Why Relationships Rule Nigerian Sales

Hello and welcome. My name is Tavishima Aide. I solve sales and marketing challenges and I'm making today's broadcast recording at home, so I expect to hear some noise in the background. Now, the goal of this podcast is business education. So if you're impressed by the time you're done, please spread the word so that your friends and family members at home 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 would love to connect with me, you can call SMS or WhatsApp me on 08064662140. Now today on the show, I want to tackle a question. Well, I may have tackled it stylishly in one way before, but let's look at it again. And that is on whether relationship building is necessary in Nigeria because some people think, you know, it is Niger, we're always straight to the business, you know, no chitchat, go straight to the point.

Relationship building, it's not necessary. Don't waste your time. That's what some people believe. However, it depends on what you mean by relationship. If you mean friendship, then yeah, in that case, I'll agree with you. Most Nigerians are not looking for friends. They just have a problem. They need a solution. They have a vision they're trying to achieve. They're not looking for for friends. So cut straight to the chase.

Get this thing over and done and let's move on with our lives. So you sell cars. Don't try to make a friend. This person just wants a car. He's not looking for your best friend. Well, of course, if you take the person out for drinks, you buy them pepper soup, you buy them beer and or not, you know, they'll drink, you know, and they'll enjoy themselves. But really what they're looking for is a car. When they get the car, they will cut and they will go.

I feel as if Nigerian self, you know. But The thing is, nobody's looking for new friends. They just have problems that they need solved. So if you're looking at relationship building, meaning you're going to look for friends, then I agree with you. Yeah, Nigerians, they're not looking for a relationship. So just get in, get out, get going. However, even though relationship doesn't mean friendship in this case, you do have to realise that before you sell something, or before you tell somebody something, or before you do something to someone or do something with someone, you do have to be in some kind of relationship.

Or there has to be some kind of interrelationship, interdependence between both of you before you can sell, before you can influence, and before you can persuade. You can't just show up a total stranger and say, buy my car. That's not going to work if you sell cakes. You can't just walk up to a total stranger and say, buy my cake. That's not going to work if you sell. I don't know all I say performance enhancing products in quotes, if you understand what I mean.

You can't just walk up and say by my thing, it's not going to work. There has to be some kind of relationship. There has to be some kind of interdependence. It's just the normal human dynamics that is involved. So if you look at it from the level of you're just recognizing that basic human thing that exists between people, that now I'm with you, we're together. And in that sense we do have to do relationship building.

But remember, the focus is not friendship because nobody needs new friends. In fact, the average Nigerian has too many friends and is trying to reduce from some of the friends that they have because they feel as if the friends that I have now, they're giving me headache or they're not adding to my life. So let me even remove some people from the queue now. This is the reason why we have to foster some kind of relationship, some kind of interdependence, some kind of,

you know, whatever it is that you have to, whatever it is that we're going to call it. Because before you can sell effectively, before you can persuade effectively, before you can get some people on board, before you can be on the same page with someone, you know, whether it's politics or whether it's something that people are doing in the office together. Before you can get on the same page, you have to be able to make an effective proposal, a relevant proposal, a tailored proposal, a tailored sales page,

or whatever it is that you're going to call it. You have to be effective. It has to be relevant, and it has to be tailored to them before it's going to carry any weight with them. And now The thing is, you cannot make this effective sales pitch or proposal. You can't be effective in it. It can't be relevant unless you know something about the person, about their context, about their situation, about their desires. Think about it.

We're currently in 2025 and as usual, everywhere is hot now. You know, people are already talking about President Tinobu being single candidates and this and this and that. You know, people are beginning to strategize. We're going to make alliances. You can't just walk up to me and tell me vote for Tinobu, because Tinobu is the best thing since sliced bread. Unless you know something about me, about my context, my situation, my desires is unless you know that you may not be able to come and say vote for Tenable.

He's the very guy. Because depending on who I am, the way I'm feeling, my situation, the things I'm desiring or the things that is pinching me, if you come and say vote for Tenable, he's the very guy. I might give you backhand. I'm not saying I'm against Inabu, I'm just saying that I'm just trying to show you how in other things, before you can deliver a sales pitch, before you can deliver your agenda, before you can deliver your proposal, you need to know something about that person,

about their context, their situation, their desires, where they're running from, where are they heading to. So in politics, that's all determine whether you go and tell somebody that look, vote for Peter or be he's the very guy, or vote for article, article is the very guy, or vote for Tinabu. Tinabu is the very guy. So it's the same in business, it's the same as in politics and it's in the same as in normal, normal human relationships, even among families.

Now, how do you get to know someone before you can make this your sales speech? You only get to know someone if you have established some kind of relationship. So the question now is what kind of relationship should we be building with our customers, with our potential clients, Whether you're in Nigeria or in America or Australia or Mogadishu or Afghanistan, The kind of relationship that we should, we should be pursuing,

of course, should be 1 of respect. Make sure respect and make sure regard, which is the reason why when you talk to the old school people, especially, you know, Brian Tracy, Tom Hopkins, you know, all those people, 1970 something, 1960 something, 1980 something people. That is one reason why they emphasize this whole thing of, of what's it called, you know, credibility, competence, you know, showing up appropriate to the context.

That's why they emphasize all these things because it's the beginning of the relationship that is going to be established. Like I mentioned in a couple of podcast episodes ago, if you're looking for a cardiologist and they say Tavishma is a correct cardiologist who graduated first class, you know, blah, blah, blah. And then you show up to my office. I'm office looks like it's a shark or is a batcher. They enter inside and I went T-shirt and then I went on jeans.

It's not going to inspire confidence in you because it is not appropriate to what you expect in that context when you're meeting a cardiologist for the first time and the relationship is going to be off to a wrong start. So that's why all these old school guys, that's why they emphasize these things a lot. It matters. So that's the kind of relationship we're going to build. 1 of mutual respect, one of mutual regard. So we're always going to show up appropriate to the situation.

We will also try and establish some credibility and establish some competence on our own part because we want to look the part and we want to be able to inspire confidence in the other person that we can do what it is that we say we will do. So first, first, respect, regard, come correct, show up correct. Then next, we're going to be able to build from rapport. And I keep pointing out on the podcast, and I'm going to repeat it again.

When we say rapport, remember how we started off today's podcast episode? We're not talking about friendship. It's not that you guys have to become five or six. No, no, no. We are just trying to establish some mutual similarity. I'm a correct guy, you're a correct guy. Or I'm a correct guy. You're a correct babe or the other way. I'm a correct babe, you're a correct guy. We're similar enough. We're good enough to hang around.

We're reasonable people. We both have common sense. Because of that, we can chat, we can sit down, we can talk. That is just what rapport is to just establish some commonality and then move on. Don't dwell on the commonality. Like I explained for to one of my clients last week who is a music producer, you know, like I told him, you know, you establish some things 123 and then you move. If you dwell, it begins to become inappropriate because early on, he and I, we bonded about our family situation.

You know them, they have a stepmother, stepmother situation. And in my own family, we have those kind of situations too. You know, I have siblings from I have siblings from another woman. But it's something we just touch based on, you know, sharp, sharp, like, oh, like you 2. And then we exchange one or two things. But then quickly we moved to the business of the day, which is how he can make money as a music producer using the frameworks that I provide.

So if we had dwelt on that thing for 30 minutes, 45 minutes would have been going off point. Who is he helping? OK, you, you have stepmommy and you have daddy issues. Me, I have daddy issues and stepmommy issues and step issues. And then we dwell on that for 45 minutes. To what end? What was a simple something of established rapport like, oh, OK, your farm was like that, OK, even me to yourself, blah, blah, blah. You know, you should be shit.

You just on the thing small and you know, eventually you focus again on business. So one point of similarity 123 and then you move on to discuss business. We're just trying to establish that look, we're similar. We're good enough to hang around. Why? Reasonable people. What good to talk to. There's no Yawa here. You can let your guard down. You know, I'm not an evil spirit. That's just what we're trying to achieve when it comes to building robot.

Now, the reason why that is important is because it's what allows us to go into needs analysis. Needs analysis is when we have conversations around the people's wants, around their needs, around their desires, you know, all those sorts of things. Oh, sorry, 1 moment. OK, supposed to have a meeting in 5 minutes. So let me wrap this up quick. Anyway, so all this rapport building is what allows us to go into needs analysis.

When you sit down with somebody for the first time and you're like, oh, OK, we went to the same school. OK, you know, by your myself, I know by oh, OK, you know this set, I know this set, blah blah, blah, blah, blah. Even your popsy to blah blah blah. Oh, you're from this part of the country. You know, that small, small, whatever, by the time you slide into business, you know people can relax more. OK, this is the correct guy and they're ready and willing to answer your questions around their business.

Now let's do a quick example again with the fellow who is doing, who has the CV, the business around CV building and he builds CVS for people that's curriculum Vt and he audits their CVS. Currently, he's targeting people who are doing NYSE and maybe possibly people find underground. I say underground undergrad, undergraduate system. So let's use him again as an example. Hopefully, I should be able to air his episode tomorrow.

That's when he spoke on his own audio. That's the podcast episodes that he found insightful, the things that he applied from the episode and how that has helped him to grow his business. So hopefully I'll be able to put his own audio up tomorrow. Then after that, you know, I'll move on. I'll use somebody else as a case study. But the reason why I use these case studies and from different walks of life, whether I CV building, whether it's export,

whether it's architecture, whether it's selling Catfish, whether I selling a Gucci or selling cars, is I'm just trying to show you how these principles that we talk about are applicable in any kind of business that you are doing except human trafficking. We shouldn't be involved in human trafficking and things like that. So if you have all the human trafficking, what you're doing is illegal. You need to repent. And if they catch you, you will serve jail time.

So where was I? OK now? So for example, in DC building something now. So First off, as the guy is showing up on the NYC camp while he's talking to undergrads, he has to show appropriate to the situation. So you can't show up in singlet and boxers. I don't think he should be able to. He should show up in T-shirt and torn jeans. I don't think so since he's still in NYC. Now if he shows up in khaki, Oh well I'm good. Since they're supposed to discuss careers.

At the very least you should show up smart casual. I don't know if a tie is necessary, but at the very least we're aiming for smart casual. Whatever it is. A smart casual means to be wearing a suit in this. OK, we're rainy season now, so the weather might not be that harsh. You know what? Let me not make any specific recommend recommendations. But since he's in the business of building and auditing TV's and you guys are going to be discussing things like career,

at the very least he should be dressed formal. Sorry, at most he should be dressed formal. Then at the least he should be dressed smart casual. So well enough we'll be able to figure out what that means in this case. Then when you show up on camp, when you're talking to people appropriate, you know, give appropriate dress, show up appropriate addressing people, appropriate, appropriate greeting, all of that. Eventually he has to slide into conversations with people around their intentions, around their interests or around, you know,

career, Nigerian job markets, you know, things like that. You know, post graduation and post passing out. The only way somebody is going to be able to start talking about these sorts of things is if he's able to quickly establish some rapport. Now on the podcast, I've always, I've mentioned my own simple formula. It's not even a formula. It's just the basic pattern that has always been with me because right from when I was small,

people have always asked, oh, Tavish my what does that mean? And I quickly clocked that in this part of the world, everybody's name has a meaning. Everybody's name has some significance. I mean, apart from Nigerian kids of maybe like 10 years ago who, you know, they used to name them things like Kanye or Jayden or things like that. So if you all know those kids that was born, you know, 10 years ago, 15 years ago and your name is Kanye or her name is Jayden, then well, I guess your mom or your dad just named you after their favorite music artist or favorite celebrity or whatever.

But outside of those group of Nigerians, the rest of us have names that mean something. So for me, I've always found it easy to build rapport around what people's names mean. Hey, bro, what's up? Hiding up? My name is establishment and you are oh, my name is Ogadenbee. So wow, Ogadenbee. Have never heard that name before. Where are you from? Wow, from Niger Delta and from so, so, so and so blah, blah, blah. I've never heard of that.

Tried before, like, yeah. But really, you know, OK, I know uncle who stayed here and here, but, you know, like, really, tell me, tell me some more. As in all, I put it like, I always, for me, it's very easy to start off on that basis of, you know, where are you from? You know, what does your name mean? I'm not recommending that you do that. Well, I'm just, I've just noticed that for me, those are typical patterns that I fall into that allow us to have a simple conversation for the people to see that.

Oh, OK, this guy that is talking to me, he's not an evil spirit. He's a Nigerian just like me. He's a calm guy. He's a correct guy. He has a good head on his shoulders. There's nothing in this conversation that I need to be afraid about. So typically, that's why I start with name, tribe, state of origin, what else? The course that people studied in school, you know, personal goals, you know, 5 minutes, small, small chat.

Especially in this case, since the person we're using for case studies in the business of building CVS and auditing CVS is the kind of thing that not only gets people to relax, but also starts giving you a sense of who this person is. Because there's some people that when you talk to them, you will know that, OK, based on the vibe that I'm receiving from this person, I should be very formal or I should be very informal, or the CV document should be semi formal, or it should be like this or it should be like that.

So all these things are really, really, really, really important. But remember, the whole point is not to get the person's family history or the history of their education or whatever. We're just looking for common commonality, common areas of interest, common areas of history, common areas of hobby, common, you know, whatever between us. So just small stock. Sorry, I say stock, small talk. And then, apart from rapport building, you get some information that is going to be necessary for crafting the perfect CV or crafting A

purposefully built CV. Most importantly, like I said, it is from establishing some level of rapport that the person will now be comfortable answering some questions. Because if you just roll up to somebody, I say, well, yeah, did you graduate? I mean, the average Niger will be thinking is my excuse me? Like who are you now for good reason. Like I don't know you, you can't just roll up on me and ask me what year did you graduate?

By the time you build some rapport, you should do shit a little bit, you know? Oh yeah. Did you graduate? It's reasonable for somebody to answer, especially if in the rapport building phase you have been dropping some stuff about yourself. Oh, you went to uni jobs? Oh, OK. I always wanted to go to uni jobs but my jam, I didn't make it, so I went to Maiduguri instead. Ended up studying hockey. What is? Oh, you study engineering?

Oh ha ha ha. When did you graduate? We can just roll up to somebody and say what year did you graduate? OK, anyway, so since I have to be out of here in 5 minutes, let me just go straight into sorry, excuse me, have a small cold preferred means of building rapport. So the best way to build rapport is face to face or in person. So like this guy now who does CVS, he has come up with a plan to go to camp to talk to people face to face.

That is the best. You're on the campground, you're talking to somebody face to face that is the best or in person that is the best. But face to face or in person is not always possible. In that case, the next best thing is audio. Phone call, WhatsApp call, Telegram call. You can make phone calls on Instagram too, Instagram call. You can also make LinkedIn audio calls. So face to face is not possible. Audio is best after audio is video.

I know some of you will think video should come first, but just trust me, audio is higher than video. Because for now anyway, in 2025, there's still a bunch of people who are very nervous about being on video. So if you force somebody to put on their video camera for a WhatsApp call or a Zoom call, lots of people will clamp down. They will freeze. So for now just know that audio is higher than video. So after audio calls, next is video.

So WhatsApp video, Zoom call, Microsoft Office, Telegram video. You can also do video over LinkedIn, over Instagram. After that, text based forms of communication, WhatsApp text, SMS, you know, all these sorts of things. Then the last on the scale is e-mail. It is hard to build rapport over e-mail because e-mail is excessively formal. Excessively formal. So by the time you send e-mail back and forth and you know, one e-mail, you're like, oh,

interesting name, what does your name mean? And then from there, the next e-mail you're not asking them or what part of the country are you from? E-mail is a, is a very, it's a formal, it's a formal medium. The person is thinking, look, can you get to the point? What are you asking me about my name and my state of origin for? You're sending me an e-mail. Get to the point of what you're asking for. So if you're trying to build rapport through e-mail, it is not uncommon for somebody to just not reply the e-mail because as far as they're concerned, you're a total stranger.

You reached out by e-mail, they did the decent thing, they responded. Next thing you're asking me questions about me because you are who and why are you asking me questions about me? And then they will ignore. So for building rapport, start with face to face or in person if you can afford to, because you need transport money to travel to somebody's office, to travel to campground to you know, you need money like you need time.

So if face to face or in person is not possible, then audio, audio is not possible. Then video. Hold on, hold on. OK, if audio is possible, you might as well do anyway. Face to face, audio after audio, video after video, text. The worst thing you can do for building rapport is e-mail. But if you have no choice, well, just manage because there are some people who they are e-mail people only. It's weird but those Nigerians exist.

So yeah, sure, send me an e-mail. They won't talk to you. They don't receive a phone call. It must be e-mail. So it is the same for follow up or follow through as I like to call it. I'll explain why later on. It's the same process, but as a guiding principle, we should always be multimodal. Multimodal means we should be open to pursue whichever one presents itself, and we should always prioritise whatever the customer or the client prefers.

So if somebody's a face to face person, but you are not a face to face person, my advice is come on, suck it up. You're a big boy, you're a big girl. It's time to make some money. You have to learn someday. I mean, Dangote says come and see me in my office, Will you say? Oh no, I'm not a face to face person. Dangote, can you call me instead? That's ridiculous. If you're looking for something from Dangote and Dangote says,

Oh yes, come to my office, 9:00 AM, the answer is sure, no problem, I'll be there. Can I have your PS number so I can call to confirm the meeting? It's as simple as that. So be multimodal, but prioritize whatever the client prefers. If you prefer face to face but the person prefers phone calls, look, don't push it. They've already said they prefer phone calls. So The thing is, Oh, sure, no problem. Can I get your phone number right away so that I'll call you tomorrow?

OK, I've collected the phone number. I'm going to send you a text message right now just so that you have my phone number as well. And you know that it's me when I call you tomorrow. That's simple. If you're someone who they prefer the video thing because they are those people. There are some people who are in love with their Zoom and I'm wondering like, why are you like, I don't get it. You people that love Zoom. I really don't get it.

But there's some people that are Zoom people. If it's a Zoom person, sure, no problem. I'll be I can make myself available for the Zoom meeting. So what time do you have in mind? OK, 10:00 tomorrow morning. OK, that's another problem. Will you be sending the Zoom link or should I send it to you? So be multimodal or be open, prioritize whatever the customer or the client prefers. So let me run off on my meeting now, let me not keep people waiting for too long.

So that's it. And that's all for today. Remember, if you'd love to connect, then you can call SMS or WhatsApp me on 08064662140. Thank you very much for your time and attention. I'll catch you same time, same place in your headphones or in your speakers.