Level Up Your Sales Game: The Power of an Account Management Mindset

Hello, and welcome to the show. I'm making today's podcast at The Mechanic. It's a long story and I'll explain later in the episode. And so you expect to hear the interruptions in the background, you know, the boys just jacking off, what else? You know, Okada here and there and, you know, other people who have showed up to repair their cars. Now, if you're tuning into the show for the very first time, the goal of this podcast is free business education.

So don't worry, you are in the right place. This is not a podcast about tourism or any of those things. And if you get any value from it, please share, promote and talk about the podcast so that friends and family members in Nigeria and abroad can benefit from the questions that we tackle. They can do that by subscribing on Spotify, YouTube, Apple, or any player of their choice. And if you have any sales or marketing questions, then bring them to me after the episode.

You can call, you can SMS or send a WhatsApp message on 08064662140. Now today on the show, OK, before we continue, I'd like to shout out Mei Baca, BP Bama from Rivers State, listener of the podcast. And yeah, this is also one of those really cool Nigerian names. You know, I've been talking about how Nigeria is really vast. We have lots of tribes. And this is something that have in the podcast has made me really, really appreciate because, you know, people discover the podcast, you know,

from different corners of Nigeria and everybody has really cool, interesting names. But The funny thing is, Maybach has says that where he comes from in Rivers that his name actually is popular. So he says that if you go to the market and you shout his name, a lot of people will answer. And, you know, we had a laugh about that because actually the same thing with me. So, you know, I run into people here and people like, your name is unique.

Where are you from, blah, blah, blah. You know, is your name Japanese? Is your name German? Is your name Irish? You know, I'm I'm thief. And so over here in Abuja and back in Lagos, people hear my name and they think it's cool. They think it's unique. What do you think is if you go back to Ben Ray State, you know, if you're in Marcudia and you're in the market and you just shout Tarvish a man, I mean, maybe like 15 boys will answer.

So, yeah. So interesting name Mei Baker, BP Bama from Rivers. He's also he's he's also an ex Navy grand. I know those people are very full of themselves now because we're saying that anybody who's an ex jam that the person is popular. So that's a problem with these military kids. They're always feeling themselves. Bernie, thank you very much for listening to the podcast. We had a really interesting conversation. Maybe I might talk about that someday.

So today, what I want us to look at on the podcast is this whole thing about sales, account management, you know, carrier choices, you know, all these, all these sorts of things. So it's not going to be a very structured episode because I had a conversation with someone who's a podcast listener. I'm not going to use his real name. Let's just call him T Diggs. And the reason why we're using the name Taye Diggs is because the guy looks a lot like Taye Diggs.

He just looks like a Nigerian northern version of Taye Diggs. So we're going to call him Taye Diggs in this episode. So I was having a conversation with Taye Diggs now, and Taye Diggs is a new digital marketer. He's probably going to move into a sales and account management role. He says that he has got some useful tips from the podcast and he wants to know how to convert leads and also how to get leads for the company that he currently works for.

So of course, I asked him like, OK, you're talking about the company, so who's going to be paying? Is it a good company that's going to pay? Abby? Is it going to be you? He said he's going to pay. And then we had, you know, money conversation and he was upfront, you know, when he had the figure, you know, the guy shout, he said he's not going to be able to afford it, you know, blah, blah, blah. But still, he didn't stop me from dropping some value for the guy.

So I'm going to share some of the conversations that we had right now. And then, of course, later on, if he's going to be able to afford paid coaching services, you know, he'll be back. But let me just share some of the things that we spoke about. Right? Yeah. Let me just share some of the things that we spoke about. Hopefully some of you are going to be able to get some Nuggets from that. So Tay Diggs, again, not his real name.

I'm just calling him Tay Diggs because the guy resembles Tay Diggs. He just looks like a northern version of Tay Diggs. And when I say northern, I mean Niger northern, like he looks like a Marlow version of Tay Diggs. So I can put it that way. You know, all my my little brothers, you know, I beg Novax. Yeah. So Tay days now. So the guy studied accounting and it's something that he struggled with. So he thought about different career choices.

He went back and got an MBA that's a master's in business administration. And while he was doing that, he started doing some writing. The guy has some hustle shaft because the guy has done both has done both work. The guy has done, you know, different kinds of jobs. So it's one of the things I had to tell him, like, straight up, like, you know, the guy, he has good view as in, you know, anyhow, Shah, he wants to make things work.

So I told him that, look, it doesn't matter what you settle on, you're going to be successful. So while I was doing the NBA now, I was writing for some people, doing academic writing, doing marketing writing, you know, picking up some small change, collecting some small coins here and there, you know, writing marketing content. But of course, he started off by doing some free work for some friends and for some colleagues,

you know, reaching out to some people like, oh, I like your business. I like what you do, you know, I think I have some skills. So how far now can I just write one or two things for you? You know, that's how we start putting out some free stuff, eventually start getting some paid stuff. And you see, when I tell people lots, because how will I describe it? And it started from my wedding photography days, you know, people, they would just say don't do free work.

Everything must be paid. Everything must be paid. And yes, ultimately you must, everything has to be paid. But The thing is, when you're stepping new into a field and you don't have a body of work, you don't have the expertise, you don't have credibility, you don't have the reputation as in how you enter and then start charging full price. It's only people who are scammers at heart that have that kind of mind that you've not done this work at all.

You just prevent present yourself. And then you just tell somebody that look, you know, pay me, you know, it's 500K, you know, a month or something like that. So I'm not saying everybody must do free work, but I'm just saying now for some people, you don't have a body of work, you don't have a, a portfolio to speak of. There's no reputation, there's no body of work, there's no nothing that you can show. These are some of the ways that you can enter into the field.

See, especially where you're selling services and you can do it at low cost. So his own scope was, hey, bro, babe, I like this business, you know, blah, blah, blah. I see your website, you know, if we do it like this, we do like this, we can improve like this, we can do like this or how far? Let me just try one or two things. Let's see if it works and then of course, if you do it and then the thing works and then you're happy, then the person pays for future jobs.

They also refer you. It's doing stuff like this is not a bad way to get into the market. Now, you're not going to build a career like this, but I'm saying in the beginning, when you do not have a body of work, when you do not have a reputation, when nobody knows you, when on your website there's no testimonial to put, when there is no nothing to show any form of credibility, no nothing to show that you can do the job.

This is not a bad way to get started. And so this is the reason why I think Ted Diggs is going to be successful because he has been anyhow shy. He's been trying to make things work. So let's see then in all the work he's been doing so far now he has been avoiding sales responsibilities. And I understand because in the beginning, oh, by the way, sorry about, you know, all the noise going on in the background. Like I said, I'm at the mechanical.

You know, some of these, you know, some of these, my little boys now they can be very, and I don't blame them. Their job is is is harsh. You know, it's boring, it's on the page. You know, you're under the sun and in the rain. So I guess, you know, they just look for ways to make themselves feel all right. In fact, the last time I was here, you'll believe these boys are just racing arcadas anyhow, you know, using arcada to now jump.

What do you call this thing when you put sand together like a ramp? Do I racing arcada, turning tricks, jumping ramps? I said, look at these boys just wasting fuel. They don't know that they can injure themselves, get really, really hurt. So then that's all the noise that we have in the background. So Tay Diggs now the guy has been avoiding sales roles. Eventually he ended up with an insurance company. And of course, you know, when you're working in insurance,

you, you can't avoid it. You know, at this point, you're practically in sales. Sometimes they will call it something else. They will call you What, what are the terms that they like to call again, consultant ahead, they'll call you insurance consultant. They will call you, you know, different kinds of things, Sure, but don't be deceived. It's sales because you're responsible for going out and getting people to buy insurance policies and you're going to be paid commissions off of what it is that you can sell.

So it's sales. Even though they call you insurance consultant, insurance specialist, underwriting specialist, something, something, something, forget that thing. It's a sales job. So if you see the application and you don't want to do sales and you see them saying the insultant specialist underwriting consultant, some just runaway, it's, it's sales. But if you're brave enough, step into the role because you're going to learn lots of things that are going to help you.

Not that are going to help you in the future because you can't start and decide that, man, this sales thing is not for me, let me go and do something else. And like I told Ted Diggs, the good thing about getting involved in these sorts of roles, sales roles, account management roles, all these sorts of things is because you're going to learn skills that when you say I'm tired and you're moving on, they parlay well, they translate well.

They carry over well into other endeavours. So like me now, if I give up this whole thing, I say, you know what, I'm done. I want to join Tina Bo and Co. I must enter the four walls of Ashore Rock and I decide to be a politician. All the skills that I'm learning here, all the, you know, all the skills I'm learning here will translate well into politics. If I say I'm going to be a pastor, let me open my church. Let me be collecting tights from all of you.

You know, those of you that are earning like, you know, 500 M and I'll collect tight from you. That is how much that's like 5 M collecting your tights. If I want to be a pastor, The thing is going to translate well. If I want to be a womanizer, the thing would OK, no, that's not a career choice. But anyway, I'm just trying to say that whatever it is, sales skills, the skills that you get when you're doing sales and customer service and account management and everything, they translate well into whatever it is that you want to do by the time you say I am done with this career.

So I told him just embrace, embrace the role, embrace the role. But he's no longer with insurance anyway. And then from the conversation that we had, it looked like his marketing special specialty was more on the strategic side, on the content side. The reason why I had to ask is because you know, there's some of you who are marketers and you guys are really, really on the technical side. So you guys are the ones that are very good at deciding who the customer cohort is.

You're good at deciding the targeting that you have to use inside of Facebook Manager or inside of Google. What's it called? Whatever Google has that used to buy advertisements. So some of you are really, really, really on the technical side, but it look like him. He's more on the strategic side. Let's decide on the content, who are we writing it to? Let's come up with copy or, you know, all these sorts of things. So yeah, that's what he does.

He's more on the strategy side, coming up with the pain points, trying to figure out the users write about their problems or their interest, you know, that sort of thing. So eventually we go to this whole question of what should I do? I'm currently in marketing, but my company, they say that they will shift me into account management or they will shift me into sales. And he has been fighting it. And of course I wanted to figure out if he knows the difference between sales and account management because there's a difference.

And you know, I'm glad that what he said because he was talking more about the similarities that whether you're doing account management or whether you're doing sales, you need the same kind of skills. And I'm like, yes, very, very good, very good. But then I asked him about the difference, and he was able to appreciate that. Well, the difference essentially is that you're not going to be doing cold calling. That's the way he put it.

And yeah, he's correct. That's the difference between account management and sales. When you're doing sales, you are running out to look for people to say, come and buy my product or my services, come and be a customer, come and give me patronage, come and, you know, come and do this, come and buy. Essentially that is sales. But when you're doing account management, you are working with people who have already bought from your company.

They bought from your company before they were a customer before, before they want to come and buy again. Or maybe they have bought and there's a problem with the order that needs to be rectified. You know, something like that. So that is the main difference. When you're doing sales, you're running after somebody. Come and buy, come and buy my market, come and give me patronage, come and be my customer. But if you're doing account management, you're dealing with somebody that has bought before before, the person that wants to top up, the person wants to buy a new thing, the person that wants to upgrade or there's a problem with the previous order and you are the person that they're going to last with.

So the account management function is kind of broad because sometimes you will be selling like when somebody comes and want to upgrade, you're essentially selling. You're trying to figure out, OK, what did you buy the last time? OK, how is it working? Did it serve you well? What was the problem? Oh, you want to upgrade and why? OK, if you're upgrading, OK, let's be looking at like this. Let's be looking at like that. So you can say that there's some sales that is involved in account management.

You will also be doing some customer service because somebody will call and say, look, I bought this thing from you. We will promise this. All of you are bastards, The thing is not working, blah, blah, blah. So you know that's customer service going on. So you'll be doing a whole lot. Then let's see what else and it's all we're talking sharp and I asked some more details about the company and he says that he's currently with the software development company and they sell to financial institutions.

Now when I heard that thing made all the difference and this was my advice to him. So I told him, look bro, you know what? Since you are currently in software development and you guys are selling to financial institutions, you know you guys are selling to banks. What else? Banks, Abby banks, clearance houses, you know, all those sorts of things. I told him this is what you do. Your next career move is go and talk to your people and tell them like, look, you know what?

I've been doing marketing for you guys and you know, I'm good. I'm grateful for the opportunity. But now that you guys are saying you will expand and you want me to be doing sales, want me to be doing account management, just tell them now look, I'm available for account management. I'm excited at the opportunity and I'm looking forward to learning new stuff. So what do you guys have set up for me and I told him throw yourself into account management straight up not into sales 1st and let me explain why.

The reason why I told him throw yourself fully into account management is this when you're in a sales role, typically you're being rewarded on performance. You have some you have small salary, you know chicken change and then most of the money will come from the one that you bring in. So since Tay digs used to sell insurance, you know, he knows, he knows the scope that some insurance firm that the monthly thing they will give you is like 50K of course, which is rubbish is not anything.

Then the big, big money that you will make depends on whether you're able to sell big, big accounts then like while I was still selling insurance or some companies that were dropping maybe like 150 KA month. But the big, big money came from whether you are able to sell big, big accounts. And I told him that look, since you're new into this, if you go directly into this space, something that is performance driven, Commission driven you,

you might struggle. You might struggle, especially since there are a couple of things you've not learned. But account management, on the other hand, account management, they're usually usually salaried stuff. So they pay you like they pay everybody else. So if you go into the company and the average salary of everybody is like 400 KA month, if you're in account management, that's how much you collect, 400 KA month. But if you're now doing sales,

your salary will be small, then your kickback, your commissions, your upside will be big. That's how it works in sales. So that's one of the reasons why I told him, throw yourself into account management. But the most important reason why I told him, throw yourself into account management is this. When you're in account management, because you're dealing with people who have already bought before, they just want to upgrade.

Maybe there's problem, you know, something like that. Don't make some inquiries. The conversations are a lot easier. It's less stress. You're just chilling in the office, chilling on that, the AC, somebody will call you, you guys have a conversation. It's a lot easier to manage those kinds of conversations than when you're having to go out fresh and trying to drum up business. And then I told him because these conversations are low stress and because these people have bought before, I told him that throwing yourself into account management will make you an expert on the customer.

And that is one thing that makes selling easier. It's not just being an expert in the sales process and having the framework. It's not just knowing the framework and knowing the steps. You also have to be an expert in the customer. You have to know what is it that they want, What are they looking for? What is the problem? What is the vision? What are their pain points? The things that they've tried out before, How did they try it?

The ones that work, how did it work? The one that didn't work, how didn't it work? When you know all these things, it makes it easy for you to handle the sales process. That's why I told him that if you threw yourself into account management, you'll become an expert on the customer. The fact that I advised him being account management for one whole year, before you say oil organ, I'm ready, let me now try sales. When you're an expert on the customer, you will see that the way you would carry the sales conversation will be different.

Because when you approach somebody, in your mind, you already know that, OK, this guy, based on what he's saying, based on what this baby is saying, is I see if she's this kind of customers. I see if he's this kind of customer. These kind of people are usually concerned about this. These kind of people are usually concerned about that. They typically have tried this. Maybe this is where they made a mistake and this is the kind of product that will suit them.

You'll be able to have a much more productive, much more fruitful, much more effective conversation because you have become an expert on the customer. So if you are in the same situation as Teddigs or Taya Adagun, as I like to call him, you know, I like to message on people and I say that he's Taye Diggs is a Nigerian, like his full name is Taye Adagun. But that's not true by the way. So if you're in this situation as like Taye Diggs, throw yourself into account management and stay there for one year.

You'll become an expert in the customer and you will hear it all because the people who have problems that are calling the company to abuse the company, you will hear it. The people who are calling in and who are happy with the company, with the product or the service, you will hear it. The people who are ambivalent about the product or the service, you will hear it. That one year you will hear it all. So by the time you're stepping into the sales rule, you will know so much.

Your mind will just be cool and calm. The only problem now be you will not just be trying to figure out, OK, what selling framework should I use? What discovery framework should I use? How do I handle the conversation? When it comes to the cosmopath, No Fear. You don't have fear at all because that one year you would have seen and you would have heard it, you'd have heard everything. So that's the main reason why I told him.

You know what, just threw yourself straight into account management. So one moment, let me check the time, OK, 20 minutes. So we still have some time. I don't want to do 45 minute episodes anymore. Then let's see what else. So another reason why I told him that the guy why that TD should do account management is because of this. So I told him that look bro, you know that you are in a complex sales environment and he hadn't heard that term before.

So I know that there's some of you who haven't heard that term before. So let me repeat, lots of times when you're looking for sales content, especially in Niger, sometimes you hear some stuff you tried, it doesn't work. And this is the reason why because lots of sales experts in Nigeria. Haven't realized or they failed to tell you guys, they failed to teach you guys that there are different kinds of selling scenarios, different kinds of selling context.

So not every single thing works. You need to figure out what kind of context are you in? And the two major classifications are you have simple sales scenarios, simple sales context, and then you have complex sales scenarios or complex sales contexts. And this is the difference. So anyone in the podcast I used to talk about how if you go to the market to buy a goosey, that is a simple sales scenario. The number of parties involved in the transaction are simple.

It's just true. There is you and there's the lady buying a Gucci. So if my wife says, how's my dearest? And I say yes, my love, so go to the market, go and buy a Gucci so I can cook for you and the kids. I say, OK, no problem. I drive to the market. That is just two people. There's me and then there is the a Gucci trader. So number of parties involved in a simple sales scenario. Simple sales context, small 2, maybe 3, but should I know plenty?

I'm back at my wedding photography days. I'll be talking to the bride, maybe the groom. That's just to worst case scenario, I'll be talking to your parents. You know, one moms here, one pops you over there. I was never talking to more than two, three people, maybe bride and then the groom, then moms here, maybe wedding planner. You know, that's for that's not too many people. So the conversations are easy to manage because you're not talking to too many people.

Then let's see, apart from number of people ahead price, when you're in a simple sales scenario, the price is not that big. So a Gucci, we all know the price currently as at the time I'm talking, OK, I don't know the price of a Gucci. But the last time that I went to the market, I wanted to buy one boodle of a Gucci. And I went there and I said how much? Then woman told me, I think it was like 5-5. I said I shout, I say 551 cup of a Gucci.

And anyway that's how bad things have gotten, you know, with hyperinflation that come on Agusi 55 for one cop. I say, OK Madam, give me two. Imagine my Agusi world. Thank you. I say hi, Nigeria don't sport. Anyway, so I don't know how much it is now, but relatively speaking, Agusi is not as expensive as wedding photography. Wedding photography is not as expensive as buying a car. Buying a car is not as expensive, as expensive as buying a house.

So you can see that when it comes to price, the level of price complexity, you know is there's a gradient, it increases. So it depends. So the more affordable The thing is, the more you are in a simpler sales scenario. But remember you also when you're not dealing with too many people, so you're not dealing with too many people and then the price is simple. Then typically simple sales scenarios is when the subject matter is simple and easy to understand.

So a goosey is very, very easy to understand, except if you're nervous when you go to the market, if the goosey is bad, you can see that is bad. The thing will smell funky, the thing will look kind of black and it will look like he's coming. So when I don't worry, you're trying to impress your wife, you buy the ago, see you go home. If you buy the wrong thing, she will laugh at you. She was called you, you made that mistake again.

So you can see that that one is quite simple. But if it comes to buying a house now, for instance, you know, you can mess up and buy the wrong kind of house. Maybe it's in the wrong area, maybe it's not secure. Maybe if it's an investment decision, it's not going to give you the kind of yield, the kind of return that you're looking for. So you can make all kinds of mistakes when it comes to buying a house, for instance, or buying a car that you can't make.

If you are trying to buy a goosey. Oh, sorry about all that noise. You know, the boys are now trying to flush out the the gas in the compressor because it's AC issues that I'm having. So we're having, you know, we replace the compressor and you know, all of that jazz. So they're just flushing out the gas. So that's all that sound is like. So you guys don't feel as if I'm farting on the air. It's not me farting or his gas compressor.

It's not me. Even if it's me self. You can't smell anything. So there's there's no problem. Where was I now? OK, I lost my train of thought. OK, yeah. I was talking about subject matter and about how the subject matter is simple. The more complex the subject matter is, the more mistakes that you can make. So those are some of the things that determine whether you're a simple scenario or a complex scenario. Then the last one that I can remember now I think is relationships.

In simple sales, the necessity for relationship is not there. So when I go to the market to buy a Gucci, the woman can afford to say something like, look, Bros, you're here, you're pricing, you're not buying. If you're not buying, please move. Let somebody else come out open market. She can be that blunt because there's no need for us to keep a relationship. She's just sending a Gucci. I should also say hi, Gucci are 5K cop and if I'm there pricing,

pricing, pricing, pricing and she can't sell a 5K cup, she can't tell me look, get outlet somebody else come and buy. There's no need to build a relationship. But if you sell cars, you can't be talking to people somehow like that because you need to finesse and build small relationship. If you sell houses, you can't tell people you know, get out. You need to finesse and build small relationship. You know, if you're selling expensive equipment like my guy who I spoke about like 2-3

episodes ago, who wants to buy equipment for processing oil, that's to make engine oil. If you're the seller of the equipment, you guys to finesse, you know, invite them to your office, sit down on that AC, you know, buy, give them cold drink, you know, sit down. You know, that whole thing. You guys build relationships when you're in much more complex selling environments. So these are the things that determine whether you're in a simple sale or you're in a complex sale.

So my advice to Tay Diggs was this, look, you're in a complex sales scenario, so just go straight into account management because there's lots of things that you need to learn. Complex sales scenarios, like I say, they're complex. You know, it's not simple. So you need to learn one or two things. When it comes to decision makers, the number of people they're going to be dealing with is plenty is what? As my Yoruba people will say, in America and in the USA, they do some research.

In Nigeria, we don't research anything. So I can't tell you what it is in Nigeria, but in America, depending on the level of research, depending on which figure, which figures you check out for what year is beginning to look at safe. When you're talking about complex hill scenarios, you're looking at anything between is this 6 and is this 6:00 and 9:00. I'll be 6 and 10 decision makers. So in other words, like he was talking to me, Ted told me about how somebody told him now, Oh,

look, selling insurance is very easy now just enter Shell or you enter Shell, you know, you talk to one or two executives, you close on big accounts. It's that simple. So, and of course, you know Teddy, you know, he laughed his eye. Is it that easy now? So then when I would just enter shell like that, you know, it's because it's, it's, it's not that straightforward. You know how you want to get into the building? Are you going to talk to your security guard when you get in?

How you're going to be relating to with the receptionist, the other parties that you have to get to before you speak to the executive? You know, like different things. And so I told him that when it comes to selling software for solutions for financial institutions, you know, banks, clearance houses, things like that, the level of complexity goes up even more. So I told him, you're going to be exposed to several users.

The management user, the technical user, the financial user, I can't remember all the times, but they're different kinds of users of your products. Now the management user is the person who is going to look at this thing and decide that OK, this thing makes sense more, go ahead. That's the management user. The technical user is the person who actually uses your software, your product, or your service. The person who has the problem,

the person who actually enjoys using the software, who doesn't like and doing enjoy using the software. That's the desk officer, that's the technical user. And the financial user is the person who is going to say, OK, no problem, Technical user likes it management user say let's go ahead. OK, now let me go ahead and authorize the payment. That's the financial user. Then there are also other stakeholders involved, like when you're selling software to financial institutions, legal has to get involved because legal department has to look at this thing to say that, oh, OK,

this thing is safe to use. It meets our yeah, customer safety requirements, it meets this requirement, that requirement, you know, blah, blah, blah. So when you're selling software to financial institutions, you're not just talking to one person. It's not like me back in the day being a wedding photographer and I'm only talking to the bride. If the bride likes it, she will pay. If he doesn't like it, we now have to toast Popsy so that Pops you will pay if Popsy has abandoned them.

I should grow up with Mumsy. When I have to toast Mumsy to pay, we can sit down on the straightforward. But then selling software to financial institutions is different. We're going to need an inside man, we're going to need a champion. We need somebody to make one or two introductions because we need to know what's up. We need to know the layer of the land. You need to know somebody in legal, You need to know somebody in accounting, You need to know somebody in procurement.

If you know somebody who is in orgas office, you know all well and good if you have the number of orgas Pennsylvania. But you can see that you are not going to be talking to one person when we're talking about these sorts of deals. So in America, to say anything between 6:00 and 9:00, I'll be 6 and 10. You can see that in Niger is roughly the same. We're talking about complex hill scenarios. You're going to be talking to multiple people.

And when you're trying to sell something and you're talking to multiple people to get the thing done, you can see that you're it's becoming difficult to managing plenty of conversations. And that's the beauty of starting in account management because when you're in account management, you have access to these people easy. The management, the technical user will call in to say yes, we're using this is the problem we're facing blah blah, blah.

This is that that you have easy conversations with him. If I'm there, you need to talk to people in legal because you have to clarify one or two things. He will patch you through to legal easy because you guys are already customers. He ever wants to upgrade or they're trying to troubleshoot a problem or you know, something like that. He will pass you across easy. Or like if you're coming brand new fresh, when it's a sale,

you'll be reluctant to introduce you to other people because it's just the nature of the game. In the beginning, everybody's is afraid. Everybody's keeping information to their chests. You know, it's just the early days. Everybody's trying to be secretive. So OK, 30 minutes. So when you're in account management, you have easy access to all these people. By the time you're ready to sell, you will know for sure that OK, if I'm going to go and sell in Zenith Bank, you will know for sure Who is the kind of person I need to talk to.

Do I need to talk to executive director? How do I get access to executive director? Do I need to talk to branch manager? How will I get access to branch manager? The legal process of of signing this contract, how does it work? The procurement process, what does it look like? You will have all these things and you can see why I say for somebody who is in a big situation, throw yourself into account management. Do it for one year, maybe even more.

By the time you're on the sales side, you already know a couple of things you won't be afraid anymore. The only thing will just be my script when I get to the gates. How can I toast the security guard and the entire side? That's for some places where you have to toast the security guard because if it's normal bank like GTB, you can just walk straight in what clearance houses, for instance, you know, because of the sensitive nature of what it is that they do, you know, don't want to know for sure.

Yes. How can I help you? Where who have you come to see? Do you have an appointment? So you just working on your script? How will I get past the gate man when I entire side? How will I talk to secretary when I talk to secretary and again to or guys office, how am I going to get appointment with OCA? Or if it's only PA that I get access to, you know, you'll just be working out all those things. What's my framework, what's my step, what's my process, you know, all those sorts of things.

So OK, 30 minutes. I'll be 32 minutes. So let me just quickly bring it to a close. So that's my advice to Tay Diggs. Yeah, right now you can't afford to pay for me to coach you while I no problem when you get some wallpaper, you know, just come back. Let's have a conversation and but in the meantime, I told him, throw yourself into account management. You're going to learn a lot and will make you a very competent salesperson when you come out.

But then I also told a digs something that I tell you guys, I look, dealing with me is a risk free proposition because for those of you who have other sales influencers or trainers or coaches or whatever that you like, look, let's be real, you have to pay them before you can even have any kind of conversation with them. What deal with me is a risky proposition. You call me on the phone, we have a cool conversation. If I have one or two Nuggets,

I'll drop for you. And The thing is, my own material is free. And Tay Diggs also said that he likes that my stuff is practical because I'm giving next class steps. This is not a podcast where I'm going to tell you acquire to refire, to aspire to attain what you desire. You know, motivation, you know, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I mean, motivation is good, but you know, that's not the main reason why lots of us are not performing in our businesses.

It's not because we're poorly motivated. It's because we don't know the next step. In fact, it's even tying into our motivation. If we know the next step, we'll go ahead and do the damn thing. It's because you don't know that's the reason why we sit and we're scared and we're thinking, we're wondering which way forward. So deal with me is a risk free proposition. Also, at one moment the mechanic is here. Let me just go and find out what's going on and then I will be back.

OK, I'm back. So I just confirmed that they have carried. OK, sorry about that. I accidentally tapped something off. So I just confirmed from the mechanic that they've carried my compressor. So hopefully I shouldn't be here for for too long. What was I? So I was saying, yeah, that dealing with me is a risky proposition for the rest of you who have tried to get in touch with your favorite influencers in the past, because it's somebody that has confirmed I've tried reaching out to somebody else, you know, e-mail, nothing,

phone number, nothing. But for me, I'm here. It's a easy casual conversation. We'll have a chat. If I can help you, I will. You know, if I can't, I'll direct you to where you can get the help. If you don't have money, it doesn't mean I won't spare you some time. We can have, you know, a quick 15 minute chat or whatever you have the money to to go ahead with paid coaching and consulting. Then yeah, sure, let's roll. Let's let's get at it.

But The thing is, even if you're looking for free options, I have over 1100 audio resources that are available on the podcast and that are available on YouTube. And so I told him that look, you don't even have to pay me for even when you start making no correct money in your sales role, you don't even have to pay for coaching immediately. All you have to do is go to YouTube, type in Tavi Shima, type in podcast, and then type in what it is that you want to know.

I have over 1100 free resources available on YouTube and you're going to be able to listen and get a sense of what the next clear steps are or what you should be researching next. So like I told him the key terms he should be looking for, especially after he has been in account management for like that kind of six months, you know, he should start looking on things for discovery. Discovery frameworks. Frame discovery frameworks are what guide the, the conversation that we're having with potential customers and we're trying to figure out who they are, what they're about, what's the problem that they're having, how much is the problem costing them?

Where's the real pain points? You know, things like that. Because that gives us all the information that we need to be able to make a compelling sales pitch or compelling sales presentation or whatever it is that you, you want to call it. So I told him that's one thing you should be looking for discovery and what's it called? Qualification and discovery. So that's one of the key terms, Qualification and discovery, another term, discovery framework, another key term conversation framework.

Let's see, what else? Another key term sales process. So I told him that just do that. If you go to YouTube and you type in Tava Shima, you type in podcasts. After that you type in qualification framework, you hit send. Every single podcast episode that I've made of the over 1000 episodes that I've recorded so far that has anything to do, excuse me about qualification frameworks or conversational frameworks will be there and then just listen and he'll be able to get the the Nuggets.

So that's what I told him to do. And of course, we're both looking forward to a time when we'll be able to work together as a paid client. And oh, we're already at 40 minutes and that's why I didn't want to do so. Let me just bring today's episode to a close. So that's all for today, folks. Remember, if you listen to this, you got value from it. Share from the podcast. If you have sales and marketing questions in particular, then bring them to me.

You can call, you can SMS, you can WhatsApp on 08064662140. Thank you very much for your time and attention. I'll catch you, dear listener, at the next episode. Now let me go back and face the mechanics and see how far with my compressor. Well, that is easy can work and I swear I'm tired of this whole thing of driving second hand cars. I God willing, the next car by Gatsby brand new so that I know that I'll buy this car and I

know that I'm using this car for the next maybe like five years and I have no problems. The only problem will be change tire service the car, you know that kind of thing. So just using like five years, six years, seven years, sell it, buy a brand new car. So any that's my own prayer for my own life shot. I'm tired of all the second hand second car, second hand car beers. I'm start driving brand new car. God willing, we'll all drive a brand new car.

So that's it. I'll catch you guys in the next episode.