Why the big 3 are important to closing a sale - live case study on how not to use WhatsApp to sell

Hello and welcome to the show. Before we begin, the usual warning this is another out and about episode. I'm trying to nuffle to muffle the noise. The windows are up, but just in case you hear people out in the background and cars passing by, that's that's because I'm on the move. But I want to make sure that I put out this episode today. Especially since this episode is a live case study to show us why the Big Three are important to closing the sale.

If you don't know what the Big Three are, it's prospecting. It's qualification. It's discovery. I gave a background to that in yesterday's episode. If this is the first time you're listening to the show, after you're done listening to this, listen to yesterday's episode. Your eyes will be opened up quite a bit. But I'm afraid you still have to search for some more because we have over 650 episodes on this podcast so far, but everything is titled carefully.

Well, it's as carefully as I can if you check. Just using the search function in the website that you're using to listen to this show or the podcast app that you're using to listen to this. If you search using the terms Qualification, Discovery, Prospecting, you should find more episodes where you can be caught up to speed pretty much. And then of course there's also the option of using Google, the interwebs, youtubes, everything basically to find out much more information.

So hello and welcome to the show. This is the sales for the Nigerian Business Podcast. It's available on Spotify, Google Podcast, Apple iTunes, any podcast player of your choice. And remember, you subscribe for free in case you're listening to this on the website and you're wondering if you subscribe on Apple Podcast if they're going to start charging you $7000 a month. That's for those people who are subscribed to. Is it iTunes music or something about nature?

I know the young bloods are all running around young guys and girls all running around with Apple subscriptions. I ask to listen to music. I think it's about 5000 Naira or 7000 Naira or something like that. But to listen to the podcasts absolutely free. You're not going to pay to any pay for anything. So if you're listening on the website, feel free subscribe so that you get you catch all the episodes when they're out.

So like I said, today's episode, case study, really interesting case study at that. I know I've done a couple, but what can I say? People's keep, people keep trying to sell me stuff. Especially now that my profile is kind of increasing and my phone number is all the place, all over the place because I give up my phone number. So people always trying to highlight me, trying to sell me something. So we have more material for doing all these case studies about how not to sell.

Now if you listen to yesterday's podcasts, you got a sense that I said and it actually is the case. It's not a matter of whether I said it or not that if you don't do prospecting well. If you don't do qualifications well and if you don't do discovery well, there's no point in going out to talk to people and those people. Oh, sorry, no, there's always a point of talking to people. I'm just saying, if you don't do these three activities well,

then there's no point in trying to close the deal. The deal is not going to close. There is no deal there. Or you could be talking to the wrong person, or you want to be talking to the right person. You might close the deal and then find out that you delivered what it is that they didn't want and there's a problem. Or that you delivered what it is that they wanted. But then they also hope that some other things would come along.

You didn't cost for that, you didn't quote for that. And then now you guys are having a big argument and dragging each other over the Internet. You know, as we Nigerians like to do, you know, somebody gives you poor service, you know, only give them a battery if you, you know, you go put something up on that timeline or whatever. And hopefully none of us will have to experience that in our business, but it does happen.

So this is the main thesis. Of yesterday show and a point of what I say a lot and I have been stressing especially at live sessions when I'm I'm having sessions with people one-on-one or with the group. I stress that a lot prospecting discovery qualification. If you're not doing that forget about this whole thing of pricing. Forget about proposal, forget about clothes. We have much more fundamental work that we need to do.

So wasted 4 minutes on intro so let's go right in. There's a message that I received from. I received on WhatsApp. Oh by the way, something that I want to point out to those of you who keep reaching out to people on WhatsApp. I've noticed that people who reach out on WhatsApp, LinkedIn, what else? All these places. I think you're pretty much just looking for people that are visible, and that's a mistake. You shouldn't be trying to hunt down people that are visible just because they're visible on the Internet.

You should be looking for people who might have a need for your product or your service, no matter how visible or invisible that they are. For those of us who have a fairly visible presence, lots of people are already trying to sell us stuff. By the time you slip into my DM or you send me a WhatsApp message, you know ten other people have already done it Today. I've not been inclined to listen to the other 10 or the other nine.

Why do you think I'm going to be inclined to listen to you? The only reason why I pay attention and I interact is because I'm a salesperson at heart. I know that the hustle is hard, and so you know I engage. Let you know. Let them not feel like I've been a total jerk, but. Let's be honest, my wife is not going to react the same way. My motherinlaw, my friends, my business partners. And it's the same with you too. If you're trying that outreach and I'm talking to you.

If you've tried this, your wife has received something similar yesterday. She didn't bother reading it, she just deleted, she moved to spam, she did whatever. So stop looking for people that are visible. Try and look for people who might have a need. Because there are some people who reach out and. The outreach, it kind of makes sense. But The thing is, it's not something I'm interested in. It's the sort of thing my wife would be interested in.

But they don't hit up. They hit me up because my phone number is all over the Internet. So let's stop just chasing after people who happen to be visible. Not a good idea. OK, so to the message I received, the fellow starts off the message by saying, good day, friend, How have you been all this while now? Why is this guy pretending to be my friend? I have absolutely no idea who he is. I click on the number thing because it's not stored.

You know When you click on the number thing, it expands. You see the person's face. Sometimes some people put a name there or some tagline and it gives you a sense of who the person is. So I have no idea. These guys, they're pretending to be my friend. How are you, friend? Have you been all this while now? This is a wrong approach you do. It's kind of creepy. It's kind of sneaky. It's off putting. And I think for the average Nigerian babe who receives this kind of message as sales outreach, it's a matter of block.

Because as far as she's concerned, man, these guys is common. But actually you might be the best person in the world with awesome skin care or some financial opportunities or or some health advice or whatever, but you start off like this, good day, friend. Have you been all this Well, she sees the message. It's the guy positioned like a business influencer or something that she's like a big. Spam immediately. So where was I anyway?

This fellow, his mind is in the right place. In the right place saying Good Day Friend is because he's trying to build rapport, but they are established principles for creating rapport with someone that you don't know. And it's something we all have to learn because we all have to talk to strangers, whether it's on WhatsApp or networking functions or whatever. So what are the principles for establishing report? I've done put episodes on that in the past.

After you're done listening to this episodes, just search rapport within the podcast and you see what the principles are. And these are the kinds of questions that we address On the sales clinic, which is the 5K coaching group where you have daily access to me. You ask whatever questions, I give answers, I give assignments to help move the business along. So that's the whole point. Of the group where we can get this kind of Intel, get this kind of coaching, and get this kind of guidance.

So back to the message. So he now continues. I'm sorry for coming into your DM uninvited. I got your contact from a group that we both belong to. Now. This is something that he should have led the conversation with, because this is one of the ways of establishing rapport to show commonality. It's a technique for building report with the potential buyer is something I've spoken about on the podcast. After you're done listening to this, search the over 650

episodes that we have so far. Use the search function. You will see it there. Just type in commonality, Commonality with two M's. I hope I'm spelling it right. Comm. Yeah, yeah. I think commonality has two M's. So commonality with two M's. You check it's there. I have podcast episodes on that and you learn how to do that. So you actually should be leading with the whole commonality thing. So it's sort of Good day, Friend, how you've been all this while.

You're starting off with an honest sorry for showing up on invited. I got your contact from the so so, so, so LinkedIn group. Where were both members? How's your day doing? Or whatever? That would have been a better opener than Good day friend. How have you been all this while? I don't know. You stop pretending. Where was I? Sorry. Let me scroll. See the message. OK. Yes. I want to connect, he continues. I want to connect with important people and share great ideas with them.

I'm a crypto person and I specialize on crypto air drops. My name is XYZ. I'm trying to protect his identity here. What's yours to enable me? Save your contact. Now this is presumptions. Presumptuous. Sorry. Don't start making asks of a client before you deliver value, or before you deliver insights, or before you show relevance or before you show that you care. So why are you asking me of my name? Now maybe in other parts of the world that might be OK, but this is Nigeria.

People are security contracts. I don't know who you are. You just dropped in unannounced. You sound like a scammer and then you're already asking me a name so I can save your contact. Now for those of you who are listening to the show here, who are Nigerians, I hope you already see where this is going. You now know if you're a guy listening to this, you know that by this point your wife would have blocked or your girlfriend would have blocked.

If you're a woman listening to this, you know that by now. Your husband, in fact, your husband, would have ignored this thing since he wouldn't even have engaged to the level that I've engaged so far. You know, we're Nigerians. Let's be honest, we know that this is not going well so far anyway. So if you must make an ask of someone, what's your name? What's your address? What's your child's age? You know, whatever it is that you need to close the deal.

Because if you deliver skin care for children, you have to ask these sorts of questions. How many children do you have? How old are they? What kind of sports are they involved in? What are their hobbies? So if you say children's skin care, you have to ask these sorts of questions. But before you start asking these questions, you need to deliver value. You need to deliver insight, You need to show relevance, You need to show that you care.

Before mom, she's going to open up and say, Oh my daughter Kami, she's 9 year old, she likes swimming, blah blah blah blah blah. If you start off the conversation with some value, oh, good afternoon, ma'am, blah, blah blah, you build rapport, then you start. The whole thing of skin care is really important to children because statistics show that poor skin care in early years leads to these kinds of diseases in the future and blah, blah,

blah and or whatnot. You know, you start off from that angle and once you might be inclined to start answering a couple of questions, like the age of our kids, try not going to their names and the school or give you the address. But if you start off with delivering value, delivering insight. Show why what you're talking about is relevant to her. Or show that you care. Then mom, see my open up and start answering questions.

You don't start from the beginning. Launch into this thing. I don't know who you are. You're a stranger. You're really asking me my name. Anyway, no problem. So the thing continues. I was engaging with the fellow, so my attitude was, hey, look guy, no problem. I understand. We'll have to hustle business somehow, you know? I understand that we have to get the market moving. So that's just my own. That's just my approach.

Because like I told you guys at top of the podcast as a sales coach and appetize with all these people and so I engage with them. But like I mentioned my wife, she can't be bothered. My mother cannot be bothered. In fact, I had to scold my mom one day because somebody called her up a salesperson and man, she washed down this person. I mean, me and my mom were in the middle of an argument, so tempers were already high, but man, she washed down the poor girl.

And after the conversation I was like mommy like. Relax. Now she's just trying to host business. Now that come, now, you know, that was too much. And my mom was like, oh, OK, yeah, that's right. She probably was too much on the poor girl. But The thing is, that's just life. You are intruder. You're catching people at the wrong time. You're going to get busy with washing down if you're not trying to use proper techniques,

processes and frameworks. You're trying to engage people in the conversation and to close the sale. So my mother not going to be nice. My mother-in-law, she's not going to be interested. My business partner Shergo, who handles the video stuff, that's for the media business that we do when we cover weddings and corporate events and things like that. In fact, Shergo would have blocked you from the first from the first message.

My brother, it's not going to block. He's just going to ignore because after all, there's infinite storage on on phones these days. So if you just leave the message there, it's not as if it's going to choke up your phone or anything. My sister in laws are the same. They're not going to engage my sisters. Going to block. I'm sure you get the picture at this stage. I've engaged like this because of who I am, but the average person, especially the average Nigerian, is going to block, is going to delete, is going to spam, is going to report, is going to whatever option is available on that media anyway.

So I was trying to get my guy to understand something. I'm just trying to help him out. So I shift the conversations. Like why did you assume I'd be interested in crypto? Because my guy has started off this conversation. Assuming. That I'm a crypto bra. That I'm into these these sorts of things. So I'm like, why just you might be interested in crypto. I'm giving him a hint or trying to hint that you shouldn't be prospecting or chasing people who don't want what you have,

who don't need, who can't afford, or who don't have a sense of urgency. I didn't do anything in the past, online or physically, to show that I'm interested in crypto. I haven't visited any crypto forums. I haven't attended any crypto events. I haven't connected, commented on any crypto chats. You know those sorts of things. I haven't done absolutely anything. Now if this guy was looking for an inbound method for people to do something online to show that they're interested, and so he hosted A crypto event and I was one of the people who attended attended it, then this approach makes sense.

In fact, the approach would be the first one should be, oh thank you very much for attending the event that I hosted, you know, blah blah blah. And then you take the conversation from there. I'm not a total stranger. You're rather we wouldn't be total strangers cause at least breeze through the events is a much more warmer interaction. So these are approaches that people can do to make their life a whole lot easy. Only chase people who want need afford have a sense of urgency overall interested in what it is that you have.

There are some things that you can do in the real world are things that you can do online to get people to raise their hand. So if you're a crypto person and you're looking for crypto bras or crypto sisters. To do business with you, then host the crypto forum and start messaging. People that attend host the crypto event and start messaging people that attend. Check. What's it called? Niger. No, there's this thing. All these forums are like Quora.

What else? Twitter. This is Nigerian website I used to write on. I can't remember what it's called, Niger something I can't remember. But there are all these places where people, people argue and comment on all these things. So just go to the comment section. You see all those people and message them. You might have much more productive conversations doing that because at least you're talking with people who are within the crypto ecosystem rather than just sending off messages to folks like me unannounced.

Anyway, my guy doesn't get the point. When I was talking about mine or target people who might be interested in crypto. So my guy continues the conversation and this is what he says. He says crypto is a modernized way of exchange. Anyone that doesn't learn how it works now will regret learning it later. So that's my guy's comeback. I'm trying to hint that hey, I'm not interested, maybe should be hinting at someone who is interested and his response is to say anybody who has sense should be interested or you they would regret it later.

That's his response anyway. At this stage, he's trying to do what the average Nigerian thinks or the average person thinks, that it's about communicating value. It's about how well you can toast. It's about how well, how smooth you can sound. So he's trying to communicate value, but The thing is, he doesn't know what it is that I find valuable. It's not just about communicating value. Being smooth and being able to make persuasive arguments is nice, but it is better to make a persuasive argument if that person's interest and your own interests already align.

Then you'll be making progress. How do you know that You're not talking across, talking at cross purposes? So how do you discover what the buyer finds valuable before you start smooth talking them for somebody who is already in love with crypto? But maybe he's not ready to take the next step, This argument of look my guy, you need to take the next step because this is a modernized way of exchange. If you don't learn this thing now, you'll regret the pain will pass you, the train will pass you by, you know, formal and all that fear of missing out.

That will work on someone who is, you know, leg here, like the kind of interested, but doesn't know where to take the next step, those kinds of things that work. So it's before you start trying to communicate value, you have to discover what the person finds valuable. So what's the best way to communicate value? How do you find what people find valuable? Again, these are the things that we discuss and try and figure out in the 5K coaching group where you can ask questions every single day.

So my guy doesn't take the hint because I'm still hinting. He continues the conversation. I only specialize on crypto airdrops. This is another mistake he's using in technical terms that the average person does not understand. And that's the reason why finally, this guy actually needs a sales coach. You're talking to someone. I've said I'm not interested in crypto. As far as he knows, I'm a total novice when it comes to crypto and you're not talking about crypto airdrops.

Do I even know what crypto is in the first place? Before, you're not talking about what airdrops are. There's a right way to communicate with regular people. Because a lot of us are specialists in our own field, we assume that every single person knows the same things that we do. You're a crypto specialist. You know what the crypto AirDrop is. You did it yesterday, You've done it today. You will do it tomorrow. I don't know what the crypto AirDrop is.

My mom doesn't know. My wife doesn't know. Your guy in the office doesn't know. So you can't just keep going around talking crypto air drop up and down thinking that you buy invisible people into making this sale anyway, it continues. Crypto Air air drops are coins that are given out free without buying it. Let me repeat, he says crypto air drops are coins that are given out for free without you buying it. If they are free then why are we paying for it?

What does the average person mean or what does the average person think? When they hear the term free, I mean these are gosh any I, I don't know for this one, you don't even have to be a sales coach or a business consultant to say that there's something wrong with the way that you are couching this message that the messaging is off. You're saying we'll give it out free, but you're saying that we have to, that we have to once we buy it, it is free anyway.

OK, so crypto airdrops are coins. He's using the coin metaphor. That's not useful. Messaging is poor. If you're talking to somebody that is innovious and and this whole thing of free anyway, let me leave the whole the whole free thing calling cryptos coins. Yeah, maybe that might work. But. It's better to just call him a token, because when the actual person, when the average person hears coins, they think coins the average person.

So if you use tokens even that is still a technical term, but it's easier to start walking around that kind of messages messaging And he continues, I want to bring it to your notice that there is a coin that you can make $300.00 mining it for free. Now I happen to know some stuff about crypto just a little bit. And he betrays that this guy has a lack of product knowledge. He has a lack of some expertise. Oh, sorry about that.

OK, that was the alarm that I set so that I wouldn't go overboard. We've already done 20 minutes on this podcast recording, so. Let me just bring it up to the close. OK? Let me scroll through his messages right away. OK, I want to bring it to your notice that there's this coin that you can make $300.00, mining it for free. So it shows lack of product, product knowledge, lack of expertise, because there's no way that you can mine for free.

There's an energy cost. In fact, the energy costs are high. There's equipment costs. I can't mine on my phone or my laptop. I need specialized equipment. There's the time and the cost of acquiring the knowledge. Because I have to go and sit at the foot of someone who knows how to mine and then receive that knowledge if I'm receiving it for free, or pay for that knowledge. Apart from that, I have to get embedded into the community.

Bottom line, it's not free. There's money involved in mining and there are hours involved in mining. If I'm a complete novice and to the best of his knowledge, I'm a complete novice. So either he doesn't know much about crypto, or he's creating false promises, which is not a good thing to do. Because if I believe this whole thing and I buy in and I pay him whatever money it is that he wants to do this magic that he wants, I'm going to get discouraged because he makes it look easy.

And then I drop the money. And then I discover that, oh, OK, that my laptop, that is. 17 years old because actually my laptop is 17 years old. I don't buy any equipment. My mom used it, gave it to my brother, and back in my wedding photography days I only used to run batch processing so I didn't need anything fancy. So when my Mac crashed I just picked that up and I've been using ever since. And besides, I do everything from my phone anyway apart from batch processing photos after corporate events.

So where was I? Yes, so then and I found out that my 17 year old computer is not going to be able to handle it. I have to buy the latest MacBook or alien this, or buy this extra software and then that, and then my number bill goes up and blah, blah blah blah, blah. Of course I'm going to become disenfranchised. No, not disenfranchised. Disenchanted, is it disenchanted, disgruntled. You get the whole idea. I'll be angry.

And that's where the quarrel starts. You sold somebody something, You think you sold him the best. Like you think you're helping the person and you don't know why the person is angry with you. This is the reason why, because you've been setting up false expectations right from the beginning. And then he says, if you're interested to know how this is how this works, let me know. For those of you who have been listening to the podcast, yeah,

I mean you've listened all the way up to now, you know that I've pointed out several times and I've told my guy I am not interested in crypto. Funny thing is, this is how he should have started off the conversation and this is a perfect example of how we should be doing prospecting. There's no point in starting the conversation if the person is not interested. So prospecting 101 is only contacting people who are interested.

If you had started this whole spiel with are you interested in crypto? Then we would have ended this conversation a long time ago. He's going to save himself all this clickity, clackity, or if he called somebody, all the typing, all the talking and things like that. Anyway, let me bring it to a close. I've been talking too much. Today's case study has shown the messages go on, but I'm not going to go into all that. So this case study has shown that if you don't prospect properly, can you see that there's no point in talking, no point in typing, no point in visiting the person's office, no point in inviting the person to your shop, to your house.

You're just wasting your time. You're wasting the other person's time. You're going to get frustrated. You're going to get angry at people. This fellow probably thinks I'm close minded. He thinks I'm not educated enough for sophisticated enough. But let's think about it. Really. Whose fault is it that this conversation is going nowhere? Well, yeah, my wife will say it's my fault because I'm the one who engaged and I guess my wife is right here.

It was my fault. But let's forget the fact that I'm just engaging him because I'm trying to be nice. Whose fault is it that this conversation is going nowhere? Is it my own fault or is it the guy's fault? The guy who has no selling framework, who doesn't know how to sell, and who is starting up this whole process wrong. Whose fault? My fault or the other guy? Think about it. I won't be surprised if some of you agree with my wife that actually is my fault.

Anyway, so that's all folks for today. If you love what you're here on the podcast and you like daily access to me, ask me these sorts of questions about how to move the conversation along. Whether it's WhatsApp or LinkedIn or face to face, or the person is in your shop, the WhatsApp coaching club is finally open. All that's required is 5000 naira a month. Ask me anything. I'll give you answers, I'll give you assignments.

If you're interested, hit me up on social media, the Dms, or you can send a message saying you're interested. The number is 08064662140 and the country code for Nigeria is +234. So if you're looking for me on socials, the name is Tavish my Adi. Don't worry about the spelling. Once you're done, have a look at the website where you're listening to this episode or check the profile of the podcast app where you're listening to my voice.

The correct spelling of my name is there, the e-mail address is there, the photo is there. So you know who it is, what I look like, how my name is spelt. And then if you're starting a business and you want to save to get capital, instead of looking for bank loans or looking hidden up loan charts, you know all these people that put advertisements over here, You know, borrow money, no interest for 30 days, 1% interest after 30 days, you know, blah blah blah, don't hit those people up.

Bad idea. Especially if you're Nigerian, you can get ugly real fast. So I'm affiliated with a reputable financial institution. They have 504 billion naira and assets on that management. What that means is they have so much money that they're not going broke anytime soon and they're secure organization to work with. What they do is they protect and guarantee your savings because the banks don't help you save. They give you an ATM card.

You withdraw a lot, They charge you on the withdrawals. They charge you, text message, they charge you this fee, checkbook fee, that fee, that fee. And at the end of the day, your money is not where you think it is. Loan checks, They'll harass you and your family members, so don't bother. So if you're interested, message me on 08064662140 to get started on saving towards your dream. And remember, it doesn't have to be saving towards business goals.

Any saving plans will do. If you want to start saving for your children's education, then primary school, Now you want them to go to Harvard. And you know that you have to save half your salary for the rest of your life for that to happen. Then hit me up, let me hook you up and let's get started on saving towards education, retirement or business. So thanks for your time and attention. I'll catch you at the next episode.

Sorry for the detour tomorrow. We should go back to the things that I wish I would have told the Smedan people. That's the Small and Medium Development Authority of Nigeria. I hope I'm using the right time, the of that's the right word. So I get into the conversations, the things that I wish. I told the speed and people and then some of the side gist that we had during their own online session on sales. So thanks for the time and attention.

I'll catch you guys at the next episode.