Whether you sell physical goods or you're some sort of service type consultant, you have to look for people to talk to that could some day become loyal customers.

In sales and business development, this activity is called prospecting and it has been the focus of the last two or three posts so far.

The scenario we're going with is a young female in a tertiary institution in Benue state Nigeria selling bags and shoes to other females in her school and other campuses close enough so that she can deliver her wares without eating too much into her profit margins.

We have made some assumptions for her that prospecting will involve either talking to people "face to face", or looking for people and communities online to engage with.

If our young fashion entrepreneur could approach people face to face to drum up business interest, how would she go about it?

The easiest place to start would be with friends, family members, and associates.

This is the easiest place to start prospecting because they already know you and they will be very polite with you. You will not feel the pain of rejection acutely if anyone here was to say NO to you.

Getting NO from total strangers hurts really bad... at least in the beginning of your business career.

The mistake that most people make when talking to friends, family, and associates about business is that they approach it selfishly and do nothing but talk about themselves all the time.

For instance, our entrepreneur here might approach her aunty who has 3 daughters and say, "good morning Aunty, I am now selling good quality bags and shoes from Lagos, Malaysia and some from the UK. My prices are really good. Aunty please come and help me and buy from me".

Is this a good way to start? It's better than doing nothing! So we have to give her marks for at least trying.

But there is a better way and it involves making it about THE OTHER PERSON you're talking to.

We will explore more of that in the next post but in the meantime, ASK ME ANYTHING in the comments section below!