Stanbic Business Incubator tips business owners

Over 200 entrepreneurs recently attended the second Stanbic Business Incubator Limited (SBIL) Masterclass of the year featuring marketing guru, Daniel Choudry who spoke on the ‘Sales effectiveness drivers for your businesses’. Choudry is the Lead Consultant and Founder of the Daniel Choudry Sales Institute based in Kampala.

SBIL, which is a subsidiary of Stanbic Uganda Holdings Limited, consistently looks out for ways to empower and help grow Uganda’s small and medium enterprises. The online Masterclass sessions are intended to strengthen the capacity of business owners to achieve their relevant goals by creating and exploiting opportunities, notably through networking and sharing ideas.

Choudry gave participants insights into how to maximize sales by understanding the different buyers, building a dream sales team, and how to develop an effective sales strategy.

He said, ‘People buy people’ and advised entrepreneurs about the importance of salespeople working on their personalities and looks because people will only buy what they sell if they like the person selling it.

Choudry said, “When somebody feels comfortable around you; they can tell you what their needs are and then you can present solutions that match that need. When you present a solution to people’s needs they sign up to buy.”

He encouraged business owners to invest in training their sales teams, creating an environment that allows them to thrive and understand their customers, competition, and business environment.

Choudry said, “Salesforce defines who a company’s customers and prospects are, what the value proposition is, and how the selling is done. Some of us have quality products, but we have the wrong people selling them. That will just mess up this entire quality product conundrum. It is important to have quality products and services, but you must also have quality presentations about them.”

He said trust and credibility cover 80% of why people buy your presentations while the solution is 20%. “Spend most of your time making people trust your brand. That could be a very good place to start and which kind of questions you ask, for people to tell you their needs comfortably,” he said.

He said the best sales are the results of making better choices which is a result of better awareness. Choudry also stressed the importance of reading books.

The session lasted two hours and closed with a Q&A session that also had attendees express their appreciation.

SBIL is also currently running a training program for SMEs, the Enterprise Development Program. Entrepreneurs in the current cohort have been trained among other things in financial literacy, digital skills in business, business planning and analysis, bid management, and quality management and control.