Is Your 'Follow Up' Killing Your Profit?

Today on the podcast, we're going to look at when to stop following up with a contact, when to stop chasing a potential customer, when to stop chasing a potential client. So I repeat what we're going to be looking at today. You're talking to someone, You hope the person might become a customer. You're hoping the person might transfer you some money. You're hoping the person will transfer a deposit. You are hoping that this miracle money will come in so that you can buy fuel or so that you can buy Internet or so that you can flex because things have been rough.

But then sometimes it's as if, man, this thing is not going anywhere. So when should we stop? Those are the sorts of things that we're going to look at today. I'm making today's recording at home. So there will be noise in the background. And then of course, you know, today's a Tuesday. The house always gets clean on Tuesday. So the lady is going to be here soon and start. So you start hearing noise in the background.

So that's what all the noises. Now, this podcast is not about my personal life and it's not about my sanitation habits. Here we try to solve business problems, especially in ways that relate to the Nigerian market. If you're interested in all these sorts of things, then you are in the right place. Welcome to the podcast. I'm your host Tavi Shima IED and for the last 5-6 years, this is all I've done. I bring you guys practical,

realistic, relevant insights, tips, tricks, strategies, things that work in the Nigerian market. And of course, just like in Nigeria or in any part of the world, we have this question that we face every week or more. Does this have legs? Should I continue? Should I stop, should I pursue and overtake or should I just give up? So if you're ready to continue learning about stuff like this, then stay tuned in. Stay locked in to the podcast,

subscribe on Spotify, YouTube, Apple, or any player of your choice. And if you would love to connect with me, call, send me a text message or WhatsApp message on 08064662140. And yes, by the way, that is my real number for those of you who are curious. I may not respond immediately. It might take 3 or 4 days, but I'll get to you eventually. All right. Also, one moment, I think cleaning lady is here. OK, I'm back. Sorry about that.

It's a good thing I told you guys ahead of time because, yeah, actually was the cleaning lady. She showed up late, you know, because, you know, personal difficulties. And anyway, and that's what Najabi, we all have personal difficulties. May God help us all. So where was I? Yeah. Yeah. So when to stop following up with the contact Now, this is the reason why. Oh, by the way, I suppose I made this podcast episode a while ago, so I'm just looking at some of my old notes.

So you know, I'm just saying I should have done this a while ago. So I'm running some things from memory here, but this is the background We are in the context of solar sales. So the person that I've I was talking to the client of mine or rather the employee of my client than the solar business. And so this particular guy now let's call him Randy. Let's call the salesperson Randy. So this particular guy now Randy, by the way, he's not a Randy fellow.

So Randy now was chasing one contact. Let's call the guy Mr. Oh. So Randy had been chasing Mr. Oh, and the conversation seemed to be flowing smooth. But then he reached one point and then Mr. Oh begin the ghost guy know the pic call guy will respond to message if I forget e-mail calls from beginning. The guy was never responding to e-mail. Maybe once in a while Mr. OP call and say oh Randy, how now I beg no vex. You know how they rode, You know I had to go shobo.

I'm coming and I will land Lagos around that kind like 5:00 PM. Randy, you know what, let's let's talk tomorrow, 10 AM, 10 AM. We'll see how we'll go forward. 10 AM 10 AM Call me. 10 AM. And that's how they got the call. Then 10 AM tomorrow. Now Randy will call Popo, Mr. O will not be call. Mr. O will not respond to message. And then the game starts again for another two weeks of ghosting. So that's the game that they have been playing back and forth, back and forth.

And I know there's somebody listening to this podcast right now, right now. I know there's somebody listening who is going through this rubbish right now. It's normal. That's the first thing I want you to know. It's normal. It's not you. It's not as if the guys taking you for granted, you know, it's not as if you're an idiot. It's not as if, you know, it's just this whole game of phone tag, ghosting, e-mail, catch up and let's follow up.

It's normal. It's not the best and there are things that we can do to prevent it, but it happens to everybody. It happens to everybody, so don't feel bad. It is just one of those things. It is the nature of the trade. It is the nature of business. This is not the kind of thing that is supposed to depress you. This is not the kind of thing that is supposed to get you down. It is just one of those things, we learn how to deal with it, we learn how to prevent it, we learn how to anticipate it, but it's just a daily part of the job.

It should not bring you down. All right, So all the Mr. OS or Madame O or whoever that we come across, this is not the kind of thing to bring you down. So Randy and Mr. O, this is how the conversation started. Initially, the proposal that Randy had given Mr. O was 13 million. Then the quarrel back and forth, you know, you haggle, haggle, haggle, the price went down 12 million. And then they started negotiating again, back and forth, the price went down 10.9

million. By the way, you see, this is the reason why for me, I don't like selling based on discounts. I prefer to head straight, you know, to the heart of the matter. Are we in the same price range reasonably? If we're not, there's probably no reason to continue this conversation, to prevent stories that touch so I won't get emotionally invested and so that you you won't feel harassed. Is there a need that I can meet?

Do you think I'm the most professional alternative, the the most professional, the most viable option to solve your problem? Do you believe that? And do you trust me or not? If you don't, there's probably no need for us to continue this conversation. That's why I believe in tackling these things heads on, because this whole game of Randy and Mr. Oh, call me tomorrow, 10 AM. Call me Friday noon, Call me Wednesday, 5:00 PM.

You don't realize it, but if you go and check your records, you'll see that you've been playing this game with this person for like one month of back and forth. Meanwhile, you're not making progress, meanwhile you're feeling bad. Meanwhile you're taking up mental and emotional space that you have been using to chase other people who are ready to give you money. You go from 13 million to 12, from 12 to 10.9. What did you achieve?

Anyway, if you've been listening to the broadcast for a while, you already know my feelings about discounting. So let me stop there. Let me not go another 10 minute rant. So, well, let's just define some terms first of all, so that you understand some of the things that we're trying to tease out in this podcast episode. Now, first of all, I use my word follow up. Those of you who've been listening to the podcast for a while, you know that I don't believe in the word follow up.

It's not just me. There's a whole host of professional sales trainer trainers who do not use the word follow up, who prefer to use the word follow through. In fact, we can distinguish between the words follow up and follow through. When you follow up with someone, you're stuck in this loop where you're chasing someone, but honestly, you're not even making any progress. Have you guys agreed to anything new? I'm not sure.

Is there a problem? We don't know. What is the next step? I have no idea what is slowing things down. I have no idea. When you're stuck in that loop, you're a Randy calling Mr. O over and over and over and over again. Yes, what you're doing is follow up because you're in an endless cycle. What you have achieved so far is called a continuation. Continuation is when communication is established or you are trying to establish communication but you're not making progress.

So it's a continuation is a cycle is a circle, round and round and round around ringa ringa Rosie, you know, but you're not making progress. That is what follow up is. So sales trainers you prefer to talk about follow through. Follow through is when you establish contact, you will agreed about something. You are clear about what the next step is, whether you are supposed to do something or the customer is supposed to do something.

But sure, the next step is very, very clear. When that happens and you call someone, what you're doing is following through because the whole point of the call is to say, oh boy, how far we agreed on ABC and XYZI have done XYZ and you know boss, how far would you how far we ABC? That is the point of following through. That is what the follow through is. So that's the reason why if you have been listening to YouTube videos, it's slight, but just pay attention.

You will see sales trainers. We don't say follow up, we say follow through. You call the customer to follow through on ABC. The only way you can follow through on 123 is if you guys agreed at the last call that this is what we're going to do next. Those are called advancements. So in our business, what we are streaming, I say streaming, streaming what we are, Abby, what we are trying to achieve, let me not use the word I don't know.

What we're trying to achieve is advancements. That is the ideal. If you're in a continuation, calling to call, to call and then to call and then to call again, that is not good. If you talk to a Mr. O and Mr. O says I'm on the road, I'm coming back from Mashoba. I'll be in Lagos around 5:00 PM. So call me tomorrow 10 AM and you say OK, Sir, you caught the call. You think Oh is good? Mr. Oh picked up the phone. No, it is not good.

You did not achieve an advancement. You do not agree on the next step. Sure, no problem. Mr. Oh, I will call you back tomorrow 10 AM. But also we stay on track. Is there anything in particular that you want us to talk about? Mr. Oh? He responds, whatever it is that he says, that is your advancement for tomorrow. If he decides to speak with his futures and say, you know what, this price that you gave me, to be honest, I'm not very comfortable with it.

And that's the reason why I've been shanking your call. You know, that kind of thing. You cannot ask that right now. OK, so so you know why, Nigel, now we can negotiate anything. So if you're opening, if you're open to negotiations, is that what you want us to talk about tomorrow at 10:00 AM? If it says yes, that's what I would like. It's OK, No problems. I'll call you back tomorrow. But you see, now you've asked some questions.

Excuse me, You've tried to tease what the issues are. You've tried to get an advancement tomorrow. He's more likely to pick up the call because we have agreed on an advancement. We're calling to go and tackle a particular issue because you've been able to tease out what the problem is. So we should always be looking for advancements. What are we going to talk about next? What is the next step? What is the next reasonable thing to do?

We should always be the ones taking the agenda as a salesperson, sorry, setting the agenda as a salesperson or as a business owner to determine what that next step is and then get buying from that person. OK. Do you think this is a reasonable thing? Do you think, would you be OK with us talking about that tomorrow, talking about this next week? This is one way that we avoid this game of follow up for the sake of follow up.

Call me today, call me next week. You didn't call me next last week. Friday. Now we said Friday, but you know what? I'm at a wedding right now. Call me on Wednesday, 12:00 PM. And then over and over and over again. And then six weeks later, no progress. Are you going forward? You don't know. Are you going forward backward? You don't know. I stay in the one spot you don't know. Are you on a high jump? You don't know. So let's get a follow up out of our vocabulary.

We will follow through on advancements. The only way to follow through on an advancement is if at the last meeting or at the last phone call, me and Mr. O agreed that this was the next step. Now, another thing that is at fault that causes all these follow up for the sake of follow up is we do not do good qualification and discovery. If this is your first time listening to the podcast, qualification and discovery is the part of the sales process or the part of the business relationship where we try and figure out who is this person,

what is their problem? Do they have a need? Is it a significant need? Does it look as if they're ready to take action anytime soon? Are we in agreement when it comes to money issues? You know all these sorts of things. If you do good qualification and discovery, everything is on the table. Everybody's being honest and there's really no reason for anybody to to, to, to ghost you anymore, especially if you establish good rapport.

We should be doing good qualification and discovery. Excuse me now, lots of you, lots of us Nigerian business owners, for some reason, we do not have a qualification and discovery process, Excuse me, we do not have a questionnaire a, a checklist or a questionnaire or whatever issues and questions that we run through when we talk to people. The client that I been talking about a lot recently, just because they their new sales team, so the people in the content production space.

So we're basically setting up all their systems fresh at some point. I assumed that, you know, they had some things locked down. So we agreed on the agenda for a meeting and I said, this is how we're going to start the meeting. I will introduce the meeting. We'll start on this and these issues and then I'll hand over to you people to continue the rest. The first meeting went OK, so there was no problem. The second meeting, by the time we were asking questions, I just realized that oh, oh, oh, oh,

oh, oh, these boys. Then the freestyle, I just assumed that they have a process that they were following. So after we caught the call, I told her, look boys, you know what? Back to the drawing board. We need to come up with a list of questions that we're going to be asking you applying the content production space. So there are some things that you have to be asking people. What kind of content do you produce? Who produced your content calendar?

Let's see what else? OK, We even had some financial questions there. How much do you pay your content team the goals that they have for their content production? I can't remember because, you know, I'm freestyling right now, but I think we came up with a list of about 10 questions or so that they should be asking their potential customers. We all need that. We all need a checklist or a script or a framework or whatever of issues that we should be asking people.

It would, it changes depending on the industry, but we all need it. So if you're an architect and you're designing the house for a person, I'm assuming some of those questions would be this house I want to build, is it official or residential? That would be one question. Another question perhaps will be location. Where is he going up? Is he going up in Abuja, in Port Harcourt or is he going up in Obama shop? Another set of questions I

believe an architect will ask is when can we go and see the site? I want to know if it is rocky ground or low me ground or swamp infested area. I'm assuming there will be some of the questions that the architect will ask, by the way, since I'm not in the building space in case I get any of these questions wrong. And I'm saying some things that engineers are supposed to say, you know, forgive me, but I'm just trying to show you that whatever business it is that you're involved in, you should have a checklist, you should have a framework, you should have a set list of questions that you're asking people.

If you are not doing good qualification and discovery, people fall into ghost mode. And the reason why people fall into ghost mode is because we're not clear what the next step is. Since you have not done good qualification and discovery, you cannot even propose what the next step should be. Since you have not done qualification and discovery, you do not know if there are any underlying problems or not that the person is afraid of talking about or refusing to talk about.

So we need a good qualification and discovery process. After you finish listening to this podcast, this is your first time. No problem. Take your ChatGPT or your Google Gemini and then this is your prompt. You will say I am a Nigerian XYZ, I'm a Nigerian capital, I'm a Nigerian engineer. I, I would love to work with clients who are blah, blah, blah. I want to serve clients in the so, so, so and so and so space. I just listened to a podcast where it spoke about qualification and discovery as a means of having fruitful conversations with potential customers or clients.

With this background, what are the kind of issues I should be discussing with potential customers or what are good qualification and discovery questions I should be asking my potential clients? They hit send. It will come up with a list of plenty things, maybe like 20 or 30. Some will make sense. Leave it. The ones that don't make sense, delete. If you start your next meeting going through those questions, believe you me, you will see that the difference is clear in the quality of conversations that you will have.

The problem is some of you, I don't know if it's pride or laziness, You feel like you're too old. You're not in primary school anymore. How can I have a sheet of paper in front of me with a list of questions that is supposed to guide the conversation? I'm old enough I should remember it don't work that way. Over time, with practice, the questions will be internalized and you won't need that sheet of paper anymore. But in the beginning, just print out that damn thing and leave it on your desk when you're making the call.

By the time you've handled a few conversations with that list, you know 20304050 customers. Now it is inside you and you know it in your sleep. But in the beginning, please print out that thing on a sheet of paper, write it down and it's really 19 minutes. Let me know around too much. So in this case, some of the reasons why between Randy and Mr. Oh while we're just going round around around around is was there really a need?

Mr. Oh was very clear that he got an alternative quote for 8 million naira. But for some reason, Mr. Oh was not taking up that quote. Because when I eventually I got through to Mr. M is something I asked him. I said OK. I said, oh, you say that? You got a quote from 8 M and say yes now, and he's my brother. And I said, do you trust your brother? I said that he's my brother now. Of course he's my brother. And OK, you know what?

That the gap between us is big right now. We're at 12 million. You're at 8:00. If you really think your brother's quote for 8,000,000 is a viable option, you know, why don't you go in ahead with that? I asked him upfront, you know, the guy wove it. He didn't say anything here, he didn't say anything there. But you can see that we didn't press down hard enough on whether there really is a need. The guy has options. The guy has alternatives.

It's not as if he has a need for what it is that we want or what we can provide. And you can see that now that we're talking money, you can see that the gap is wide. The gap between 12 M and eight M is big. Then there was also the matter of timelines and urgency. Mr. O wants it for his house, but they haven't completed the house. The house is still being built. Perhaps that is one reason why he's not engaging any company yet, precisely because he has not finished building the house.

That is also another thing that we didn't press hard upon. We ask, OK, Mr. O, you want it for the house? What stage is the house at? Oh, OK. You are the decking stage. Yeah. Since you are at the decking stage now, it's not looking as if this is something that you're willing to take delivery of, you know, this month or next month. You ask and the guy will say, yeah, you know, actually we probably want to finish decking around November.

We'll do plastering around January. So to be honest, my brother Randy, to be honest, I think we'll be like around that time, February 2026, before we're ready to take delivery. You have that conversation now, you know, there's no need to be chasing somebody week after week after week, month after month after month, because you're currently in September and is looking as if realistically speaking, the guy might not be ready to take delivery of nothing until February of 2026.

This is the reason why we have these conversations, qualification and discovery, and we ask questions. We're trying to figure out the particulars. What does this person want? What does this person need? What are the person's timelines? What is the problem? Can we solve it? Is it a problem worth solving? So anyway, so again, I'm getting sidetracked. Let me just answer the question. When should you stop following up with somebody?

It's very easy. If you can't secure an advancement, it is time to give up. Remember, an advancement is the next step. If you can't secure a next step, if you can't agree to a next step, if the person will not give you a next step, if you can't think of a next step, there's no point in calling and calling and calling and calling because you're just calling to waste somebody's time. If you can't add value to the situation anymore, like OK, this phone call, I'm going to call.

Will he add any value to this person? No. Will he add any value to me? No. Even if the person picks, what are we going to discuss? I have no idea. That is time for you to stop. You're not adding value, you're now being an irritant and that's why the person is not answering your phone call. It's like, oh, Randy, this irritant won't let me rest. If you can't get a firm budget or a timeline, OK, We have different packages of AB and C

between the cost of eight M to like 12 M. Which one sounds reasonable to you? The guy is not showing his hand. The guy is not saying anything. It's time to give up. You have no information, You have no idea what are you chasing? Timelines. The person is not saying when it is that they are ready to take action or when they might be ready to take action, when they might be ready to take delivery. So it's time to give up.

What are you chasing for? You have no information. If you can't get an advancement, you're not adding value to the situation. The person, you can't get a sense of their budget, you can't get a sense of their timelines. It's time to give up. Send a break up message. This is the point of a breakup message. A breakup message, no point. It gives you emotional closure. The breakup message basically just says, oh boy, this game we are playing, I know they play them again.

I'm not calling you again. It gives you emotional closure. You've done your own, you freed. Then the other advantage is sometimes when you send a breakup message, it revives the conversation because there's some people who say, Oh my dear, I'm totally sorry this happened. This happened. And then conversation continues. The most dramatic case that I've given on the podcast. I'll repeat again because yes, now I was the most dramatic, but it doesn't happen all the time.

The lady responded and said, Ah, Mr. Eddie Novaks Bumpsi just died. So my siblings just came back into the country. We've been planning for the wedding this sorry for the burial, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. You know, it's like, ah, sorry, ma, this is is not about that. When is the burial? God grant your family the grace to be at a loss. You know, this is this, that, that, that. And you know, yeah, eventually we went ahead with the project.

But for her, the reason why she was going ghost is because moms you don't buy. So when she didn't pick my calls was because seriously speaking, she had more important things to deal with. For me, I was thinking school fees. For me, I was thinking Sharma, for me I was thinking Internet, for me I was thinking pinging deposit for her, she was thinking I need to bury Mumsy. But I followed my process. I sent a breakup message and I've read it.

She now responded. You know, I sent my condolences when I asked when was the burial. It's yeah, it's because I was concerned also so I can pray for them, but also so that I know when to continue with the follow up. Yeah, I know some of you will be saying hi, this guy, you're a criminal. No, no, he's not being criminal. It's unfortunately, you know, that's just life. We need to know people's timelines so that we can plan around them.

If the burial is January 29th, most people will stay back in the village 2-3 weeks, arrange headstone, this, that, you know, stuff like that. So if the burial is January 29th, yeah, it's not a bad idea to send text messages 1st and 2nd week of February and then maybe call them again like February 28th and then, you know, get the conversation back on the road. Anyway, let me not dwell too much on that example. But yeah, so that's the reason why we send the breakup message.

Now, the sample breakup message that I told Randy to send is this. Good afternoon Mr. O Looks like you've really been busy. Are we finally moving ahead on the 10.9 million naira offer or have circumstances changed on your end? Send the text message so you might think it's too direct. No, it's not too direct. You're actually trying to ask some legitimate questions. The last time we spoke, I gave you an offer, 10.9 million.

You said let's talk on Wednesday so we can move forward. You visited the call on Wednesday and you said you were in a meeting. So you're sending a text message now. Are we going ahead with 10.9 or how circumstances change on your end. It's very simple. Now. I knew that Mister Oh was going to ghost and I told him when Mr. Oh ghosts. This is the next message that you're going to send. Good afternoon, Mr. Oh. Neither I or my colleagues have been able to reach you concerning your interest in solar.

Now, I'm going to assume that you've either gone ahead with your brothers 8 M offer or personal circumstances have changed on your end. Either way, we're not going to be in touch anymore. Best of luck, Sir. Please reach out if you need any support or information in the future. And that's the second message. So that's what I told Randy. Call Miss O today, Wednesday. The guy who ghosts. No problem. Call him again next week.

He's going to ghost. Send a breakup message. Once you've done that, you, Randy, are done. You'll be playing this game for two months. You can't continue with this game for two months. You are done. You will move on and talk to other people in the pipeline because you've been wasting two months chasing Mr. Oh. The more time you spend chasing Mr. Oh means the less time you have to be spending time with Mr. A or Madam B or Orga C or Alhaji D, and either of those could be good customers.

If you've been playing this game of catamouse with anybody, please listen to me. If you have a Mr. Oh in your life, you've wasted three months chasing Mr. Oh. It means you're taking up mental space in your head, in your mind, in your chest, in your heart that you could have been spending chasing or Boyfi A, Marzi B, Alhaji D, or you know, DMF either. Those people could be good customers. Once you reach this stage where you cannot secure an advancement, you are not adding value.

You can't get a line on the person's budget. You can't get a sense of the person's timeline. It is time to send up, send a break up message. I exit the situation if they're serious and they're legitimate concerns, you know, they'll get back to you later on. Like the Madam who said you know my why, don't buy. But either way, free yourself. This game is tiring, it's exhausting. Free yourself. Go and talk to other people who might be interested, other people who could be good customers.

So in summary, when we're having conversations with people, please, qualification and discovery is key. Figure out what do they want, what do they need? Figure out what they can afford, figure out their timelines. Is there any sense of urgency? Ask it in simple conversational ways. Then you will know how to pace yourself. So like when the Madam reached out to me, it was the same thing. Oh, sorry about that man. You know, blah blah blah.

God grants your grace, your family grace to be at a loss. Or when is the burial? This is this take out man you know small talk because even me my mom's still alive, but I lost my dad. You know some small talks from my poor building my name. I understand these village people. They can be weakened sometimes it was like that when my father died, you know blah blah blah blah blah bills on my poor show some concern. We're human beings yes all money, so I can flex, but you know I'm also a human being.

You know, Mumsy just died, so I know how that thing can be, but before we ended the call want I need. OK, So, Ma. So, yeah, you need time off to bury mom, but I'm assuming that we're still on board with the last proposal. Oh, yeah, definitely. I'm on board. I just can't get to get to that right now. No, no, no. It's OK, Madam. No problem. I understand. I understand. We're good with all the terms and you're interested, so that's not a problem.

Since the burial is January 29th, you know, you probably need like 2 weeks to clean up in the village. So I think let's just say February ending. I'll call you. Is that OK, man? Yeah, sure. No problem. You see, Does she still have a want or I need? Is she still interested? The terms we discussed before, are they OK? Yes, they can afford it. Because if there's also been situations where somebody would say, OK, and this is one of the cases that Randy faced where the woman said, oh, yes, you know what?

We agreed and everything. But to be honest, after we went for this burial, I also know. So I beg Randy, I need a discount. So you can see that situation where we're having a frank conversation. So we run through it again, won't need afford urgency. We schedule the advancement. Madam says it's OK to talk. February ending, no problem. I go and pencil it into my diary, into my calendar, February ending, qualification and discovery, asking people questions.

What do they want? What do they need, What can they afford? What are their timelines? What budget are they working with? Who is the person going to be making decisions? Is there any project that they are planning for? Because remember Mr. who is building a house And I think Randy lost sight of that fact that Mister who is building a house, the very set of conversations that they should have been having is our congratulations, Sir, you're building your own house.

Hey, no more saying yes, Sir to landlord. Congrats. So when I grow up and I become a big boy, I want to be like you meet you. I want to build my own house. You know, you laugh about those also things. It looks like you're making idle conversation. No, you're trying to figure out who is this person? You're trying to figure out their timelines. And So what are you planning for decking? What are you planning for this stage?

What stage are people at now? OK, so that means you'll be like next year, like March will be when you'll be moving into the house. Now, Mr. I will say by the grace of God, by the special grace of God, then you write it down in your book, Moving into his house, March 2026. By the special grace of God, you're now talking in September. If you're talking in September and somebody's moving into his house by the special grace of God in 2026, and you're selling solar, solar needs to be installed in somebody's house.

Of course, the house needs to be completed before you do that. What makes you think following up every week is going to move this deal forward Anyway, let me stop here. Don't waste time chasing Mr. Owes. Send your breakup message. Follow your process. Just leave the chips to fall where they may. We should always be scheduling advancements, scheduling next steps. But I'm so Mr. This was a pleasure talking to you. Based on what I've heard, I

think the next step for us is we should do these days and that that that Madam. What do you think? Madam will either say yes or no. If she says yes, very good. You have something on the calendar schedule the next step on the meeting. If Madam says no, I don't think so. So. Oh, sorry Madam. It's as if I missed out something that is really, really important. Can you feel me in my what have I missed and then my Now we'll talk our own.

Either way, you don't have information about how you are planning the next step. So summary, when you have a contact, the first thing you need to do when I say contact is a phone number you're supposed to call. So if somebody says that, oh, I think my cousin needs blah blah blah, call my cousin. When you call the contact, oh hello, I got your number from your cousin, blah blah blah, they're trying to confirm are they interested?

If they're interested, you know, do some small talk, try and figure out the extent of their need. Then the next step is set a meeting. Then of the meeting, you go in depth to try and understand the problem. After that, maybe you agree that you go over two or three options, you call the person back, OK, based on what we discussed last week, these are the 2 three options that I think can solve this problem. And then get some feedback, try and get confirm what it is that they're keen on and say, OK, all right, no problem, I think I

have enough information. I should be able to send you a proposal by next week, Wednesday. How does that sound? Oh, next week Wednesday sounds OK. You know what? No. I'll be travelling on Wednesday. I'll be back by Friday. Send it to me on Friday. OK. No problem. I'll send it to you on Friday. Then you shuttle it down. You can see you have your next advancement now and you call up on Friday. Hey. Hello, Ma. The last time we spoke, we said I was going to send you a proposal.

I'm ready to send it to you right now. But quick question, man. Usually when we send proposals over to our clients, most of them, most people typically get back to us in 72 hours. Do you think that sounds about right for you? Say 72 hours? Yeah. Yeah, it's Friday today. So if I send it, I'm assuming like by Wednesday, you should have made-up your minds. I know Wednesday is too far. Send it today. By tomorrow morning would have made my decision.

Oh, tomorrow morning. Oh, yes. OK, no problem. So do you think I can call you 10 AM tomorrow morning so that we can discuss implementation and next steps if we're going forward? You see advancements, advancements, advancements. One step, one step, one step. That's how we move things forward at any step in the process. If you don't end up with this CD game offering up for the sake of following up, my friend, just free Disney, free it.

Send your breakup message and then move on. If they get back to you, good. They don't get back to you. Even better. You not have free time. You go and start chasing other people who might be able to become better playing clients. And let me stop here. It's been 37 minutes. Of course, I give my phone number at the beginning and at the end of every episode. So if there's anything that I've said that is unclear, please reach out to me and we can have a chat.

And in fact, that would now inform the next podcast episode that I make, you know about these sorts of things. 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 WhatsApp message on 08064662140. And if you're ready for more talk like this, what realistic relevant stuff that we can use in the Nigerian market, then you are in luck because we have over 1200 episodes.

So just scroll, keep listening. There's lots of useful stuff as you listen. No doubt things you want to apply and then apply those things when things work, reach out to me, let me know If something doesn't work, reach out to me. Let me know if I have confused you. Reach out to me. Let me know if I've helped you achieve clarity. Reach out to me, help me know. Either way, I will be glad to hear from you. So that's it and that's all.

I'll catch you guys later.