's talking or now beginning to hear EEEEE, you're now beginning behind, you know, all of those noises.

So the echo and that that feedback, that's what it's called, the technically seeking, that's what it's called. So we're going to do this episode right now so that you guys will know how to avoid all that EEEEE during your meeting. And when two people are talking and you know, they don't, they don't mute themselves. Maybe you're in a hollow environment. All of you are in the same place. And then you now start hearing you, you, you, you, because you know, it's somehow now you're trying to put up a professional front.

All of you are trying to be, you know, on point like we are the guys like This Is Us, we're tight, we're professional. Next in declared to be hand shoe you, you, you, you, you know, it's not now not very good, not very good at all. So that's what we're going to be looking at today. Now making today's recording on the road I'm on, I am at an undisclosed location in Abuja. So of course, there will be noise in the background, you know, people walking about,

people gossiping, you know all sorts of things. Now, if you're tired of using business strategies that work in America and the UK, but they fail anyhow, anyhow, the moment you try them in Nigeria, then this podcast is for you. Welcome to the podcast. I'm your host, Tavishima Ayede and for years I've been bringing you practical, realistic, relevant insights that deliver results to the Nigerian market. So if you want to stop wasting your time with generic advice and start growing your business the Nigerian way.

Now stay tuned in here to the podcast, subscribe on Spotify, YouTube, Apple or any player of your choice. And if you'd love to connect, call, send me a text message or a WhatsApp message on 08064662140. Now again today on the podcast, how do you set up your meeting? So of course, I already told you that with the team, we're already gone of us on basic stuff. Number one agenda, when we have this meeting with the client,

what are we going to discuss? Because one of the very first ways that you begin to start looking on professional is when you shop for a Zoom meeting and then you begin the freestyle. Now, for those of you who've been listening to the podcast for a while, I'm sure you guys are already figuring out a couple of things about how I like to, how I suggest that we do business. And number one rule is no freestyling, no the freestyle,

nothing. Now, freestyling is OK when you're professional, you've been in the game for decades. And even then it's not really freestyling. The thing is, you already have the template. It's just that the template within day for your mind, as in you have been doing it for so long that the template is internalized. So like when you go to a hospital and a surgeon is about to do operation on you, it's not as if they are not following a checklist.

It's not as if they are freestyling. They're not freestyling. It's just that they've been doing this for years. So the checklist is in their head, you know. So you come in first in soap, then you wash, then your hand, you check scalpel, you check this, you check that, you know, so, and then same thing for pilots. But I think for pilots, the checklist has to be written out and put down. You know, they follow it, you know, whether they've been in the thing for no matter how long or not.

But bottom line, sha, this is your first time listening to the podcast. Just take it as a standard golden rule. No to freestyling, no to freestyling at all. We decide on what the agenda is going to be ahead of time. We decide on the script, we decide on the outline, we decide on whatever it is you want to call it. So that's the first thing we did. We hooked up on the agenda and that's the first thing I discussed with my guys.

So I'm sure they don't mind me using their real names. But since I'm not saying the the company, you know, their identity is still protected. So I said Dominique Ibuka. So this meeting that we're going for now is what we're going to do. Let's have a meeting. There's a person where we're expecting, this is how we think we're going to be able to help the business. But before we do this, this is how we structure the meeting.

I will start it like this. I will hand off to you Ibuka. Ibuka, you hand off to Dominique like this. Then we'll do qualification and discovery. This is how we'll be asking them questions. This is how we'll figure out what it is that they need. Then this is how Dominique, you now hand back to me, me. I'll now do recap from there. We'll now do next action points. Then from action points. That is how I will now, you know, exit the meeting and then go for the go for the close.

So that's how we, we came up with the with the agenda. So you're going for your Zoom meeting. Agree. First, put your house in order first before you people go and invite outsiders because it really, really, really makes the house look like rubbish for a foreigner. Well, I mean an outsider to come in for the meeting and then it's clear that all of you are not, you know, point. Well, of course Abuka and Dominic, they didn't disgrace me because they came for the meeting one time.

So that was good. Meeting was supposed to start 12. I signed in like around that car 1158 by the time I was there able count Dominic do already gisting. I said very good. That's how I suppose be you know when you're writing outside out for the meeting. It was supposed to be on ground first you should be waiting. Let let it not be that the visitor is the person who will come and be waiting for people to show so that part was good so they were on time.

We had an agenda now, like I said, the meeting started and then before you know it, somebody will say something, something, something, something. Begin to hear EEEE and after a while behind you, you, you, you, you, you, you, you and was making the thing making the meeting a little bit unpleasant. And at some point, you know, the person that we invited for the call, you know, said that he had trouble hearing. So I now had to be manually muting and on meeting people myself because I just figured,

you know, now zoom meeting now, you know, like now Google meets for everybody knows how to Google meets. I just assume that everybody knows. Apparently not everybody knows. So that's how it works when you're live and doing these kind of meetings. When you want to speak, you're on mute and then you talk. The moment you talk just, yeah, mute yourself, sharp, sharp, because all kind of things happen. You can leave your mic hot.

When you say mic is hot, we mean the mic is on. So your mic can be hot. And then before you know it, maybe your children are playing in the background, everybody behind your children as they're fighting and say no, Daddy, Daddy, he took my meat. He took my this, he took my, you know, everybody. We hear now that you don't have enough meat in your house. So that's the reason why you, you know, on mute yourself, the mic is hot, you talk immediately finished.

Yeah, just meet yourself or your wife can't be walking in the background. She's just dragging her legs. Everybody behind try, try, try during the meeting. So that whole thing of mute on mute, mute on mute know how to do it very, very well. Now for me, I do it manually. I just tap the screen. But my brother has been trying to teach me that there's keyboard shortcuts, you know, and I'm like, I beg another thing I need to learn.

So you can go and research it. But there's something you can do. You just tap on your keyboard, you know, prep up now your mic will be mute. Now when you're ready, prep up, your mic will now be on. So you know, when I research the keyboard shortcuts, you know, but for me, I just do it the same old way. I use my finger, I tap or I use the mouse and then I scroll and then I click. But either way, mute or mute, so it stops all the disturbance coming in from the background and it helps to keep things nice and clean and professional.

So mutual mute down is basic. So everybody go and learn how to mute and unmute because sometimes there's all these small, small things that begin to 'cause, you know, one kind impression, like I thought these guys were professional, but you know. So anyway, so your mute and a new game gassed me on point. Now the difficulty that's concerning the echo. Now luckily, since I have the radio show and you know, I have some experience with the media,

I was able to figure out what the problem was. It's just that, you know, I figured out the problem while the meeting was going on. It's not as if we can cure the problem. So this was going on. Now Dominic and Ibuka, they're in the same office. Then there was a third guy, Momo, who was a part of the meeting. They're from the same office. So all of them, they're in the same office. Then me and the other guy Victor from a different organization were in different location.

Now this was the problem because they're in the same location and because all of them were using computer mic, that was what was causing the feedback. So Abu cars mic is hot, that means it is on. Then Dominic's mic is hot, that means it is on. And then Momo's mic is also on at the same time. Those are three different audio resource, the three different audio feeds. Yes, I know The thing is kind of technical, but let me try to try and explain small.

You have three different audio feeds all feeding audio the same time into the same into the same input source. So those 3 audio will be bouncing across themselves. That is all be leading to the echo and leading to the sound. So for those of you who are Christians and, and you know, you're in church and you're doing Thanksgiving and you know, the, you know, the choir is playing Bing, Bing, Bing, Bing, Bing, Bing, Bing, Bing, Bing.

And then maybe the pastor's microphone is on. And then the choir's microphone is on. The person who is making an announcement that microphone is on. And then another Walker in the church, the microphone is on before you know. So that's where that sound comes from. That's feedback. It's all those different audio inputs, everything bouncing across each other. So when it happens in church, you know, like we're used to it because you know, my Niger now.

So I used to it everybody who just off mic and then the singing will the singing will just continue. You know, is a genie magazine, magazine, magazine and we just off mic and then continue singing. But for the Zoom meeting when nothing happens, you know, not nice, not professional. So the more we finished the meeting now we did a debrief. That's also another good thing. Whenever you finish a meeting, all of you, you suppose debrief this meeting now that just finished, how do you think he went?

Do you think we did this well? Do you think we handled that part well? Oh boy, you fuck up like sorry, excuse me, you know, sorry for a bad language. This was be a clean podcast. Oh boy, that part you mess up, you suppose nothing like this. You suppose nothing like this, you know, So everybody, we do the debrief so that the next time we're having the meeting won't misbehave again. So that's why we're going in. You say, hey, Kilichi, remember that time, I beg, don't go and do that thing again.

Nancy, remember what happened the last time? Let's stay on point, Rita. Ruth, you know, we have to keep this thing tight today. So it was do a debrief. So we did the debrief and then we had the conversation. And that's one of the things we spoke about South in troubleshooting now. And I'll told them that. OK, Hey, Booker, it's like you're using your computer microphone. Abby, you guys say yes. OK, Normally how far computer microphone is a yes, Mama also computer microphone say yes.

And that's the problem. And I told them, OK, you know what, from now, henceforth, whenever we're having any meeting, all of you, you must headset up straight. Everybody go and get headset. It doesn't have to be expensive, even that cheap. You know the one that looks like iPhone headset, you know you can buy for like 3-5 if you don't have 35, those are Oramo headsets or Oriano. Those ones go for like 1/5. Just want to buy those ones.

Once you plug it in to your computer or to your phone, now the audio feed that will be coming in that microphone will be closer to your mouth. So it won't be causing all those feedback problems. So this is how we can have Zoom meetings, especially if you guys are in one location. Some of you will say how can all of you be in one location? It does happen. It does happen because lots of you might be doing work from home.

But let's face it, like in the legal industry, lots of people are still coming into the chambers. The chamber is the law office. People are still coming into chambers. So yes, we're all here. We're having the meeting, the client is in Germany or in whatever. But you know, if we're all here in the law office and we're all using our tablets, all using our computers, all using our phone, and then all of us, we're all using the device microphone,

we're not using headset before we knew it. And then the person is wondering, how can I be paying millions of naira to these people and they can't even put the put the act together. So all of you, please, all of you, like I said, Oriamo, that's like 1/5 or so or Rimo, whatever it is. Then the iPhone one, that's like 3-5 or so, Of course not the original iPhone 1. I mean, you know what I mean. You just want to buy these things in traffic, but you buy this thing, it solves the problem.

So I think I was part of enough general principles about how to organise your Zoom meeting that you guys can take some dressing from. But this this headphone one, this is 1. I really urge on all of you because there are lots of people who are trying to grow their business. You're trying to increase your sales and you know, you don't have a headset and you know, for for a very practical reason, if you don't make sense supposed to get your headsets or your earpiece, because part of growing your sales actually means that you're going to be on the phone a lot.

You're going to be on the phone a lot. You're going to be on the zooms a lot. You're going to be on the meetings a lot. So even if we're not worried about audio feedback and all these sorts of things, let's be honest then, if not for you to use, how often are you going to be holding your phone, you know, to your mouth or to your head or something? You know your shoulder will start to hurt. Your arm will start to hurt.

Right now you say my hand is not painting me. Of course your hand is not painting you because you've not gotten serious about growing your sales yet. Or you get serious and then you're starting. You're now making, you know, four or five calls every day. You start to feel it. At the end of the day, you know, you get home and you'll be like, ah, babe, this is my shoulder. This is my shoulder. You don't know what's happening.

You don't know what's happening. But The thing is that you know, you've been using your hand, holding the thing to your ear. From there, you enter the car and you now drive. If you're based in Lagos or Portal Court, that means you're now stuck in three hours of traffic. And then you come home and then you don't have water. Water board has finished. You now go to the well or to your neighbor's compound. You go have fresh water.

Like how would your shoulder hurt? So one, get your earpiece. All right, 1535 more expensive options named DI told you guys about the time when I went to what's the place called in Abuja and silver bird it's is it office office and beyond or something like that. I went there and I saw one headset. The thing looked like he had descended from the heavens looked like a headset for the gods. I said correct. This is the kind of headset I

want and I picked it. I was thinking that this will be like 20 K you know 30 Ki took it to the front. The girl scanned a program and then she said this is going to be are you going to pay by card or transfer? I said by card and then I gave it to her. Then she said OK, that'll be 350,000. I said what they say yes, 350,000. I said no, no, no, no, no please let's just give back to me. Sorry, sorry. And I went to go and put it back.

So yes, whether it's 15, you will find, 35 you will find if you're a bigger boy, 350K you will find you know, so there's headset for every single budget. So I think that's it. OK, ready, 15 minutes. No need to stretch this podcast any longer. So that's it. And that's all for today. Remember, if you'd love to connect, you can call, send me a text message or a WhatsApp message on 08064662140. And if you're ready for more realistic and relevant strategies for the Nigerian market, then you are in luck because in this very feed where you're listening to whether it's a podcast player or whether it's YouTube, in this very feed, we have over 1000 episodes.

Practical insights right here. So all you have to do when you're done with this episode is Scroll down, binge, continue to listen to the other episodes in the archive. So that's it and that's all. I'll see you soon.