Why Your Happy New Month Texts Aren't Working

Today on the podcast, we're going to be looking at whether it's a good idea to send happy new month, brand new month messages. And the reason why is obvious. It's the 3rd of September as at the date of this recording, 3rd of September 2025. And of course, on the 1st and on the second, I received a bunch of these things. So I know you've received a bunch of these things too. So that's the question we're going to tackle today.

My name is Tavishima Aede, I'm the host of the podcast. If you'd love to connect, you can call, send me a text message or WhatsApp message on 08064662140. So back to the question, Brand new month, happy new month. We thank God we have crossed into the amber month. May God see us these blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. Is that a good thing to do to promote your business? By the way, I'm speaking about these things primarily from the angle that some of us are sending these messages because we want to grow our businesses.

Now, some of you, it's possible you send these messages because you want to keep in touch. If you generally want to keep in touch, then this is my answer to you. Stop that immediately. All right, Everybody's doing it. You're clogging up my inbox. Same thing with your mumsy. You're clogging up your mumsy's inbox. If you actually mean to tell your mumsy happy new month, sit down, compose something for mumsy send. Compose something for Popsy Send.

Compose something for Uncle Clitor's send. Compose something for Auntie Agatha. Send. Of course, it's going to take up your time, but at least when Auntie Agatha sees this thing, the message in her inbox will say, oh, that's my beautiful niece, my sister's daughter. She's the only one that cares for me. Oh my God bless her. May God bless her. Oh, this my child. So stop sending on this generic Happy New Months, you know, send it and then just blast the share to everybody.

So your uncle knows that this thing is not genuine. Your mumsy knows that this happy new month you're sending her is not genuine. So if it's for personal reasons, stop sending these messages. Sit down and craft something personal and then send. So that's for those of you personal people. Now let's move straight to business. Now, is it a good idea to send brand new month and happy new month messaging to promote your business?

Now, in a sense it is because what you're trying to do is you're trying to remain top of mind because if you're toasting somebody to do business with you, it's not a good idea to leave the space to just be, you know, like that. If you talk to somebody 1st of March and the person says I'll be ready like around, I kind of want ending the gap between 1st of March and 31st of March is large. I'll be how many days is March?

30 days are September, April, June and November. All the rest are 31. OK. Yeah, March 31. So the gap between 1st and 31st of March is large. So you guys look for a way to keep in touch ways that you show up in the inbox every once in a while. Let people remember you, Nasha, you're still there. So that's what we mean when we say top of mind, Nasha. People just they see you small. So the whole point of these things. Happy new month, happy new Year,

happy Sunday, Happy Monday, Happy Valentine, happy Easter, happy Salah, happy Del Maloud, happy. You know, that's the whole point. Stay top of mind. So in a sense that is good. However, excuse me, the problem with this approach, brand new month and every every is that the one is repetitive and it doesn't add value to people. Then everybody does it. Because of that, it is easy to ignore and it just becomes background noise on your phone.

Let me repeat in case you're not following, in case you didn't get what I'm saying #1 the problem is The thing is repetitive. If you don't believe me, go on. Open your phone, open your WhatsApp. As you're listening to this podcast, open your WhatsApp. Then Scroll down. The first brand new, brand new mouth message you see. Look at it, especially if it's someone who is the business owner. Then Scroll down, you will see that every single communication you've had from that person has been happy new month.

The person sent you happy new month in September. Check it. You'll see that the last message that the person sent was happy new month for August. Then underneath that, the last one that he sent you was happy new Month for July, and then check happy new month for June. Then check again. You, you see what I'm saying? You can catch the pattern now you see the formula as is repetitive. That's the only thing the person is sending it will be a variation of happy new month,

happy Sunday, happy new month, happy Sunday, happy new month, happy Sunday. Acting is repetitive as if you understand me. So it's known it's not adding value to the person's life at all then plus everybody does it. So the problem is not just that you, you sent it to everybody in your contact list, your customer that is receiving this thing. If the customer has done business with let's say 50 business people this year, at least ten of them will be sending him this message too.

So he wakes up on a Saturday morning and then bring, bring, bring, bring, bring notification. Happy new month, happy new month, happy. The guy is ignoring all of you. It just becomes one big blur. You're supposed to remain top of mind, but you are not remaining top of mind in a sea of sameness at all. That's why I say when you fade into background noise, you're sick. Blame. You just look on WhatsApp, you see the first Happ, you just know that is happening.

You just ignore it. After a while all of them will pile up on the phone and well, people just ignore. Some people will block, some people will add you to do long press and they'll click on the archive. Do not archive you in WhatsApp. Or the worst one, Google, the messages you're sending, the person doesn't even have to take action. Google will use the algorithm will look and see that OK, this person has sent this business has sent 10 messages to this person in the last 10 months.

This person has not opened a single one of these messages. It will now put you in promotions folder. That was before, before. But then now I discovered that there's a new something I discovered because I saw the option one day I open my Gmail. Now Google said show me a modification. He said all these businesses, you have not opened any of the e-mail in the last so and so days. Do you want us to click on subscribe? I was very happy because he saves me the stress of going in and saying unsubscribe,

unsubscribe, unsubscribe. So one hand, I just click on subscribe all. Another time I was minding my business, another notification came now, oh, you haven't responded to sources and saw this message. Do you want us to block report as spam? And what do you think I did one hand, I just click select on all report to spam. So if you don't know, Google is offering these options now to consumers and I'm sure other male providers are doing the same thing.

So if you continue with this happy new month, happy Sunday, Happy Eden, Malut, happy Easter, happy Valentine, what else? Happy Halloween, happy Children's Day, happy October 1st, what again? You know now there are plenty. This is what's happening to you. People are ignoring you. You have become background noise. People are archiving you in WhatsApp. And then for people who use Gmail, we think is now automatic. They're not even doing anything.

Google is now putting you in promotions tab and making it easy for people to unsubscribe, easy for people to delete. Remember, the whole point of happy new month is that we're trying to stay top of mind. So why continue to do something that is making it easier for people to forget you, easier for people to block you, easier for people to deny you. Business owners, I hope you're listening now. Happy new month. Very bad idea.

So if you want to do this thing well, you need to look for ways of adding value to people's lives. Every time you receive a message, sorry, your customer, your former customer, or your potential customer receives something in your inbox, you should be aware of adding value to their lives. Adding value just means if they read this thing, will they learn something? If they learn something and they apply, will it make their life better?

Will you teach them something they didn't need before? You know, those are the kind of things you should be looking at. You should add value to their life. Now, in case you don't understand where all this is coming from, it is because I received plenty of these messages. One of them was, and I can't remember if you call them optician, I'd be ophthalmologist, you know, eye doctor. I've been to them before. I can't remember where.

I haven't gone back anyway, but I've been to them before and this is the kind of messaging that they sent. So of course, I checked my inbox and guess what? All their messages, Happy new month, happy Sunday, happy new month, happy Sunday, happy Children's Day. You understand, useless users, users. So that's actually what inspired me to make today's podcast episode. So I'm going to use these people now, the eye clinic as an example of how you can add value to people's business.

I brainstorm some of these on my own. You for your own business. Just sit down, sit down, be calm and see how you can bring some some of these things for your own business. It's not hard. I bring some some of these things just by just before I started this podcast episode, I just wrote one or two things. You 2 you can write one or two things. If coming with idea is a problem, go and use ChatGPT. Go and use Gemini. Go and use copilot.

Go and use Claude. Go and use Pez. Is it Peppers perplexity? There are plenty. Pick your air tool of choice and it will help you. So these are some value add. Now for those of you who are opticians, I'll be ophthalmologist up to you know, eye doctors. If you have a website as an eye doctor and these people they have website. I'm assuming that you have a blog feature on your website. On your blog feature, you're supposed you're supposed to be writing some kind of educational things because the whole point of the blog feature on your website is you're trying to instill confidence in other people behind my no.

Is that it? Anyway, you're trying to set it up so that when people come and they see you don't feel confident that this is a correct establishment. That's what you're trying to get people to feel. So putting up educational pieces for provoking pieces on your website is a very good way to do that. So you can be sending people links from your website every once in a while. So even if you're going to do it on the first of every month instead of happy new month or brand new month, because believe me, everybody says happy new month or brand new month or whatever variation, how about something like you send them something on the 1st of every month, OK, let's say this month for instance, the message that they receive is how to tell if your eye condition is curable or reversible, for instance, or something like that.

Now somebody like me who has been using glasses for a while, wife is using glasses too. My mum, she's using glasses too. My father-in-law is using glasses. My mother-in-law is using glasses. My late father was using glasses. One of my kids is using glasses. You, you see the picture here, you see the pattern, that kind of headline. Do you think I'll click on it or not? Seeing that me, I'm surrounded by glasses on every side.

To the front, people are wearing glass. To the back, to the left, to the right, my whole family is wearing glasses. Do you think I might click on that link or not? Chances are I might. Chances are as an eye doctor, as an ophthalmologist, as an optometrician, as an opto, whatever. Chances are if you send nothing to 100 customers, I'm sure at least 30 would click on it rather than sending happy new month. And you know for sure that you sent to 198 ignored you.

If you doubt me, go and check your inbox or the happy new month that you sent. How many replies did you get? Maybe your mother replied begrudgingly. She's not happy that you didn't compose something next for her, so she's replying. But even that replies like is a grudge. In fact, maybe she's replying to give you a hint so that you know my son. Next time send me something original. So how to tell if your eye condition is curable or reversible?

Some people might click how to care for your expensive lenses. You think I might click on that? My son has glasses. I wear glasses, my wife wears glasses. Anytime we have to go and fix replace or something it's it's money I didn't budget for. Glasses have become expensive even if you go through NHS. So is it NHS? I'll be NHIS. That's the government insurance something the government will only remove 10K from your glass,

expenses only 10K. So if you go to the altar, ophthalmologist, optometrician up to whatever eye doctor and they look at your son's eye, they measure everything and they say auger that the lens alone for this, your son is 50K. That's the lens, that's the glass, then the the frame. Now you can select outside. We have our selection here starting at 10,000 all the way up to 120,000. And then your son says, oh dad, I like this one.

I like this one. Unfortunately for you, the 1 he pick is 95 K. And then your wife is like, no, no, come on, let's pick something much more affordable and then your wife pick something that is 75 K. Do the math. The government said they're only removing 10K from it. Then now you are sending me this message saying how to properly care for your expensive lenses. You think I might click on nothing or not? Chances are if you send it to 100 of your clients you are an up to I person.

I'm sure a couple of those people will open it and I appreciate it. And remember, the whole point is that you're trying to remain top of mind. Some people might even see that message. I remember that. Oh, it's been one year since I went for my eye checkup last. They can now ping you to now say, are you people open on Sundays? Then the conversation will continue. Oh, no, Sir, I'm sorry. We don't open on Sundays, but we open, you know, Monday, so, so,

so and so and so and so. It's not convenient. You can now say, OK, but we do house delivery service with an extra charge or something. So, you know, you know, whatever I teach. Are you continue the conversation, see these are benefits of remaining top of mind and you can see that you're doing this in value added ways. So how to tell if your eye condition is reversible? How to properly care for your expensive lenses? By the way, this is me just freestanding here.

So some of these ideas might be good, some of them might be bad, but you know, I don't know. But I'm just trying to show you that there are options. Another option, you can be sending messages on the 1st of every month, interesting titles, something like maybe something like when I put it like when you're doing promo discount for your annual review, you know the message is, oh, when was the last time that you had your eyes checked?

Let's say you send that message in September. Yes, September 2025, you know, was the last time you had your eye checked in October of last year. If that is the case, we have some good news. We are doing a 15% discount for our loyal customers who want to do annual review. In fact, to take advantage of this, just reply to this message and say fast pass. Once you reply to this message, when you get to the clinic, we will put you ahead of the queue so you do not even have to wait.

Now those who also have to go to the doctors repeatedly, whether it's for children's malaria or eyeglasses or whatever, we hate the amount of time that we spend. If you go and see doctor for because your son has a malaria, I guarantee you, you're spending six hours. If you want to go and see the eye doctor, it's the same thing, six hours. If you want to see dentist, forget it. Your whole day is gone, gone. If we receive this kind of message by saying not only will you give us 15% discount, you even do fast pass.

Like when I enter, all I have to do is show the reception is my phone and they'll say Nos, put him at the head of the queue. I mean, I'll forget it. Of course, we'll respond to this message. So this is just two or three ideas that I just did Sharp, sharp. Now, if you up to Metrician ophthalmologist, up to eye doctor, you will sit down in the office. You are your social media team, you're your customer service team. You will begin to brainstorm.

Are you telling me that in one hour you can come up with 15 mess? I say 1512 messages the only first of every month you'll be sending people that are value add that will help you stay top of mind. Come on we're all smart. You can come up with it and if you can't, like I told you, perplexity plod. What else? Google, Gemini, ChatGPT, whichever 1 of choice. In fact, you can even do this exercise using Facebook's Metas AI tool.

It is in your WhatsApp already. Even me that I didn't get it early. It's now in my own WhatsApp. So it is in your own WhatsApp. So you can go into Metas AI tool and start typing it in there. I am an up to eye doctor. I want to send messages that would help me remain top of mind with my customers. I'm coming up with a messaging sequence for WhatsApp that is going to be delivered on the 1st of every month. I want it to be around value added.

How will I say it now? I want the messages to be value add that will educate customers about different aspects of eye care, different ways of maintaining their glasses, and something, something, something. Give me 24 ideas that I can use in this regard. Send. So that's the prompt, this thing I dictated, that's the prompt. You know, hit send and you get some ideas of the 24. Let's say of the 24, let's just say the AI tool is useless and 20 of them are useless.

At least you have 4 ideas that you can send for. OK, this September you can send for October, November, December, and January next year. You see that? If you think gives you rubbish results, at least you have 4 that you use from now on to January of next year. When January of next year come, we'll worry again. OK, How do we come up with some new ideas? At least you have four months break. This is how you do value add.

This is how you send people messages to remain top of mind on the 1st of every month. In fact, in my own opinion, since the 1st of every month everybody be sending these messages. Don't send your own on the first. Chill send your own on the 6th of every month. All those happy new months, they would have sent it September 1st, September 2nd, September 5th. So chill, send your own September 6th. Send your own September 10th when the person's phone is no fool because we all know that September 1st, October 1st is the day we just used to ignore messages to click mark as read and move to archive.

All right, so that is how we can do value add with these messages. Now, other ideas are based on businesses already using their CRM. The CRM is a customer relationship management tool. It is just a tool or the point of record or whatever that you have in your business that shows you who are my customers? When did I talk to them last? Who am I supposed to talk to next? What are the issues that we're still discussing? What is the outstanding that I'm supposed to do for them?

What is the outstanding that they owe me? All these sorts of things. That is the CRM tool now. Up to mattress, ophthalmologist, up to whatever, up to eye doctors. You all have CRMS in your business. I know that because every time I go to sit down in those places, whether it's eye doctor, teeth doctor, or general body doctor, you doctors, you sit down the computer and you start typing in a whole bunch of stuff. And then when we're done, the nurse can also see the information on her own computer.

So you guys already have something that has all this information, but the problem is you guys just let all that information sit there. You're not doing nothing with it. How about doing this? You already have people's details, you already have ACRMI know that there's some legal issues involved because because of clients, how you say it, client confidentiality, you cannot allow a salesperson to start looking through client records.

So I know that there's some legal issues involved, but you know, think I'm sure with some creativity who can come up with something. So using CRM, how about setting personalized and call reminders around annual review? If I'm chilling here, minding my business, and then the phone call comes in. It's for the eye clinic. And then they say, oh, hello, Sir. Am I speaking to Tara Schumer? Oh, yes, I'm speaking to Tara Schumer.

You're the father of Susan. Oh, yes, that's my son. So, Sir, I hope you don't mind. We're just doing a what do you call this thing? We're just doing a courtesy call. How's your son doing? He's doing very well. The glasses are OK. Yeah, the glasses are OK. They haven't broken. No problem. But Sir, you know that ideally will be nice for us to be checking up your son's eyes every 12 to 16 months. Say 16 months don't pass.

Say yes, Sir, based on our records, the last time you were here with your son was so, so, so and so. Say no, it wasn't that long. So actually it was, I'm looking at the records here right now. We checked and we did this. We did this. We said, oh, OK, actually it's true. So Sir, since we're on the call right now, would you like to schedule your next appointment? Would you like to schedule the next appointment? You see, smooth, easy value add because you have ACRM, you already have the records of who your customers are, when they came last, when they are supposed to call next, put in that call.

It's that simple. Then when the man comes in, because you already have the record on file, you also know the last time he came with his wife, you tell him to OK Sir, you know that actually, yes, your son zone is overdue, but it looks like Madam zone is going to be up in six months. Yours is going to be up in another eight months. How about we schedule, you know, both of you to come in for another five months. You can see that setting up these things, having these personalized follow through,

calling these people, instead of sending a happy new month, you increase the chances that people come in. You increase the chances that you find something wrong. Maybe your guy has more cataracts in his eye or something. I shouldn't have to be explaining all these things. It should be obvious. Instead, you will have expensive CRM that you've paid for. You're paying people maintenance, paying people the data charges, and then everything.

And you're sitting on these things and doing absolutely nothing with it. Absolutely nothing. It's just a wasted resource. So personalized call reminders, upcoming annual review, simple call to check on somebody's eye health, simple things like 1 clinic that we used where we did mom's operation on her eyes. Do you know, until today, they haven't called us to say, oh, how is mummy? How is her eye? Is the thing still there?

Did her eye call out? Did her eye fall out? No, single no. So you can see now that with these two ideas, I just sat down and I just sketched this thing on paper. Sharp, sharp 5 minutes if you will sit down with your social media team or with your customer service management team, I'm sure you can come up with lots of ideas, but these are just two ideas that will help you to stay top of mind and value add. People will remember you.

You'll increase the increase the likelihood that people will come in to you know, to your clinic for checkup to buy glass to do this, to do that. So this is how you stay top of mind. Not happy new month, not brand new month, not happy Sunday, not happy Christmas, happy Easter, Happy Edo Maloud, Happy Halloween, Happy Hanukkah. Happy. Yes, some Nigerians have started celebrating Hanukkah now. Nigerians you overdue, you should come down Hanukkah.

Can you spell Hanukkah? Do you know what it even means? Nigerians are celebrating Thanksgiving. It's an American holiday. What are you celebrating Thanksgiving for anyway? Now chance we can overdue. So yeah, that's it. That's how we stay top of mind. So if you're sending brand new month because you love people, take the time out, send something customized and crafted to them. Send mumsy A personalized message. If it is for business, just skip the happy new month thing.

Be sending it on the 10th of every month. Let the thing be value add, increase the chances that people will see your messages and actually click on it and enjoy the thing and actually increase the likelihood that they'll pick up the call because they have to call you to inquire something or call you to schedule something. So that's it. And that's all for today. Remember, if you'd love to connect the number to call, send a text message or a WhatsApp message to is 08064662140.

Thank you very much for your time and attention. I will catch you all at the next episode.