Loading…
Auto-generated; may contain errors.
Loading transcript…
Hello and welcome to the show. Today we're going to be talking about how to reach out to other benefactors, or rather how to reach out to benefactors because in this part of the world, it's something that we're used to. You know, you meet an influencer in quote or there's somebody who is influential in your community or you have a rich uncle or a rich auntie or you know, that's what we do in Niger. So today's episode is going to be hard to reach out to these sorts of people because I
haven't hammered yet. You know, I haven't blown, but still I'm getting outreach from a bunch of folks. And typically it's people saying things like my name is XYZI do Abci got your number from here and there. I need your help or advice because this is my difficulty. And typically it's me, me, me, me. I need, I need, I need, I need. Can you, can you, can you please, please, please help me, help me, help me, that sort of thing.
And since it's part of the Nigerian culture, I guess it's something that we can get rid of. So today's podcast episode is going to be dedicated to share some ideas about how we can be much more effective when it comes to reaching out to benefactors, getting them on board with our cause and trying to see what we can do to get benefactors to help move our ministry forward. Now, apologies because this is going to be a noisy episode.
I'm going to audio booth. In fact, it's a late night episode so and that's because had a very busy day today. Well, a fun day anyway, because wifey decided that we should take the kids out. And of course it makes sense because, you know, X mass period and all that. So what the Java, is it Java or JAV? The JAV Christmas thing at the Hilton Hotel. And yeah, it turned out to be good fun. Excuse me, good fun. Anyway, where was I?
So like I said, OK, so later that episode. So expect me to be more, more foggier than usual. OK, Yeah, that's what I said. Today I'm going to talk about how to reach out to benefactors. I've made a few podcast episodes about that in the past. And so I guess today I'm just trying to extend that dialogue. Then if you'd love to connect with me to explore opportunities, then call me what's happening on 08064662140. Then connect with me on social media.
I spend most of my time on LinkedIn. The name to look for is Tavishima Aide. So like I said, typical outreach that I'm getting these days is my name is Max YZI. Do this and this. I got your number from here. I would like you to help me. I would like advice. This is my difficulty. Help me do this for me, do this for me, do that for me. Now we'll just talk on the Internet about being authentic and honest and everything.
You know, I hope you guys can see now the reason why I say do not start off by being authentic and honest and everything. Because sometimes being authentic and honest and all our jazz is not necessarily in our best interest. Because like in this case, yes, you're being authentic. You're speaking your truth, you're showing how much it hurts. And it's a passionate plea because sometimes I look at these things, I'm like, man,
honestly wish I could help this guy or help this girl. But this honesty, this, whatever it is that you're trying to do is not going to be very effective in getting a response. And let's face it, like I said, I have not blown yet. And I'm already receiving a ton of these outrageous. So I can imagine how someone like Tony Lumelu or, you know, Dangote and all the others must feel, you know, when they open their inbox or they check their SMSS.
And I'm beginning to see why, you know, there's this stereotype in Nigeria about how rich people are heartless and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And I've been and see where it comes from. You know, there's no, there's a limit to how much of this that somebody can take. You know, you wake up in the morning and your WhatsApp messages, you know, my name is this. I do this. I got your number, I'm in difficulty, help me, You open your emails.
My name is this. I do this. I got your number. I'm in difficulty. Help me. You go to church, My name is this. I do this. I'm a difficulty, help me. You're in a mosque, My name is this. I got your number, blah, blah, blah. I'm a difficulty. Help me. There's only so much of it that somebody, you know, human being can take. And now I'm beginning to see why rich people in quotes in this part of the world are considered to be cynical or heartless or whatever, because there's only so much of this that somebody can take.
So let's explore a better way that you can go about reaching out to benefactors or reaching out to potential benefactors since it's our culture in this part of the world. Well, before I go into it, shout outs to some folks, some kind of folks, there's Victor Chinoso. Victor E Chinoso, he was a listener of the podcast on Spotify, reached out to me on LinkedIn. He's a digital marketer and he's Google certified. That's really, really impressive.
Lots of Google certifications going on these days, and I think it's not a bad way to make yourself stand out apart from the crowd. So if you remember, on previous broadcast episodes, we've been talking about trying to beef up your professional credibility and trying to distinguish yourself. This is one way that you can make yourself stand out from the crowd. So I'm not just a digital marketer and it's not just YouTube.
I've been watching to learn my craft, but I'm actually Google certified and I've worked on XYZ number of campaigns, so that sort of thing. And so Victor Sheen also wished God's blessings upon me and appreciated my effort on the podcast. And I'd like to say, Victor, thank you very much. Comments like yours, encouragement from guys like you is what helps to keep the show going. And then there's also Grace Okuri, who also listens on Spotify and reached out on LinkedIn.
I think she's a former law officer at Law Pavilion and she's currently legal. No, hold on, OK. She was a legal officer at Law Pavilion and currently a research assistant at Babcock University. And she says the podcast is a breath of fresh air from the lifestyle podcast that we have in Africa because, you know, most of the African podcasts are, you know, our own lifestyle issues, shall, you know, be your greatest is motivate yourself,
problems of millennial life for young men, millennial life for young women, blah, blah, blah. You know, all these other things. They're not bad. But I'm just saying that's what everybody's trying to do so far. I was a breath of fresh air discovering the podcast, an African podcast hosted by someone living on the continent on strategies on how to deal with business and how those strategies can be applied in the African landscape.
And so she had lots of kind words like that. And so thank you very much, Grace of Corey for listening to the show and Grace of Corey and Victor Chinos. So I hope you guys are handing out the podcast to other people so that the benefits that you derive from the show, other people can derive as well. So that ties in neatly to the topic we're talking about today. Ties in neatly to what? You know, Gracel Curry said, we're talking about problems of face over here on the African continent and see how business strategies can apply to these sorts of things.
And that's exactly what we're doing over here today. So on the continent, at least in Nigeria anyway, Nigeria and Ghana, because you know, our culture is going to be similar like that. Nigeria, Ghana, Cameroon, we have this big man thing, this big woman thing, this benefactor thing. So today let's figure out how to reach out to benefactors much more effectively and go beyond. My name is I do this. I got your number. I need your help.
This is my difficulty. Help me. So the better way is this. I think you can pretty much keep the intro, but things might be better if you try things wrong way. If you showed up to big Bros or big sis or whoever it is and you say that, look, I listen to you at XYZ. That's in my own case because I have a podcast. And it would also be the same for Illumilu and Dangote and whoever is the big man or the chief or the pastor or the whatever, the imam, whatever it is you're running after.
It's possible that these people have spoken and several engagements, you know, they've been on TV. Some of these people might have books written about them or they may have written autobiographies or something like that. So their ideas are out there if you're willing to search. So it might be helpful to say, look, you know, bigger Bros, Big says I listen to you at XYZ. Well, I've been exposed to your ideas around 123.
I've tried applying XYZ to help improve my situation, but so far I'm coming up with zero. These are difficulties I'm coming up with. How would you recommend me getting around these sorts of difficulties? Now, in a certain sense, it's still the same thing. But the first way is you coming cap in hand and you're begging. I need your help. This is my difficulty. The second way is coming about it in a much more elegant fashion, like this is my problem.
This is how I've tried to solve it based on what you've said in the past or based on what you know, ideas that I think you would try to execute, you know, giving your worldview or giving your business giving or whatever. And these are the difficulties that I've come up against. So in your professional opinion, what would you recommend about getting around these sorts of difficulties? You know, you're doing the same thing, but you're not begging.
It's not give me something, give me something, give me something. It's look, I'm stuck and I have already tried one or two things, one or two things based on what I've learned from you from interviews or from your whatever, and I'm stuck. So what would you recommend as the next step? You guys are going to have a much more different conversation than I'm in trouble, I'm in difficulty. Help me now. I think starting off the relationship this way, then trying to add value over the long term.
You know, I've given the example of my short term mentee from last year or maybe two years ago, Remy Leco, and how after our conversations, you know, she keyed on to the fact that I don't like PowerPoint. But I'm constantly being asked by show organizers, event organizers, you know where I'm speaking. You know, there's some people who say, look, there must be PowerPoint and I hate PowerPoint and I don't use PowerPoint.
So if you're going to consider me to come and speak at your events or to come train up your people, I'm letting you guys know ahead of time. I do not like PowerPoint and I do not use PowerPoint even for a for our engagement. I am not going to use PowerPoint. So just letting you know that if it's important to you, just letting you know that we're going to start that quarrel from the beginning. Well, anyway, so Remy Lekum picked up on that.
And you know, for her, the way of helping was like, I love PowerPoint. That's what Remy Lekum says. My wife is also one of those people who loves PowerPoint. My mom, she also loves PowerPoint. And to be honest, you PowerPoint people, you guys confuse me. I really don't understand you guys. You really confuse me. But anyway, she loves it. And she was like, look, whenever people are stressing you over PowerPoint, just give me a call.
Tell me what you want to say in the PowerPoint. I'll send you over some drafts. And so for her, that was her own way of adding value to my own life. And that's the reason why for the few times that Remy Lekman said, look, I'm trying to reach into this account, I had this difficulty. What do you think I was? I had no problem with brainstorming with her because this is how she was thinking of adding value to my life. OK, you don't like PowerPoint.
I love PowerPoint. The next time you need PowerPoint, give me a call. I'll send you over some drafts so you can start off your conversation the first way that I mentioned. But now talk about how you try to solve the problem based on this person's business philosophy or generalized philosophy or whatever. And then talk about the problems that you've been running into. And then ask for the advice about how you should get around said difficulties without asking them for money over time.
Try and add value to the relationship by adding value to the relationship. I just gave you an example about Remy Leko and PowerPoint because in this case, let's face it, for her to make a PowerPoint presentation for me, it's it's just going to cost. And I don't know how PowerPoint slides look great and I don't know how long it takes her to do it, but let's just say it will take her two hours. It will just take her two hours of her life.
She's able to help me out. And then that is what gives her the right to ask me a bunch of stuff in the future. So the scope is the same add value over the long term, it'll give you the right to ask for things in the future so that maybe even one day if you call up the person and say, hey, bigger Bros, you know, I hate to do this, but to be honest, man, I'm in, I'm in a hole. I didn't like 100 Ki beg Bros. If you help me, you know, at least you would have earned the right.
Sometime in the future, you're going to be able to sneak in the ask. Now, let me give an example about how, because to be honest, like I said, it's the culture in this part of the world. And you know, I won't lie, you know, I've had to, as much as I would like to admit it, I've had to reach out to benefactors every once in a while. You know, I'm not proud of it. But let's just pretend that in the future I run into more voodoo because I've been mentioning her on the podcast,
you know, on a Ebony Live, Ebony live TV, the former streaming service and the former TV station because I noticed that no longer on DSTV, but I see some of that stuff on Netflix. So I'm wondering, is the station still there? I'll be usually back into streaming only. So let's say, you know, like next week I run into Marbudu and I need like 500 M. If I do this whole thing, you know, my name is this. I do this. I'm pleased to finally meet you.
You're my hero, I'm a difficulty, I need your help, blah blah. I beg raise me 500 M you know that's somehow that's me cap in hand. I'm begging but so excuse me late night and then plus how my time in Abuja is getting really bad right now. Maybe I should join all these people wearing face masks. Where was that? So I run into more abudu. If I do this cap in hand thing and I start begging for 500 M, you know, it's somehow no.
But then if I meet her, let's say we happen to be speaking at an event together or something. And then I talk about her hotel acquisitions. Because back when I was a younger man growing up in Lagos, with her involvement in Protea Hotel, there's something that I found really, really interesting because Mahabudu came up, her come up in the game was through human resources. I think she was a, she was a human resource professional.
I don't know her full career, but I know that she was in human resources. And then next thing you hear that antique ones Protea hotel and it's something I found quite fascinating, especially since the 1st wedding fair that I ever attended happened to be at a Protea hotel. So yeah, I found out to be quite interesting. So if me and are more able to now happen to be on stage speaking or something, I'm not just going to ask her for 500 AM
like that. We'll start conversations around, you know, how hotel acquisitions because to be honest, that's the one that interests me. Yeah, she's known more for being a media mogul, but the thing that caught my own fancy is the whole hotel acquisition thing. And we'll have that conversation. I involvement with Project Hotel, how the whole thing started. She currently has an Ebony Life Place, so it looks like a real fancy, swanky hotel.
If you check the pictures online, just Google Ebony Life Place. So yeah, you know, the conversations would be around that, how she entered in, how she divested her ownership in Protect Hotels, how she's been able to leverage this whole thing with Ebony Life. Please talk about her current business and priorities and, you know, stuff like that. That's the way that the conversation will be more able to flow when we finally meet person on person and we're speaking on the same stage.
Now. Later on, I will try to add value to her life and to her business over the long term. And it's going to earn me the right to ask something. Eventually, someday I might end up doing business with her worth 500 M, But you see that I'm not going to. The first time I meet her is not going to be hey, what I would do. I really love what you do. This is how I first heard about you when I was a young man on the come up. I'm glad we're finally sharing the same stage.
I beg, I need some help. I need some advice. I need some difficulty. I beg Auntie, if you raise me 500 M, that's not how I'm going to start the conversation and hope you guys can even see that if I start the conversation that way from the get, I'm ready putting myself in the what's that word? Now I'm putting myself in lower, lower status from day one. And when you're dealing with your benefactors, you know, big boys, big girls, there's a limit to how much lower posture, lower status, lower.
I'm finally hard to put this thing into words. How much of this kind of positioning that you want to adopt over the long term? You know, somebody should see you as an equal in a cultural sense or in a philosophical sense or in a whatever sense see you as an equal. I mean, they acknowledge that, yes, I have more money than this guy, but at the very least, they should know that they're equals. So when me, I'm more would do.
When we jump, eventually, when me and Dangote, we start to roll. That's how I want the whole thing to be. I want down with you to see that yeah, me and this bird were equals. I have a shit ton of money. He has no money. But you know, this guy's all right. That's I want to position myself and that's I should be positioning yourself too. So this whole thing of my name is this is I got your number. I need your help. I have some difficulty.
Send me money. Do me this, do me that. Let's try and pipe on that a little bit. And I know it's it's hard, especially when you need money like now, now, now, now, now. So for those podcast episodes where I talk about networking, I hope you guys see how the whole thing ties in. You know, when I say and other people talk about networking, when we say that the best time to network is not today. The best time to network was,
you know, last year or two years ago. Because when you have a need today, what you have is solid network and resources you can't tap into. You can solve that problem today, but if you're in a hole now, like if I need 500 M now and I start running now, I'm trying to reach out to people because I'm trying to raise 500 M now, you know, that's the problem. But if I did some networking 345 years ago and I started rolling in certain kinds of circles and you know, I'm in the hole for 500 M, you know, it's a different thing.
Me reaching out to people is different. They know me. I'm an associate, you know, we're friends, you know, we're boys or I'm some promising young man that somebody's willing to take a chance on or something so. The best time to build your network was, yeah, last year or two years ago. OK, no problem. We didn't start. Start networking now. Start reaching out now. Start building alliances now. But just know that you can't start tapping in or asking for money or trying to draw down on these relationships today.
So give it some time. Don't come with this whole please give me money. Please help me come with it from this angle, like, oh, I've been exposed to you in the past. I admire what you do. I know that this is what you said. This is how I've tried to apply it in my life. In applying it, I've run into a number of difficulties in my business and in my career. How would you recommend I go away from I push through these problems?
OK, now that I have your phone number, would it be OK to keep in touch every now and then? Then you now try and add value to that person over the long term. That is all. We give you the right to ask for something in the future. So that's the best way to go about it, to keep playing this benefactor game. Now, some of you are going to say, you know, real politic. And I understand, especially in the political, that somebody's people, you know, big men, big women don't want you to stroke their ego and everything.
So like, I understand that's your game. I get it, especially if you're involved in the political space. So that whole thing of you go there and without you will be nothing. And, you know, you praise the person and you put the ballet and everything and you prostate and you hold their shoe and you carry that handbag and yeah, that's you. If that's part of your deliberate strategy, you know, stroke, there you go. You're the best thing since life spread after God is you all that whatever.
If that's your strategy, then it's OK, no problem. It's all good. There are people who do that deliberately as a strategy to boost their careers and to boost their businesses. Unfortunately, I don't know that how to do that sort of thing, but look for people who are good at that thing and then learn. Yeah, because it does happen because like I've noticed in Abuja now, people are putting on billboards calling Wiki. Wiki is the minister was against obviously minister for Federal Capital Territory.
I can't remember by Anyway, he's like the equivalent of the governor for the FCC currently at the date of this recording. So people are calling him, you know, Mr. Fixer, Mr. Transformation, Mr. this, Mr. that. So, yeah, people are doing that. So if you want to do that as a deliberate strategy, then yeah, by all means go ahead, but just realize that it's a system, learn the system from these people and apply accordingly.
So that's a pretty much what I wanted to come over here on and make a quick episode about today. Just to let you guys know that I think there's a different way to reach out to better factors and to play this game. Ultimately, let's try and be helpful resources and let's try and position ourselves as equals. Me and more Abudu are not equals. She's older. She has a shit ton of money and I don't, but at the very least when I do meet her and when me and Tony Illumilu, when we finally speak on the panel together, I want them to see me as equals.
Of course you'll recognize that they have a shit ton of money and I don't, but at least culturally they will see that we're equals. And I think that's how you guys should be pursuing this as well. Yeah. So that's it. I think I will wrap it up that way. So let me see. Shout outs. OK. I already shouted out Victor. Thanks for listening to the show. Already shouted out, Grace, thank you very much for listening to the show.
I really appreciate your kind words. And after a long day, actually, it was very, very nice thing to open up my LinkedIn inbox and to see the wonderful message from Grace Okorie and the praise. So I really, really appreciate it. So thank you very much. You guys have been listening to the show especially since we're at 1000 and over 1004 episodes right now. So I really appreciate you guys, not just the people discovering me now, but those of you who've been with me from the beginning.
Thanks for the love and thanks for the encouragement. So if you're ready to get actionable strategies to grow your business, you can book a no cost business audit with me just by calling me or messaging me on 0806466 2140. The country code is +234. Or connect with me on socials, especially LinkedIn. All the other socials are going to disappear in January. I've already started the process of deleting my Facebook page and my Instagram and they said it's going to take one month.
So you know, by the middle of January, I'm not going to be anywhere else, just LinkedIn. And me giving up my phone number is not an Ave. for you guys to say this is me, this is what I do, this is how I got your number. I need your advice, I need your help, this is my difficulty. I need some money. That's anyway I've said more than enough on that. So thanks for your time and attention. I'll catch you guys in the next episode and I hope you all have a wonderful night.
I think it's time for me to get some short eye after I upload this episode.