Tayo Solagbade’s
Performance Improvement IDEAS
(PI Squared) Newsletter

Monday 28th  January 2019

NB: This PI Squared newsletter will be published weekly, on Mondays, in place of the Speaking/Web Marketing IDEAS newsletter, starting from today – 15th February 2016. I’m reinventing my Monday newsletter content and theme, to accommodate my vision of serving the growing audience of serious minded individuals and organizations reaching out to me, with information, education. news and research findings designed to help them do what they do better.

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PII 152[TRUE STORY]: Seize Every Opportunity to Close a Sale: Too Many Things are Fighting for Your Prospect’s Money – Bonus Commandment No. 2

To succeed in selling ANYTHING, you must develop the discipline to smartly convert sales leads to money you want. In this second bonus commandment, I share another true story to illustrate how to use a WMS to achieve selling success.

This story however has an interesting twist, because the prospective buyer came back to me (days after we’d spoken and he’d failed to take up an offer I emailed to him) to say he’d been robbed of his phone, laptop and other devices (including online banking token)!

Yet he told me he STILL wished (despite getting robbed only days earlier) to purchase the software he’d enquired about, based on the promo offer I’d made to him!!

Talk about a Motivated Buyer! This guy was an excellent example of one.

NB: On TayoSolagbade.com I have retained the N200 to $1 USD exchange rate with which I launched international sales online for my flagship products, in 2013. That’s why the ExcelVB Poultry Farm Manager which sells for $375 USD, is available to buyers paying with Naira within the country, for N75,000.0 Naira. 

Like I said in my 10 Commandments of Web Marketing for Business Success, the WMS designed and implemented the way I recommend, will often attract “Motivated Buyers”, to contact you about what you sell. At that point, it will then be up to you to do what is needed to close the sale,

That’s exactly what I did with this Farm CEO, who has now become the newest member of my Cost-Saving Farm Business Ideas club.

The screenshots below tell the story about how I led him to the final point, by empathizing with him.

This is where Psychology comes to play in selling. Your selling instincts need to be finely honed to accurately assess the psychological state of prospects and clients, when they come to you.

For instance, in the case of this Farm CEO, I immediately saw that he had conviction that my software could help him. This was why he still returned to ask for it, despite having only just suffered considerable material loss.

He was yet to buy a new smartphone and only had a small N3k phone he’d picked up after he got robbed. It lacking browsing capabilities and so he was not yet able to do mobile money transfers.

The truth was however that his priorities could change at any point in time. Apart from the need to replace the stolen items, other pressing money demanding tasks or events could force him to DELAY his plans to spend money on such a solution. A good example is if a medical emergency suddenly came up in his home.

The above considerations – and the fact that I’d also been robbed of similar devices less than a year ago – prompted me to send him a revised version of the promo offer he’d come back to enquire about. And I added zero cost bonuses as a gesture of goodwill, as my own small way of empathizing even more, with him.

But it was slightly higher priced – because, like I have told others who came to me (and as I stated in the 10 Commandments Series), I strive to make my offers with integrity.

I do this (making offers with integrity) by ensuring they are reasonably unique in terms of pricing, bonuses and other features. That way, the buyers knows that s/he is getting what is promised, and which differs from what came before, or what will come afterwards.

After I sent out the offer, it occurred to me that he might not see the email early enough, since he did not have ready access to Internet connection. To be fair to him, so as to give him the best opportunity to take it up, I called him up, and was not surprised to learn he had yet to check his email.

[TIP: Do you see how acting with due diligence can help you avoid losing useful selling opportunities? My advice: Don’t be too laid back and depend exclusively on indirect methods of communication like email, messenger etc. Sometimes it makes more sense to simply pick up your phone and CALL THE PROSPECTIVE BUYER so as to tell him/her about the juicy offer you’ve cooked up!]

So I read the email offer out to him on phone and asked if he wanted to take it up. He said he did, and wasted no time in asking me to text him my account details.

But he noted that he would only be able to make the payment on Monday (we were speaking on Saturday p.m). This was because he had no means to make payments from his phone or via online banking.

For my time limited promo offer, this would not work – and I told him so. You see, the buyer ALWAYS has to make a commitment to tie down the offer as given.

Otherwise it would be revised upwards in price, and possibly the accompanying bonuses modified.

I made this clear to him, and suggested he talk to a trusted other (friend, colleague, relative or partner) to send in the payment on his behalf.

He initially said he could not immediately think of anyone. I replied that other buyers had often said the same, but after doing a little checking, were able to find someone to help.

NB: As long as they can trust you to refund the money to them, people who know you well will often accept to help you send payment to a 3rd party, if you ask them the right way. I know this because I have done it countless times – several of those involving having clients who have NEVER met with me, helping to send funds to 3rd parties they’d never met, on my behalf!

At this point he agreed to explore the alternative payment option I’d suggested, in order to take up the attractive multi bonus offer I made to him, before the deadline.

Sure enough, he got a friend to help make the payment – she did so twice

[TIP: To make things easy for him to convince the helper, I told him he could make the payment in 2 installments. That way, the person would not worry that the sum was large. By Monday, he would be able to get cash to the helper and she could then pay the balance. And that was how it went].

Above: This SMS message failed to deliver to the Farm CEO due to a network glitch. I’d tried sending it after seeing the credit email alert shown below:

Below: 2nd and final instalment – done by the client’s friend

I am NOW preparing the products he ordered, by personalizing him using his name, business name and contact/other details he’s sent to me.

Those of you familiar with my work, most likely recall I ALWAYS personalize my products for each buyer. This is so as to better protect their investment in solutions I deliver to them.

I have shared this true story to illustrate the importance of taking timely action to close sales leads:

Act Decisively. Avoid  Hesitating or Procrastinating.

To paraphrase a common saying “Delay can be dangerous”.

You see, people often have a variety of expense channels competing for the money in their hands, pockets and accounts.

Make up your mind what profit margin to aim for with each product or service, BEFORE you start generating sales leads.

That way, when they eventually come to buy (and they will, if you use your WMS like I recommend), you will be ready to make IRRESISTIBLE offers that motivate them to make payment before they consider any other things they wish to spend their money on.

Fail to act as recommended above, and you could see potential sales fizzle out right before your eyes. THAT, is not something you want to happen, if you seek authentic selling success!

INVITE ME TO DELIVER THE FULL 10 COMMANDMENT SERIES AS A LIVE TALK TO YOUR GROUP/TEAM MEMBERS