Not Every "Yes" Means a Sale: The Art of Customer Qualification

Hello and welcome to the show. Today we're going to look at the question. We're going to try and figure out how to know when a buying sign isn't a buying sign. Now the reason why this is a good topic to tackle is because well of course lots of U.S. business folks, self-employed people every day. You know, we're trying to bring in our money every day. So we're having conversations with people, Instagram face to face, having networking sessions.

And we always get into those situations where we're talking with someone and then someone says, oh, how much? Or the person hears what you do. And they're like, oh, really sounds interesting. You know, just different things in conversations. And you know, people take all kinds of signs to be positive or negative, you know, depending. And so the positive signs, when people think someone is taking a step closer to becoming a potential customer, you know,

people consider those things to be a buying sign. And then well, of course we already know what objections are. That's when people are given reasons for why they can't move ahead with the purchase or they don't want to take a step forward in with the business relationship. So we're going to focus today on buying signs. You know what are buying signs? How do you know when you have a real buying sign? Because there are some people who think that when a customer says a potential customer rather says how much.

There's some people that think it's a buying sign. I think that someone is interested now. I don't think how much is a buying sign. I think you have to ask a couple more questions trying to figure out exactly what it is is going going on here. But I'm sure you guys have figured out the difficulty of this whole thing about buying science versus non buying science because it's you know, for most folks it's kind of subjective.

Yeah, I would say for most folks it's subjective because not everybody goes to school to learn sales. In fact, sales as a course is not currently not available in Nigeria as far as I'm aware. I don't know about the United Kingdom. I know that there are some schools in America that are teaching sales not as a, what's it called undergraduate degree, but as some adjunct in marketing courses and things like that. So it looks like people have been left with their own devices when it comes to figuring out what the buying sign is.

So in other words, if you like sales and maybe apprenticed under someone and your mentor or your, you know, your person who brought you into the trade, let's say you're a wedding photographer. And OK, well, the reason why I'm using, I like using that example is because that's just where I started my business journey. So you could say that's my core constituency. So you're coming in as a wedding photographer and the person who trains you tells you that, oh,

OK when the bride says this, it means she's interested. Then you just log that into your scope that, OK, when you hear this phrase or when you hear that phrase or when the bride looks like this or when she smiles that way or whatever, you know, those are buying signals. So that's the difficulty of trying to figure out what the buying signal is because there's lots of subjectivity that's involved. You know, what do you think versus what do I think versus what actually is the reality.

And this whole thing of trying to figure out buying signals now becomes an unreliable art since we all have different standards for the buying signal is so. But I guess the whatever it is that you think is a buying signal, one danger that we should walk away from is over valuing buying signals. Because back to the wedding photography example. If you came into the business, your your mentor, your your hero, whoever brought you into the wedding photography business or the fashion business or whatever.

If the person says that somebody comes over to the store, the person is driving an expensive car like a Mercedes-Benz. If the person smiles several times during the meeting and the person asked how much, then take that to be a buying signal. Now The thing is, we shouldn't overvalue buying signals. Because when you overvalue buying signals, you become what's the word? You become too greedy is not the word I'm looking for.

You become too, you become too anxious and then you rush to close the sale. And that is where problems come up, because lots of times when we get problems in the sales processes because people have tried to close the sale prematurely and that's where objections come up. Now if you are a newbie listening to the show, this is your first time listening to the show. An objection is just is basically any reason or any concerns that the customer has before they go ahead.

So back to the wedding photography example. If you see if the bride comes in and the Mercedes-Benz and she nods her head and she laughs a lot during the meeting and then she asks you how much and then you take that as a buying signal and then you try to close, she might hesitate for a number of reasons. Maybe it's because before she got here she chatted with some of her bridesmaids and they were talking about the newest and latest greatest technology in wedding albums and how synthetic albums are the best and blah blah blah.

She might be hesitating because she has looked at your albums, she doesn't know if you offer synthetic albums and so she doesn't know if your albums are state-of-the-art. But The thing is, because you're rushing to try and close the deal, you haven't been able to figure out what her concerns are. So you keep pushing and pushing to close the deal. But The thing is that her hesitation is going to be there. Because for her, if it's a big deal that she wants a synthetic album and not the classic lay flat album, if that is a concern at the back of her mind, it's going to be there.

Now The thing is, it'll be nice if most of our potential customers were assertive and would come out and say guy, calm down, you know, how can we close now? I'm actually looking for synthetic blah, blah, blah blah blah. Do you provide this now? It'll be nice if that's what people do. Well, unfortunately people don't do that. And in fact, if you look at yourself in your own buying with your own buying history and your own situations where you're trying to buy something, you see that most people hesitate.

The reason why they do is because the average person is trying to keep things close to their chest because they don't want to take advantage of the bride doesn't want to say guy, calm down. Now this album self is this synthetic because she doesn't want to be taken for a ride. Maybe she wants to go and do some research, know what synthetic albums are, what they look like, what they feel like, what the price range is, you know, blah blah blah.

Instead of her asking you upfront, you know, is this synthetic? And they say, Oh yes, it's synthetic is the best we imported from China, blah blah, blah. Then you try and close the deal and then she's in that awkward situation at the end of the day where what she gets, even though it's not poor quality, it's not quite what she wanted in the beginning. So most people play their cards close to their chest in the selling situation, sorry, rather in a buying situation because the bride is in a buying situation, so she's going to hesitate.

And if you overvalue buying signals, that is the kind of problem that you can get into. And it happens to everybody, whether you're a lawyer or whether you're a fashion designer or blah, blah, blah. So to the lawyer example, you might be she might have said a little bit and maybe during the conversation you figured that she had some challenges with intellectual property protection, you know, trademarks, patterns, those sort of things.

And because she came in driving a Mercedes-Benz and a a, you know a correct looking suit and she has a fancy accent and she smiled and laughed a lot and and she said how much you just think oh buying signed and then you start trying to close. The problem is because you have you become too anxious to close the deal and you haven't followed the fundamentals of running good qualification and discovery. She might have other problems that are much more important that you have not tried to solve.

So yes, the intellectual property, the intellectual protection, sorry, no mix up my words. Intellectual property protection. Yeah IPIPP. So the IPP concerns might be there, but maybe that might be trivial and there might be something else that is much more weighty that you want solved. But you're never going to know that because you you're trying to close the deal now because she came in with a Mercedes-Benz with a correct looking suit.

You like her bag. She laughed a lot, she smiled a lot and she asked you how much. So you think all these are buying signals. So that is a problem. Now most people, especially if it's going to be a hefty fee involved, she's going to say let me think about it and then she's going to leave. And the truth of matter is that, yeah, intellectual property would be nice to have a trademark would be nice to have a patent, but there was something much more bigger at the back of her mind.

And let's face it, our customers, our potential customers and clients, they are not the specialists. So there is no way that this lady who has come to speak to you, the lawyer, is going to know that there are much more fundamental problems. All she will know is that all these things you're talking about, intellectual property protection, trademark will go to Ministry of Commerce, will file this, will file that and we'll go to court will file this, will file that.

All of that will will sound nice, but they'll just be that nagging thing at the back of our chest that it's not just, you know, she likes what she's hearing, but there's something that she hasn't heard. She's not a professional, so she's not going to know. If you were to not overvalue buying signals and focus on qualification and discovery, that's figuring out who is this person. What are they about? What business are they involved in?

What are they trying to? What problems are they trying to solve? What vision are they trying to aim for? How can my product or service help them achieve that goal? How bad is the problem? Is it a problem worth solving? Because there are times that people have big problems, but I don't think it's a problem worth solving. Reminds me back when I was in Kano and I was with Summit Summit law firm in Kano. That was after my youth service and a customer came in.

It was one of these issues trademark infringement and stuff like that. So we, the firm, we filed an Anton pillar order and so we're able to go and oh OK, sorry, forgot that most of you are not lawyers but it's the low down. The law allows you to protect your trademarks, your patterns. The whole idea is the law is not going to allow somebody to pretend that they're you understood your customers. So one of the remedies that is available under common law, that is laws that judges can make, is that the judge can say, you know what, We've looked at everything this guy is pretending to be?

You grab the police, grab the bailiff, you guys go there, go and open his factory, seize everything and bring it to the court. So I think it's an Anton Pillar order. I think you'd have been out of legal practice for a very long time. So those of you lawyers who are listening, if I got it wrong, I know you're probably screaming ahead of right now, but you know, it's this order. It's not order. But anyway, those of you who are not lawyers, you probably get the gist of what I'm trying to say, that a judge can, under second certain circumstances can make that kind of order to say Mister man, go and grab the police, go and grab the bail.

If you guys go there, these guys pretending to be you, go and back everything, bring it to the court. Let's settle the matter here. So we went ahead, we did that. The client's fee at the end of the day was, this was a long time ago anyway, but I think it was about 700 and 750KA150K as it was good money back then, good money. So we went there and I was a member of the expatriate community in in in Kano, so and we went there to levy the order and apparently the fellow who we went to levy order against, you know, freaked out with the police there.

And then there's some expatriate communities that, you know, know themselves, you know, they have a power. What kind of thing? So he saw the police and everything. And, you know, of course my guy got scared. And so he picked up the phone and called the other person to say Igbo, you guys should calm down. I'm like, it's not that deep. I'm sorry, I'm not going to do it again, you know, that sort of thing. And so the client called us and I called my guy rather and said,

OK, you know what? This guy has apologized. He said we won't do it again. Let's flashy everything, this court case. Let's flashy all the things that we've come to collect. Let's flashy and my ogre. You know, as any lawyer would do say we would advise was like, look, dude, we're already here. We spent money. Like, you know, my fee is my fee. And I'm still going to collect MY150K police. We've mobilized Bailiff. We've mobilized.

The cars are here, everything. Let's just do this thing sharp, sharp and finish this process that we've started. But the girl was like, now, no, I just freed the guy. He has learned his lesson. He's not going to do it again. And so the lawyer Maraga collected the fee and of course we left and it looked like the guy went and he didn't say no more. Anyway, the point of the story that I'm trying to make is this. Sometimes people have problems,

and I think it's a problem that is not worth throwing too much money after, which is why you have to do discovery. So apparently for this guy especially since he wasn't a born in the community, in the diaspora community, you know as per their foreigners so in Nigeria that the ones that had Aspira. So since he's an all he just wanted was his for his younger brother to stop misbehaving. Well not younger brother but all I put it you know as per you know there's big boys, there's big girls and then there are different levels of bigness or seniority if I can put it that way.

So he just wanted this young upstart to stop misbehaving and to stop trying to steal his trademark. And the fact that the guy got scared and called and apologized and everything was was good enough. So sometimes there's a problem that needs to be solved. In your professional opinion, you think this is the best way? Let's go ahead and do it. But The thing is, you're not the client. Sometimes the client thinks this is a problem, but it's not a big enough problem.

So apparently this is one of those problems that was not that big enough. We started the gas. You know, the guy is scared and no problem. Let's stop. Point made, No need going all the way despite what you your professional opinion is. So we always need to be having qualification and discovery questions to try and figure out who is this person, what are they trying to achieve, what's the problem? How can the product or service help solve this problem?

Is this a problem that is worth solving because it even affects the kind of professional recommendations that we can that we can make. So summary before I got, before I lost my train of thought with the story is let's not over value what we think are buying signals. So it's not mathematics that the person shows up like this, the person looks like this, the person said this, the person said that therefore buying signals try and close.

So let us not overvalue buying signals. We must always go through with qualification and with discovery processes before we try and close. Especially since if the potential customer like the examples that we've gone through so far, the lady who is in front of a lawyer or the bride who is part of the wedding photographer, if she has any concern, you're not going to tease it out once you start trying to close. Because once you start trying to close and discussing Naira and Kobo and tell the person, look,

your bill is going to be 350 K, most people lock up and they're trying to reduce how much they're supposed to spend. You should try and figure out actually is what we're trying to figure out actually is have you done good qualification and discovery? Is your proposal as airtight as it should be? Is there anything that is missing from the proposal? Let me put it that way. How does the proposal adequately reflect what it is that the person is trying to do?

It's only when you got into that stage that you can now start trying to close and say, oh look, Madam has been a wonderful meeting. I'm confident that we can help you achieve this and this and that and that. In my professional opinion, from what you've said, I think we should try ABC and XYZ. If we do that, do you think is going to be able to guarantee you this and this and this that you're trying to achieve? And then if the person sitting before you back to lawyer example says yes, exactly in fact or a lawyer.

I like everything that you said, this one and this one, this one in fact if we do this to gong gong it will is, you know, case closed. It will satisfy me. We'll achieve this, will achieve that. It is when you're at that stage they can now start say okay Madam, we're getting based on what we've discussed, your bill is going to be 2.5 M, you know and then you guys start with the haggling with the back and forth and everything.

So don't overvalue buying signals trying to figure out what the buying, whether you have a buying signal or not. But as a general rule in my own opinion, I I think if something is too easy, just press for more details because there are people who show up saying OK, let's go back to the winning photography example. There's people who show up saying Olga photographer or Madam photographer. My wedding is December 25th. Do you do synthetic?

You say yes, you say, oh OK, good. Please give me a quote. I want synthetic 12 by 24 inches with three frames. My wedding is going to be in Abuja and it's only one day event. So now in this case it looks like you have all the information that you need to make a choice and the person sounds quite educated. So you might think OK this is a buying signal but this sounds too easy ask for more question so press for more details.

Ask more questions so that you well First off you have to be able to get get a sense of you have to know who the bride is. You have to build some rapport. You have to build some flow between both of you and that's not going to work. If she calls up and says, or the photographer, do you offer synthetic and you say yes. And then she says, OK, how much synthetic 12 by 24. Give me 3 frames. Wedding is Abuja, December 25th.

You have to get the conversation going. So lots of things that you can ask. So like in this case, OK, the one of the most basic things that the wedding photographer would confirm in this case, I'm looking at qualification. Those are questions around the person would be, well, First off, if she's the one who's getting married. Because sometimes there's some brides in quote that call like that. You give her a price, you guys talk and then after the second phone call you realize that actually she's a cheap bridesmaid.

She's not the bride. You've wasted 3 days trying to build relationship, trying to toast, trying to get Joe, trying to negotiate with someone who has no authority to pay the final bill. So good practice for wedding photographers. First of all, they tried to confirm who they are talking to. Oh, thank you very much for calling the block. I've got all the details. You said synthetic, this is that wedding date. Blah blah blah blah, blah.

Is that correct? She says yes. OK Oh, by the way, are you the one getting married or you're the sister of the bride or the bride maid to say I'm sister of the bride? Then of course you know you need to ask more questions because you need to know how come the bride is not the one that is in front of you and whether sister of the bride has authority to pay. Sorry to to negotiate fully because sometimes you just calling and looking for looking for information.

But in this case let's assume that it actually is the bride herself. Who? The bride herself who called. So yeah, so we figured out that is the bride. You know you ask some personal questions. How the how does she and the groom meet, you know, blah blah blah. Then you also now since this is a fairly specific quote me personally, I'd be curious. I'd ask her, you know synthetic. How come you ask for synthetic and not you know any other options and then hear her out.

Now you might find out that the reason why she asked for synthetic was because she wants top of the line. She wants the best. She wants the most sophisticated. She might not be aware of current trends, the market and current technology. And maybe there's some new style of photography wedding book that has been invented in Australia that hasn't reached Niger yet. This might be a good opportunity if she's a sophisticated bride and who is wealthy enough.

Might be an opportunity for you to upsell her on the newest kinds of books coming out of Australia instead of the synthetic books that are coming out of Lagos and coming out of China. So you see why you should always ask questions. If it's too easy, press for more details. Don't rush to close the deal on buying signals. OK, 20 minutes. Let me see if I can bring this thing to a close quickly. So basically, just in case I

didn't express myself properly, the buying signal is basically is any cue that you receive from the other person any verbal cues, any non verbal cues that shows the the buyer might be interested in the product or the service. Now when I say verbal cues, it might be the questions that the person asks. Like when the person says how much does this cost? Some people take that to be buying signal. In my own opinion, how much?

That is not a buying signal though. You have to ask more questions and patch two or three things together before how much equals to buying signal. But don't just take it out. Every single person that calls you at it means the person is interested. It was like that. You have your hopes dutched perpetually because well in Nigeria anyway, that's the first question that people will ask. Are you available for so, so and so?

How much? That means your hope will be open every single call. So what was I? OK, so verbal cues. Now sometimes it's non verbal cues. Some people smile, some people nod their head, some people gasp. You know, like when they hold the wedding album. Let's see what else. Some people start bringing out their wallet. I think that is a buying cue, you know? But in this case, bringing out the wallet can mean anything. Maybe the person was bringing out the wallet so that they can bring out their business card to hand over to you.

Or bring out the wallet so that they can write something on behalf of some. Write something on a piece of paper. Or they might be bringing out their wallet because they want to collect your business card to put in their wallet. So don't just assume that because you guys have been talking for 30 minutes, Madam is reaching for her wallet. Then it means Madam is ready to pay. Or that our guy is ready to pay. It doesn't always work that way.

We need to ask more questions. We need to look for more confirming signals. So verbal cues, Non verbal cues. That shows that the buyer might be interacted. Interested in your product or your service. Yeah, could, yeah. Could also include facial expressions. But then again, you know, confirm. Because there are some people like me. I'm told that I have a resting beach face. So there's some people like me who I might be excited, but the excitement is just not showing on my face.

Now my wife can tell when I like something, but my mom can tell when I'm excited about something and my kids can tell. But most people they just think they're looking at the blank wall. So like for those of you who listen to podcast episode where I talk, I spoke about the brand new phone that I got 'cause I have a a Xiaomi 13 C Now for my wife we got a 12/12 C so for my wife she could tell which phone I was interested in, but the sales person clearly, I mean she, I mean she had no clue but she did a good job selling us those phones.

Anyway, let me not digress too much with all these stories, but buying signal, verbecue, non verbecue, facial expressions, things people say, the actions that they take, those are the sorts of things that we consider to be buying signals. So I hope I've been able to point out that the things that we should consider is not just that a buying signal has happened. So it's not just enough that the the bride came in a Mercedes-Benz and she looked real tight and she sounds real nice and she laughed for 5

minutes and then she asked how much we need to consider the strength of the signal. If you laugh for 5 minutes, we need to try and figure out the laugh. Was it an improving laugh or was it a laugh of dismissal? Because there's some people who laugh when they want to say, when they think, How will I translate it now in Niger, you know, like when you're talking to somebody and that person laughs and says, this guy, you're not serious.

How will I translate that? Oh yeah. I guess that's a way of saying, like, your proposal is outrageous. Let me put it that way. Yes. Uh, huh. So there's a laugh that is an approving laugh. There's also a laugh that says your proposal is outrageous. We need to consider the strength and the quality of the signal. So it's not enough that she laughed and she said, how much? What kind of laugh was it, You ask? Call things out.

I said, sister, this one that you're laughing, is it that you approve or OK, no, no, that's true. Whatever, any. But you know it depends on your personality and how it depends on your personality. The level of report that you built and then things like that. So you can ask straight up so assist that. This one, you're laughing, you know, are we ready to move ahead or this one that you're laughing? It's like you don't believe that what I'm saying is true or you get the gist.

We should be trying to look for confirming, confirming signals. Then let's see what else then also helps if you use multiple signals for confirmation. So don't just assume that she's ready because she asked how much. Look for multiple signals for confirmation, so if she smiles, OK, that's good. If she asks how much, that is good. But if before she asks. If after she asks how much, she says, please give me two minutes, let me step outside and let me call my fiance.

You know, that also might be a good sign. If she does that and then comes back and then she says, look, I really like everything that we've seen here so far, especially this is this and this. But to be honest with you, when we're coming here, my absolute rock bottom was X amount. What can you do for that? That might also be a good signal. So you see that it makes more sense to look for all these signals and see how weighty is it, rather than the first time she smiles at you and she says how much you now start trying to go for the kill.

I'm trying to sell her, sell her silver package, platinum package, golden package, or whatever package it is that you have in your wedding photography service. So look for multiple signals. We're trying to get an accurate assessment of how interested people are. First of all, first of all, I interested at the. Second of all, it's a proposal adequate. It is only after we do that that we can start trying to close the deal.

So, well, learning to deal with buying signals actually is critical for success because you have to figure out when it is to now put forward the proposal and say the next step is this or the deposit is going to be this or this is how much it's going to cost you. But please, please, please. The most important thing I hope I've been able to pass across and emphasize it again just in case I didn't, is what you should be doing is don't overvalue buying signals.

What we should be doing is always doing qualification and always doing discovery. Who am I talking to? What is the problem? What are they? What are they trying to solve? Where are they running to or where are they running away from? The proposal that I have in mind, is it adequate, you know, blah blah blah. So if the bride says, can you give me a sample, let me go and show the groom. Let me go and show my husband to be.

Don't rush to close the sale there. You can ask questions. You can say, yeah sure, no problem. I can give you a sample. Which samples would you want and what are you hoping? What are you hoping to achieve? If you show your husband this or you show your sorry, no husband, OK, well in Nigeria by the time, at least in the wedding space by the time you know they're engaged and they're already talking to you, we just start referring to them as husband and wife.

There are some brides who will say no he is not my husband yet we're getting married in December. I've only I've run into like one or two birds like that. But in this case I don't think will be will be a problem to say So what are you hoping that you know if you give it to your husband like you know what do you think your husband is concerned about? You know, things like that ask more questions. So the more questions you get,

the more confirming, confirming signals that you're going to get or the more objections that you're going to get that have been unspoken. And either way, it's good. If you ask questions and get confirming information, then you know that you have a good deal on the table and it's time to move for the close. If you ask more questions and you get objections, that's not a problem. It means that there are some things that bride doesn't quite understand, potential customer doesn't quite understand or she thinks that your proposal hasn't been able to cover one or two areas.

That is good. It is good that you know it now so that you can address it now at this current meeting. Because if those objections are there, you give her the sample and she goes and you never address those, you never address those objections, chances are it's not going to come up again. She's not going to give it up herself because like I said, when we get to the stage of naira and cobo, most people will just lock up and they'll start trying to reduce how much the naira and the COBO is.

So the more objections that we can get out, the better. OK, 30 minutes. OK, Too long. So let me just bring it to a close then. So thank you very much for your time and attention today. I hope I've been able to expose, open up you guys to, especially those who are newbies. If this is your first time listening to the show, what a buying signal is, why it's important. When to try and close the deal, when not to, when to ask more questions.

So yeah, connect with me on LinkedIn. My name is Tavishima Ayede, I'm the host of the show. You can confirm the spelling of my name from the link we are currently listening to this episode. Then also connect with me on WhatsApp or Telegram. I love hearing from you guys. The phone number is 08064662140 and the country code is +234. So thanks for your time and attention. I'll catch you guys at the next recording and there'll be no detour we have OK, I'll know my list of questions now, but whatever it is that I promised two or three episodes that we're going to do after buying signals, that's definitely what we should be following up with.

That's for those of you who are regular listeners. So I'll catch you guys at the next episode.