Loading…
Auto-generated; may contain errors.
Loading transcript…
Hello and welcome to the show. I'm making today's recording at home, so expect to hear some interruptions in the background, whether from neighbors or from the kids because they're home and they're watching TV. So for today's episode, I'm going to go over, I'm going to recall the conversation that I had with effort or Sai Yogi. Sorry, I'm not pronouncing your name properly. In fact, I know I'm not pronouncing your name properly.
He's from been in state obviously with a surname like or Sai Yogi. My father-in-law is Isha. So you know, when I see them, them when I see those names, you know, I know. So yeah. He's a listener of the podcast on Spotify. He got in touch because he wanted us to discuss lead generation in his business. And he is a realtor, a real estate agent, or, you know, whatever it is that you guys call yourselves. Now, of course, if you've been listening to the podcast for any length of time, you know that when we say lead generation here, we just mean anything that you do to get people to raise their hand, to show that they might be interested in your product or your service.
Let me repeat that again. The most important function that we have in business is marketing, at least according to Professor Peter Drucker. Now, marketing is the business function that lets the whole world know that you exist, what you do while you're here, the problems that you solve, how you can help, you know, you get the picture. So that is marketing. Now, sales is a subset of marketing. So that's why I like to say marketing is our mother.
And for those of us who are sales professionals, you know, we are the children. So marketing is a mother, sales is the bikini, advertising is the bikini, and then, you know, on and on and on. So marketing is the mother. She has many children. So part of that art of getting people to know that we exist and trying to spark curiosity and spark conversations is lead generation. Now, lead generation is when we do something, whether physically, online or offline,
to get people to raise their hands to say, oh, I might be interested. The reason why lead generation is a good thing to do in your business is because if people raise their hand, and of course, you know that, OK, this might be a useful somebody to talk to, that this trans, this conversation might lead to some money at the end of the day, because we waste, we spend a lot of time and resources trying to spark off conversations with people.
And it's not every conversation that is going to yield a fruitful result. So of course, if you can't do something that'll make the people opt in, show themselves, raise their hand and say, look, I might be interested and that might be a fruitful conversation to have. So that is what lead generation is all about. Now, the oldest example that I've been given over here on my podcast is the fellow who went outside my son's school and was handing out Flyers.
Anybody who picked the flyer and who sends Adm or who sends a WhatsApp or who calls that person has given some indication that they are interested in either buying back to school shoe or bag or textbook or whatever all the stuff that the fellow was selling. So these, that is an example of some of the things that we do to spark conversations because we throw something out into the world or into the universe as people like to say nowadays.
And then somebody does something back and then he gives us a sign that OK, maybe this person is interested. Let me follow this guy, be yawning. Let me see what good to come out of it. Now, a lot of times when you hear lead generation, a lot of people are going to be talking about stuff exclusively online. But I'm here to let you guys know that even though it's mostly online, people who say lead generation, really lead generation can be done anyhow,
any which way, if you go to a business fair like I used to do back in the day when I was still a wedding photographer, we go to the bridal Expo. We have the register there, we have the sheets of paper there, and somebody comes and leaves their name. That is lead generation because the babe who drops her name and who drops her husband's name, that could be an indication that they might be interested in my product, my service, which was wedding photography.
Now, it doesn't mean that is a done deal, which is where qualification and discovery comes in. You know, as I'm talking with these people, I'm trying to figure out who they are, what they're about, what are their tastes, what are they trying to achieve. You know, the extra information that I get is what is going to help me to close the deal, especially if I do a good job of relationship nurturing. But anyhow, share whatever business you do, you need to be thinking about lead generation.
And so that's why effort or say Yogi broadcast listener got in touch and that was the conversation that we had. Now, unfortunately, I didn't take lots of notes. So lots of what I'm going to talk about now will be from memory as at the day of this recording, I think we've spoken maybe like that kind 3-4 days, maybe one week. So I'm just running this from memory now. The reason why I couldn't make lots of notes was because at some point in the conversation,
I tried helping him work on his copy. And whenever I'm having sessions with people and I'm making AI recommendations, I like to do the thing live and in the flesh. So as I'm on the phone, you're on the phone, you know, share video screen and then, you know, begin to type as in we prompt this thing out, we flesh this thing out so that you might, you can see yourself as everything is evolving, as everything is just taking shape.
So because there was a lot of looking at the prompts, changing the prompts, looking at the results, editing this, editing that, that's why I didn't make lots of notes because I was on the phone and I was on the keyboard and we were looking back and forth to see what it is that works. But I'll try and remember some of the stuff that we spoke about, even though today I'm not going to be able to share some of the some of the copy.
So well, I sent the copy to him on WhatsApp. But to be honest, if I want to copy and paste from WhatsApp and then print out the paper, it will just be extra work to for making the podcast. So bear with me. Anyway, whoever gets in touch and you have a similar problem will be a similar thought process anyway. So that is no problem. OK, Now, before I start with the conversation that we had shout outs, Yeah. So today I want to shout out Mike Emmy, who made comments on Spotify, who said that the podcast is insightful and he asked for my contact details in case he has any questions.
And I always give my contact details at the end of the show. I guess I should start putting it at the beginning for those people like Mike Emmy who don't listen to the end. Because Mike, if you had been listening, you would have gotten my phone number. But anyway, Sha, I gave it to him in the comment section on Spotify and I'm putting it here again for those of you who are like Mike Emmy who have questions or for those of you who are like Effort or star Yogi, as in you want to come and discuss something specific about your business.
So the number is 08064662140. Again, the phone number 0806466 2140, the country code is +234. That is my WhatsApp number. So send me a WhatsApp message and let's have a chat. Although only one person since I started the broadcast has been bold enough and that is her Margaret. She commented on Spotify as Margaret Spicy. So shout out to Margaret Spicy. And I gave her the phone number and surprisingly yesterday she called me and we had a lovely chat and then we now reschedule to have a proper phone call, you know, some other time 'cause you know, I was on the move.
And apart from that, I like getting some information from you guys, you know, before we have a proper session. Because you can't just be given advice, you know, just in general. It has to be particular and specific to the person's problems, to the person's contacts, context. So those are my contact details. Thank you very much, Mike Emmy for the comments on Spotify. Then also a shout out to Ukaji Cynthia, from your surname, I'm assuming you are one of us.
You know our own, you know, like Benmi people, you know, Benmi Nasawa Taraba. I'm assuming you're family. So she's my sister. I'm assuming. If you're not one of us, please let me know. It'll be nice to know where you're from because I haven't heard that surname Ukaji before, but it sounds almost like a tea surname almost then. OK. She also found a particular episode to be insightful, especially the one around business financing.
I think that was one way I spoke about business finance options for women, for female entrepreneurs. So shout out to you guys. Margaret Spicy, thanks for listening and commenting. And also thank you for calling the first person who was brave enough to just call directly instead of sending a message first. Then also shout out to Mike Emmy and then shout out to Kaji Cynthia. Then, of course, shout out to Effort OSA. Yo gay.
OK, then let's see. So now we're talking about lead generation. Oh, before I get into that, you know, I mentioned about how the kids were at home. So just interesting fact, my older son has discovered the Discovery Channel. I'll be National Geographic one of these things. So I just went out to tell them I look, I'm about to record the podcast. So I beg you guys, pipe low. Nobody should run into nobody should except if it's an emergency.
Just allow me, let me finish this recording and you believe what those boys are watching. There's an episode going on right now about snakes, about constrictors. So boy constrictors in Amazon and then African pythons, of course, in this part of the world. And man, those snakes are huge. I mean, when we're kids, they used to give us gist about, you know, to say the snake can swallow you, the snake can swallow you. And I've seen it live myself.
I just watched an African Python swallow a deer as in a popped out of the river. You know how they show everything in National Geographic? You know that. So that's why my wife says they should stop watching National Geographic. She says it's demonic. Now, are you going to be watching a lion killing something or you know, so any that's our own point of view. But for me, I think it's just good healthy knowledge about the world.
So if you're curious, yeah, watch some of these channels, history channels, National Geographic. If you have kids, I really think it's OK to allow children to watch these sorts of things. It's just the the facts of life, especially if your children are, I mean, like once they're past, I don't know, like 5 or 6 years old, like, so they see a lion killing something. What's the big deal? So, yeah, I just saw a snake eat a whole deer and of course, you know that deers are bigger than ram.
So the thing came out from the water, He grabbed the thing, he squeezed. You know, like when you're washing cloth, how you squeeze the cloth to remove the water. It squeezed the thing and started swallowing from the head, including the horns and swallowed the whole thing and man, now something else. So yeah, that's it. I just said, let me share that just to you people that well, nothing is real. So if you grew up in Nigeria at a time when people still used to tell children those things because they used to give us all those, just like, where did you go?
Oh, I was playing at the back of the house. No, next time don't enter the Bush. You enter the Bush. Python will swallow you. This da da, da, da, da da. So I'm just letting you know if your parents told you those sorts of things when you were little, they were not lying. It's real. This thing exists. All right now. Lead generation effort or SAG Yogi then? OK, so of course I have to look at stuff that he was doing already to generate leads.
Now, the reason why even if you reach out to me, I'm going to ask, So what have you been working? What have you been doing so far is because traditionally when it comes to sales and business development, before we start coming up with any kind of fancy strategy, we have to sit down and look at what you've been doing and figure out what is working. Because except if you're an absolute dance or maybe your people in your father's village really hate you and they're praying against your progress.
Definitely you would have tried like 5 or 6 things and one or two of them are working. And of course there's nobody who's an absolute Dons. And I've told you people that the people who in your father's village that God is in control of anything. So you know God punish devil. They can try to throw out your progress all you want, but as long as they have a clean mind, you trust in God, you're trying to do your own business clean,
everything will be fine. So we try and figure out what it is that you have been doing so that when we see the one that works with my knowledge about selling principles and selling frameworks, I'll teach you how to optimise that process. And then we will now double down on the one that is already working. It is only when we have maxed out what it work, what is working, then we can now start doing creative strategy. There are too many of you who want to grow your businesses who are looking for some ground breaking strategic something something something like there's no need for any ground breaking magic as a matter of what has been working now or is it Flyers that has been working And last month I did 1000 Flyers.
The goal for this month will now be 1500 Flyers or 2500 Flyers. That's how it works. Is it Instagram ads that I ran last week and it is working and my budget for last week was only 7 K OK, maybe this week I'll make my budget, you know, 8K200. So that's how you do it. Then, as also explained to Effort and a couple of other people, I'm explaining now that when it comes to sales and business development, when it comes to growth, growing your profits, you're going to face 3
challenges roughly. In the first stage, all your challenges can be overcome by Effort. Let me repeat, If you've been listening to this podcast for a while, you already know it. But please allow me to repeat the host bill for people who are discovering the show for the first time. In the early days, all your problems can be solved by effort. Effort just means, am I doing the right thing? And let me do more of that. Finding the right thing to do and doing more of it will solve a lot of your problems in the early days.
Now, after you have figured out the right things to do and you're doing enough of it, the next set of business challenges, excuse me, will be overcome by scale. What scale means is I have found what works and I am doing it. But the problem is I am a one man show. How can I stop myself from being a one man or a one woman show? How can I start multiplying the effects of my labour? Whether I'm going to use technology to multiply the effects of my labour or whether I'm going to hire other people to sell on my behalf to multiply the effects of my labour.
That is what scale is about. I figured out what works. But I'm I'm a one man team. I'm a one woman squad. How do I go beyond one woman squad that stage 2? After you've gone beyond one man squad, one woman squad, the next set of challenges you will have to overcome will be problems of strategy. It is then you can now start thinking, do I enter a new market? Do I open a new product line? Do I do a strategic alliance with this person?
Do I buy another person's business? Do I, you know, all that fancy stuff? Unfortunately, lots of people in the beginning, they start with strategy. No, the time for strategy is not the beginning. In the beginning we're just trying to figure out is this a good business idea, is this thing profitable and do I know how to sell the damn thing when I figure that out, Effort, more effort, more effort, more effort because we are human and we are limited in capability.
Eventually you have to have made that look as a one woman squad, I have gone as far as I can go. So now the issue of leverage will now come up. How can I use technology or how can I use other people to now scale out the selling. It is after that that we can now start thinking strategic. So that's the proper order. So for effort or Siyogi or for people who are in a similar situation who reach out, the number one thing is going to be OK, what are you doing?
What has been working? How are we going to optimize this thing and then do more of it? Now what he has been doing for Lead Generation was sponsored ads, sponsored ads on Facebook, sponsored ads on Instagram. Now for those of you who are absolutely new to the business thing, this is the way it works. You put up content on Facebook or Instagram or wherever. When we say content, we mean words, posts, photos, video, audio, anything they put out on the Internet.
And then sponsored ad just means you give Zuckerberg some money and you say well Zuckerberg take this thing and show it to 5000 other people or 10,000 other people who might be interested in ABC and XYZ. So that's what you're doing essentially. So he was running sponsored ads then he was also sending direct messages occasionally to people and he was trying to, he came up with a plan for hitting 30 people roughly three times weekly.
By the way, this is beautiful, not the strategy in itself, but the fact that he has a plan and that he's executing. And when you keep your plan concrete is easy to motivate yourself and not burn out. If you decide that you're going to be D Ming people, but you don't have a plan. And then you sit down Monday, you're just D Ming, D Ming, D Ming. You my DM maybe 200 people today and then tomorrow you're tired. And then you maybe you DM only 5.
And then you know, Wednesday you say, I beg, it's not only me that killed Jesus Christ. And then you stop. You want to rest for one day. Before you know it, you've rested for the whole week. And really that week you only did maybe like 1 1/2 days of work. So it's a lot. It's, it's better. And it's much more feasible to say, you know what, I'm only going to DM 30 people this week and I'm going to DM them three times. Can you say that 30 is workable?
30 Let's say you only work Monday to Friday. 30 / 5 that is Abby. 6 I think that should be 6. Please if I am wrong take it up with my math teacher. That means she didn't teach me well. So to say a word to be hit up 30 people three times a week, that means 6 contacts. You're only going to do 6 contacts every day. Can you see how the thing makes sense? It's not stress. You can wake up. Look at your list of six people. Do your list and then mentally you're free.
Like I've done today's whatever. I know doing 6 seems small, but The thing is 30 people every week, 4 weeks in a month, that is 120 people. So you can see how you just take an approach to work where you're going to take things small, small, small and break things down. You can see how you can be taking it easy, easy easy easy easy every day but at the end of the month cumulatively you have done plenty because I can assure you your competition is not reaching out to 120 people a month.
I can assure you average person is lazy or doesn't come up with a plan. Like I said the average person means well so they won. They will go hard, message like 80 people and then get tired, like I said, and before you know it, maybe something happens. Then there's public holiday and you know all kinds of things. And before you know it, you see that maybe the person only did two or three days of D Ming in the whole month.
So the first day he did 80, he felt like he did something. And then, you know, you just did overtime. You're not really doing much. But the person who says I'm going to be doing 66666 every day, that's 120 a month in a year. How many is that? I don't know. Is that 1000? 200 and I'll be 1400 and something. And those of you who are good at math, you do the number and let me know. So it's beautiful when people take this approach. 30 people every week, three times weekly.
That means I'm only hitting up five people every day. Then let's see what else. And then his strategy for DME people was to look at the handles and content around certain kinds of people and places that are luxurious because he's looking for clients that are luxurious. So he was hanging around content from Airpiece. I mean, that was interesting. I haven't heard this before. And that is the benefit of working with you guys because it's a two way thing.
I'm teaching you guys what I know. You guys are also teaching me what you know. They also teach me what works in the field because to be honest, I never would have thought of this by myself, that I can go to the LinkedIn handle of Airpiece and pay attention there and see who's commenting. And then from there be DM ING people to see if I can get business. Let's see. So airpiece hotels, you know, clubs, clubs in Benin effort.
Well, of course, you know, Osayogi. So of course he's based in Benin then. OK, well, he's a Benin boy, but he actually is based in Benin. Not not to say that Benin boys won't leave Benin, but anyway, you get the point. So where was I now? And so that was the that was the strategy. Some of the things that I've tried in the past and then the substance of his message whenever he reached out to people basically was, oh, good day, he introduced himself, This is what I do.
Are you interested now? If you've been listening to the podcast for the length of time, you already know that this is not the right way to do things because nobody gives an F about you. Nobody cares who you are. Nobody cares what the company is. That is the reason why I say, look, if you're going to do this whole direct messaging strategy, you're better off starting with your unique value proposition or a problem statement.
So I'm a realtor who specializes in that kind of property. Is this the sort of thing you're interested in? You know, straight to the point. Some people will say yes, some people will say no. Oh, sorry guys. You remember the time I spoke about Bush burning in Abuja and how it's a problem. You will not believe what some idiot has actually set fire outside the apartments. They're doing Bush burning right now. Let me have a look and see that it is controlled.
Well, it looks like it's a controlled fire. But anyway, now, so we see him in Abuja, some of us carry our village habits and then we bring it to the city. So yeah, that's it. Bush burning going on right now. I heard what was I now forgive me. That was a distraction. And so you better starting, starting off with a problem statement or your unique value proposition and then see if the person is interested. Go straight to the point because most people are not reading this whole thing of who you are, what you do while you're special,
while you're unique. No, no, no, no, no. That's that's too. You're wasting too much time, especially since I've been saying it time and time again. Nowadays, people are scheming, they're not reading. So if you start off with hello, this is me, I'm the best, brightest whatever in Abuja and we specialize in this dot dot dot dot and this dot dot. I mean, most people just, if they open the message at all, most people just close and move on to something else or hit block or spam, then I'm not going to go into that because I've already done lots of episodes about that.
Then OK. He was also doing organic posts and he's posting once daily on social media and then for him the social media is a Facebook and then LinkedIn groups, posting in groups. Now this is also something that is beautiful. Now I'm not saying the strategy in itself, but this whole thing of planning your work, truncating your work, giving a cadence, you can say it makes your life easy. So he wakes up every day and he knows that I am going to DM5
people today. After he DM 5 people, he also knows that I'm going to create one post today. When I create that one post, I'm going to share it on on the Facebook group. When I'm done, I'll share that same post in the LinkedIn group. You can see how you can organize and plan your day and give yourself space to breathe. One post a day. So you might say it's not much, but think about it. One post a day. If you're working Monday through Friday, that means you have done 5 posts in a week. 5 posts in a week means that you have reached out to Sorry, you have put out 20 posts a month if I'm correct.
Now think about it. And This is why I say that even if except if you're an absolute Dons or except if people from your father's village really mean you, like they want to finish you on your lineage. Can you see how if you're contacting 120 people every single month in DMS and then putting out 20 posts every single month on social media, can you see that like the devil really has to be against you for something not to work really.
If anyway, let me know if I'm stressing. But basically, if you take the right approach, you're giving yourself a cadence, you're giving yourself some realistic targets and goals. Because this thing, what we're looking at here is very realistic. 5 DMS in a day is not that's, that's realistic. Worst case scenario, two hours is enough for you to do 5 DMS every single day. Then content production. OK, let's say you're slowing content production.
Maybe another two hours, you see? But you know, 4 hours you can be done. And then you can go off and do some other things, you know, play PS with your boys or something, or go and hang out with your girlfriend. So where was I then? He also was going to go and meet people and I think that was bold. And I like that because too many people like to hide behind a keyboard. So when I meet people who are brave enough to go and talk to strangers, I really applaud them.
I see. Look, this is a secret. For those of you who are afraid of talking to strangers, let me let you know something. I have not heard of anyone in Nigeria or abroad who has died or who has been killed or who has been arrested or who has been shot because he spoke to a stranger. For business purposes, if you're trying to go and toast a babe and you know your game is weak or you're a creepy fellow and that's a different thing, you might end up being arrested or something.
But for business purposes, I have not heard of a single person who has ended up in jail or who has ended up being beaten because everybody knows that you're just looking for a daily bread, so nobody will beef you even if you're an interruption. So it's perfectly fine to talk to strangers for business purposes, an effort or say Yogi has not been harassed or thrown into jail. Even though he walks up to people in restaurants, public places, and he starts talking about his business as a realtor and how he can help people.
He has never gotten into trouble. I have never gotten into trouble. I have never heard of anyone who has gotten into trouble. So it might be scary, but don't worry, that is part of the reason why I have this podcast and I talk about things like this. And if you notice, I skew more towards the real life interaction thing. I'm not necessarily the online online thing because to be honest, you know, every single whatever you want to call them guru or business consultant or whatever, in Nigeria,
everybody's talking online, online, online. So they're not too many of us are talking about what to do offline. So let's see. OK, so now the question now was, OK, effort, you said you're doing all these things now, which one has been giving you the best results? And then he said, oh, that's simple, sponsored ads now because sponsored ads have been working for him. I am not telling you that sponsored ads is the best business strategy.
Sometimes it's a matter of who you are, your skill sets, your interest base, what you're working hard at, things like that. So for him, in his own context, sponsored ads is what has been bringing in the naira and Kobo. It may be possible that for someone else, it might be the DMS that is bringing in the naira and Kobo and therefore another person. It's impossible that it is a talking to total strangers that is bringing the naira and the Kobo.
So please do not leave this episode thinking that I'm saying everybody must run sponsored ads. That is not what I'm saying. I'm just saying go out and try a bunch of stuff. Let's figure out what's working and how we can optimize it. So sponsored ads is what has been working for him. Now we have to now go into this conversation like look, oh boy, sponsored ads, very, very good. But let me have a look at the copy of your sponsored ads.
This whole thing or focusing on your company, you, you, you, you, your company, you, your company is, is not the best way. So it has been working the way you're doing it, but now we need to tweak it and optimize it. We need to make it about the other people. All the outreach has to be about the other people. But then we now went into the copy of the advert, the advertisement and the advertisement. I liked it. It was OK.
OK, initially it started off with how did it go again? Like, do you know that 9 out of 10 people become billionaires through real estate? Something, something, something, you know, you went straight in. And for that I have to applaud him. It's fantastic because he's coming out with a strong hook, stating the nature of the problem and showing what it is that he's going to solve. Although for me, honestly working because First off, I
think you should reflect his value proposition. And also because that kind of grammar of, you know, do you know that 9 out of 10 millionaires something, something you're attracting a particular kind of person. And maybe we should try and broaden the appeal also, because when you attract these kind of boys and girls who are coming in quick, quick, because I want quick wins. You know, it's easy to get frustrated customers from that kind of people.
Because if you come up with this kind of language in that 9 out of 10 people become millionaires to real estate, then they do deals with you two or three deals. And then after like one year, they're not yet the millionaire. You know, it's the kind of thing that they'll say this guy, he doesn't know what he's doing, blah, blah, blah. You know, my badmouth you because they didn't get those kind of results. So I also think that sometimes when we're trying to attract business, we should attract business with more realistic expectations.
You know, which is why I never say that you people should call me and your life would never be the same and I will turn next your business. I will never give that kind of talk. The best I can say is, look, let's have a conversation. I can share with you a couple of perspectives about what's working, what's not working. When we figure out what is working, I can show you how to optimize it. And if we apply these things consistently for the next 4-5,
six months, you should be able to see some results like, you know, 30% more business or something like that, you know, keep it realistic. So what was I sorry, I'm running this one from from memory. So it's I get off on a tangent. And so yeah, so I said, now let's tweak his copy around the unique value proposition, around the problem statement. So I asked him, effort, what is your UVP? By the way, if this is your first time listening to the show, UVP means unique value proposition, unique value proposition, it means many things, but the definition, the way I like to define it is UV.
PS What did your customers tell you about why they're doing business with you? That is the best way to inform your market, your market messaging, because if you have 25 customers and 18 of them said, OK, let's say you're, you're a cake Baker and 18 of them said, we love your creamy butter. Sorry, what is it called again? Butter. Is it butter font? I'll be butter something butter icing and I can't remember. I've been out of the event space for a while.
So if you have 25 customers in 2024 and 18 of the 25 said we love you because of your creamy butter something, something, something, then you have to be an idiot to not know that what you reflect in your messaging should be that you know you have the creamiest, butteriest something, something, something basha. You should be using the words that your customers have given you. The rationale behind this is if 18 out of 25 of your customers have said this, the chances are that there are other people who are thinking in those terms as well.
So putting out your marketing and advertising copy in those terms will relate to other people who are like them. And this is the beginning of how we start attracting certain kinds of people that will be easy and profitable to do business with. So we should always be having conversations with our customers. Because when I asked him about his UVP, he started talking about Trustworthy. I wrote Trustworthy Downshot and he mentioned a couple of things,
but I said no, no, no, no, no. So yeah, I thought, look, this this is what I mean. The people that have done business with you, what did they tell you? Not what you think. And this is something I can speak about first hand because when I started off in business, I assumed as a wedding photographer that people don't like Photoshop. They want to see that natural face. And I assumed that that was my unique value proposition.
And in my marketing, I kept on talking about that, about how I keep things candid. And then no Photoshop when I started asking my brides, not that I have multiple wives. I mean in the wedding space when you, your client, you, you call her, you know, my bride or my groom. That's just where we talk in Abuja, at least back then in the wedding space, I don't know about now. So then somebody would say, oh, I had 20 brides this year.
It's not that the guy married 20 babes. Is that the guy? Wait, let's say you are MC, for instance. He means he emceed the weddings for 20 babes that year. So when I anytime I say my bride or my brides, that's that's what I mean. I don't have multiple wives. I only have one wife. God willing, I will only have one wife and I don't know if my father-in-law is listening. So let me let me behave myself on this podcast. All right, I was like.
So when I started asking my brides now about why they do business with me, the answer surprised me. People are talking about my professionalism. People are talking about me being on time. People spoke about me being courteous. People spoke about me being trustworthy. A few brides said I was the only vendor that they never had to worry about. People spoke about all kinds of things except my photography. And to be honest, as an artist,
nothing broke my heart because I wanted people to say your photos are wonderful, your photos are amazing, Your photos are this, your photos are that. Your photos are, you know, on and on and on and on and on. And oh, they're candid and they're beautiful. That no Photoshop. But, you know, people was talking about other things, else other things. And that is part of the reason why I am where I am today. I've given up the wedding stuff.
If corporate organisations call me, yeah, I'll handle it because when it comes to corporate organizations, I can talk in those terms. And they appreciate those terms of being timely, on point, timelines, being professional, you know, they get all of that, especially in the documentary space. You know, people like the fact that you're dealing with somebody and the person says, OK, you know what if you transfer by so, so and so date,
we'll be in the field by this and this date. And if we do that, I can assure you that your documentary will be delivered by December 27th. So people appreciate that kind of stuff, especially in Nigeria where nobody can give you a timeline on anything. So I assume that my unique value proposition was one thing. When I started talking to my brides, to my customers, I realized that people are doing business with me for a whole host of reasons that has absolutely nothing to do with my photography.
Of course, if my photos were useless, don't be doing business with me. But just to show that sometimes what you think is the unique value proposition is not exactly what you think it is. Like I know of a cake person who kept on talking about how sweet her cakes were because she baked the cake for my own wedding. Well, actually the reason why we did business with her, my wife and a couple of other people that referred to later on was because she was a master at sugar craft.
She's the kind of person that will make a cake for you. I'm sorry, one moment, looks like the call is coming in. Sorry. Hold on one more, let me attend to this and I'll get back real quick. OK, So sorry about that. I just had to attend to that real quick. And don't worry, eventually I'm going to set up a proper recording space, you know, so I don't have to record out of my phone anymore and have all these interruptions.
So, OK, bottom line, what I was trying to say was talk to your customers, know what your unique value proposition is, What is the reason why people are doing business with you. When you figure that out, take those exact words as much as possible and see how you can make that a part of your marketing and a part of your messaging. It is going to appeal to those kinds of people who are already thinking in those terms. So that's the scope.
So he now said that, well, from talking to customers, they like the fact that he has flexible payments and everybody is happy with his locations. And I said fantastic, that is what we need to be putting there. Now the trustworthy thing, he said it himself, but Shah, I left trustworthy. So I said, now we have to reflect trustworthy. We have to reflect flexible payments and we have to reflect good locations. I put down one aside because what we're going to do was to use Google Gemini or char GBT to come up with good marketing copy.
Now the best way to get results from these tools is to give detailed prompts. You have to say something about you, You have to say something about the problem or the context. You have to say your goals, and then you now give you the instruction. So am I having conversations with effort or say Yogi, I'm trying to tease out the key terms that we're going to use and feed it into Gemini or char GBT or copilot or whatever you're using to now give us a decent copy that we can start with.
Of course, you will always take the text, always take the copy that these tools give you and you will tweak it. You will use your own words, you use your own verbiage. Because if you're a Yoruba realtor in Ibadan, you know, that kind of copy, like how do I put it? If you're a Yoruba realtor in Ibadan and then you're a Benny boy in Benin, like my guess is, you know, maybe your copy doesn't necessarily have to flow the same way.
I don't know. But anyway, while different people all have different styles, we sound different ways. So we take whatever it is that these things say and then we now tweak it and make it sound more like us. So trustworthy, flexible payments, good location. That is going to be part of the unique value proposition that should be reflected in this copy. Then we also had to break down the amount of opinion. People do real estate because they either want to do home ownership or investment.
So remember the first part of the copy where he said, do you know that 9 out of 10 people become millionaires through real estate? Something, something, something. By writing that kind of thing, you're only focusing on people who are buying real estate for investment purposes. And you're missing out of people who are going to buy real estate for home ownership. People who are tired of being tenants, they want to become landlord.
Now, it's also a good market. And he admitted that yes, he has some of those clients, but writing 9 out of 10 people become millionaires to real estate might be leaving out those people. So the next set now was Occupy gotten value proposition down, trustworthy, flexible payments, good location. Then we're looking for people who are interested in home ownership or investments. So using that now from here on, I can't remember because it was the whole process of taking things step by step.
We now did this thing live. I typed out a prompt. I send it to him. Have a look at it. You know, we ran it. This is what he generated. This is what we're going to change. And then we now did some copy and paste because the calls to action that were on ChatGPT were not as good as his own. I can't remember what his own call to action was. I can't remember. Call to action is the next step that you want somebody to take. But yes, hands down, his own call to action was the best.
So as a matter of cut and paste, we cut and paste option one from CHA GBT, we cop and paste his own call to action. We slammed it together. Bam, one prompt. As I sent it to him, he looked at it. His response was wow, the reason why I have OK we should be using these tools is because of the time that it saves us. This was a sharp, short conversation between two guys, total strangers, some quick brainstorming in 20 minutes and he got copy that he looked at and he said wow.
Now in his own time he would take that copy and tweak it how it is that he wants. But it is a good place to start. Oh, sorry, one moment I have to take this call and I'll be back. OK, sorry about that. It actually is the mechanic. Yes, it's my car again. You know, this time is the I'll send some noise. And I thought was something to do with the fan belt because I had that replaced and then by turns out now, which the also I
think called the compressor. Yeah, the mechanism in the compressor is acting up. So yeah, that's what we're sorting right now. So can you see the reason why you all should be praying for your boy that I'll buy a brand new car next year? I want to be driving SLK next year. I can't be doing this second hand car thing again. Also beg I'm tired, where was I? So these are the benefits of using artificial intelligence. Quick, quick, quick, quick,
quick, quick, quick ideation, quick ideas and useful ideas that we can work with. But Please remember, the reason why I'm recommending these tools, char, GBT, Gemini and all whatnot, is not because I'm saying we should be lazy and I'm asking them to do the thinking for us. You know, the thinking has to come from you, the strategy has to come from you, the idea has to come from you, the direction has to come from you. Just think of it like back in the good old days, my first, I
started off in law. So back in those days, you go and you work in a chamber with your organ, your principal, the senior lawyer. You can go and attend a meeting with the client and people are listening to what it is that the client says. You, the junior, you're the one. I'll be writing down the notes now. OK, This is what Mrs. Ogden said and Mr. Combi said this and Mallam Roof, I said that you don't want to write everything.
When you now go to the office, you will now take all those your notes. You will now prepare a proper report and then give it to your guy. Your guy will look at it and say OK, oh, Travis Schumer, you did well, but change this one to this, change this one to this, change this one to this. Rewrite it like this. Go and do it for me and then come back. I'll now come back and give my OK, my guy will look at it and say OK, very good.
And then he will now sign the letter, sign it, and then will now send the letter out or send the document out or send the contract out. As far as the client is concerned, this document has come from, OK, let's say the law firm is Malcolm Gladwell Associates. By the way, that firm doesn't exist. Malcolm Gladwell is he's an author. And I'm doing, I'm getting ready to do a book review for you guys. Already done 11 on that.
So let's say it's Malcolm Gladwell Associates. As far as the client knows, this thing that has this document they received, this contract, they received it came from Malcolm Gladwell Associates. They are not really concerned whether the senior lawyer Malcolm Gladwell is the one that wrote it by himself. Those of us who are on the inside, we now we know that it is the junior lawyer Tavi Schumer who prepared it. So when we're talking about using AI, it's exactly the same thing.
The AI tools that we have can be there in your Google meeting or let's say, OK, let's say one of you calls in and we agree to have this thing over Google Meet. We can have this meeting over Google Meet. And then I have an AI tool in the background transcribing everything that we say that keeps the minutes of the meeting. The most important thing is at the end of the day, I'll look at the minutes of the meeting and I'll delete the parts that are inaccurate and you know, tidy everything up, shorten it here or maybe explain something better.
The most important thing for the end client is the summary that I submitted. Did it adequately reflect what happened at the meeting or not? The outcomes we agreed to, are they there or not? So please, let's not worry too much about how to use these things in our business. We should be using them in our business, other tools because they make life easier. And don't overthink it. It's the same as when things were done old school.
It's just that in the old school day, I will become an auger in the office and now designated to a secretary or designated to a junior lawyer. Now you don't have money to have a junior copywriter in your office or something. You can use ChatGPT to do that junior work for you, for Gemini, for you. Anyway, that's subject for another episode. But OK. So what is the point of today's episode now? OK, the point of today's episode or my interaction with them Effort or Sergey is this go and do a bunch of things.
Try and figure out what works. The thing that works, try and optimize it. That's why you should be spending most of your time. So if the money is coming in from sponsored ads, perhaps you should be spending more time doing sponsored ads and spending less time D Ming or less time talking to strangers. But it is all context dependent. It depends on you. If you have been making much more money talking to strangers, not sending sponsored ads, then my own approach would be, you know what sponsored ads DM less free, less free it talking to strangers.
That's the one that works. Good. Let's now sit down, come up with a framework, come up with a game plan. How are we going to find the right people to talk to when we talk to them? How are we going to be able to figure out what their needs are? How are we going to be able to figure out if we have the skill set or the inventory to fulfil those needs to match those needs? Then how are we going to be able to make an effective proposal or presentation?
How are we going to do relationship building? How are we going to do relationship nurturing? How are we going to get them to take the next step? How are we going to get them to close? When we close the deal and we deliver, how are we going to figure out who is happy? For the ones that we figured out that they're happy, how are we going to be able to get them to buy again or to be fair, new business to us? For the ones that are unhappy,
what game plan are we going to come up with to resolve the problem so that when we resolve it satisfactory and they're happy, we also get them to come back and buy from us or to bring friends, family members and associates. So if talking to strangers is what has been working over sponsored As for you, then when we talk, that'll be the game plan. OK, Talking to people now, how are we going to figure out all these whole things?
So that's just it. But especially effort to say, I'll say you again, I didn't tell you this, but I'm saying it now and all the other people to hear the way that you've been trying to break things into small, small chunks absolutely works. And that is standard practice when it comes to sales. If it is phone calls, you decide, OK, I'm going to be calling 10 people every day, five people every day, 100 people every day. I mean, it depends on you and what you can handle.
But you have just come up with this small, small, small list. This is what I'm going to be doing. Monday I'll do it. Tuesday I'll do it. Wednesday, I'll do it Thursday, Friday, I'll do it. The result is that you might not see progress on Monday, on a Friday or Wednesday, but overtime, cumulatively, every single thing will yield returns. And don't worry, just keep doing what it is that you're doing. You'll be fine. The thing is, you're doing lots of stuff.
Most people but are not taking time to reflect. So keep sending out the 30 WhatsApp messages. Sorry, I'll be keep reaching out to five people every day. At the end of the month, that would have been 120 people. You now sit down and say, OK, how did this work, How did this work, How did this work? That gives you a fair idea of where to look next. So that's it for today. Thank you very much for your time and attention. Again, thanks to our efforts for reaching out to Margaret,
Margaret Spicy for reaching out, Mike, Emmy, and Ukaji. Cynthia, again, if you missed it, if you'd like to reach out to me because you have questions or you'd like to book a session with me, the number to call is 08064662140. Again, call WhatsApp or SMS 08064662140. Thank you very much for your time and attention. You can also follow me on LinkedIn, so I'll catch you guys in the next episode.