Let's assume you're a female entrepreneur and part of your "sales pitch" to get your aunt to buy from you is "female empowerment" and "we are family".

How do you go about setting up "the ask"? And is that enough reason for someone to buy your product or service from you?

We've already settled in prior posts that the main reason someone will buy from you is because of a pressing need or desire that they have.

Other "charitable" considerations like female empowerment and love of family might also be a factor, but only if those issues are important to the person.

If your aunt isn't “woke”, doesn't care about female empowerment, or maybe thinks the feminist movement has gone tokenistic, then talking to your aunt about supporting female owned businesses might fall on deaf ears.

If your aunt doesn't care about family, or if she thinks that your father is an irresponsible leech, then bringing up family might work against you!

So how do you know when to bring female empowerment and family into the sales conversation?

You do so only when you have an idea of what this person's motivations are on the subject.

The manner of figuring out these feelings is by engaging in open conversations and asking questions that lure the person to talk some more.... questions like:

"Aunty what do you think about female owned businesses?"
"When you were my age what kind of hustles did you run?"
"I hope you're happy with the initiative the children in my generation are showing?"
"Was family support important to your success when you were growing up?"

The answers to these questions will lead to a light conversation where you can later introduce the fact that you've started a business selling shoes and bags and would be happy if your aunt becomes one of your first customers.

Remember we're still working with the scenario where we are ALICE who is a female undergrad entrepreneur in Benue state Nigeria who is looking for customers for her new business selling shoes and bags.

In prior posts we made some assumptions about the kinds of people that Alice should be running after for business, and how she could approach friends, family members, and associates to get the ball rolling.

In summary, you shouldn't be talking about anything in the sales conversation unless you have an inkling that the potential customer has an interest or desire there. The only way you'll know for sure is from open and frank conversations that you initiate.

There's no point in talking about how environmentally and ecologically superior your products are if the customer at hand doesn't give a blaze if the earth burns in 100 years time.

Our sales conversations ought to be tailored to the person whose needs, interests, and desires we have before us today.