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Bulk SMS Resellers in Nigeria

Monday, October 12th, 2009

Have you started your own bulk sms reseller business?

Have you started your own bulk SMS reseller business? A guy just asked me that question, and I was wondering what made him ask. He was all excited as he gave me a quick lecture on how I have been missing out in the  new multi-million dollar business of reselling bulk sms to fellow Nigerians.

At first I was a bit confused and I was wondering if anything spectacular had happened within the few days I went offline (I took a break from the virtual world to face some pressing issues). As much as I can recollect, bulk SMS has been available as an online business opportunity for more than two years. Well, it didn’t take quite 2minutes before I recovered from the initial shock from his question. He helped me without by unwittingly mentioning the phrase “multi-million”. Whenever I hear the phrase, “multi-million dollar” or “multi-million naira”, my security antenna gets fine tuned. Such phrase often accompany “get rich quick scheme”. This is naija you know. If you play the “mugu”(fool), you may not even live to  regret your action. Anyway, in this particular case, it wasn’t about 419 or Nigerian Scam as foreigners will term it. It is about an old business that some con artists are parading as a new discovery.

Online sale of bulk SMS is indeed the new business-craze in town. Not that it is new elsewhere, just that Naija brothers and sisters have decided to zero in on bulk SMS reselling as the new online business that will bring in the million fast.  In case you don’t understand, the politicians have made it a taboo to think on anything less than seven digit income.  Everyone talks about making a million (naira or better still dollar) as fast as possible. Gone are the days of working patiently for years to build a fortune.

So, whenever a naija brother or sister hits a jackpot with a business idea, be rest assured that within a few weeks, many wannabe entreprenuers will abandon whatever they’ve been working on and rush in to make theirs too (even though many business mentor has pointed out that this is not the way to do business, yet, the lure for quick cash won’t let them listen). It amuse me when I see such rush by newbie entreprenurs who fail to find out how the first guy went from raw idea to achive business success! It is not about duplicating a business, it is all about learning how it works and working SMART. Ok, enough of my personal view.

Bulk SMS is the new business idea rocking right now in naija. Online Forex Trading seems to have lost its appeal. At least those who want to be a millionaire overnight are no longer seeing forex trading as the way to get rich overnight. No thanks to those who have exposed the deceit behind those Forex Trading Seminars. David Ajao won’t be forgiven by many of the con artist. I learnt that the sale of automatic forext trading robots to naija newbie forex traders have dropped significantly.

What is bulk SMS by the way?

Ok, so what is Bulk SMS? First, SMS means Short Message Service .  Bulk SMS  is simply a way of sending simple text messages to numerous contacts at once using the internet instead of your cellphone and you need not go through your telecom service provider. Am not quite sure the Nigerian Telecom operators such as MTN, Glo, Celtel, Zain, Etisalat etc love this idea, because it robs them of the abnormal revenue they make from Nigerians for each SMS sent via their networks. The telecom providers charges for SMS is higher than that offered by bulk SMS resellers.

Why use Bulk SMS?

I just told you.

1. It is cheaper. Unlike your service provider who will charge a higher fee for delivering the same text to a contact on a different network, bulk SMS gateways will deliver all SMS messages at the same flat rate irrespective of the destination.

2. It is easier to send to numerous contacts. Actually toyou can send SMS to millions, within a short time, for example, you can send a message to a million contact in less than five minutes. Once you have purchased the required credit, you upload a list of the contacts and write out the SMS message. One click will send to 1 contact or 1million contact, it is simply your choice.

3. You can schedule the delivery. This is another great feature. You can actually write a message now and schedule it to be delivered at a later date.

Bulk SMS Reseller Business

Ok, so how do I make money online from bulk SMS reselling. Simple, get a reseller account, (I won’t provide any link here because I am not promoting any) you can Google for it by typing “Bulk SMS resellers in Nigeria” into any of the popular search engine. Once you get a reseller account, the next step is to get clients. Yes, you need people who will buy smaller packages of the bulk SMS from you . For example, if you buy 5,000 units of SMS at the rate of 3.5naira per message, you can offer to sell each packages of 200units at 800naira. That is far cheaper to the 5naira that Nigerian service providers charge per SMS, so be rest assured you have a ready market. Also, you can design a website and offer to send SMS on behalf of people. Once they pay you, you simply send the SMS on their behalf to the list of contact they provide at the point of sale. This is a cool business for youngsters. You can sell the service to those wanting to announce an event e.g. a wedding ceremony, burial ceremony or a corporate event. I guess you’ve received such an SMS in recent times.

Some bulk SMS gateway provide the facility of inputting the sender’s number, so that you can actually receive reply. However, some charge a fee for such.

Is Bulk SMS reselling for me?

Well, only you can tell wether bulk SMS reselling is for you. I never encourage anyone to engage in a business he or she does not have passion for. It is easier to succeed at a business you are passionate about than one that irritate you. Now you know what Bulk SMS reselling business is all about. It is not a new business, but for Nigerians, it is a new way of making money online.

Will Bulk SMS Reselling Make me a millionaire?

Well, it all depends on you. Several successful entrepreneurs started off with business ideas that didn’t look promising, and yet they became financial giants. If you get yourself equipped with the right knowledge, set a goal for yourself and work persistently on it, this may actually give you an opportunity to make your first million. However, I must warn you that it will not happen overnight.

Warning: Scam Artists use Bulk SMS as a tool

Some will not agree with that it is not possible to make a million from SMS reselling overnight. I understand, such must have been told the story of someone that started Bulk SMS reselling and hit the first million naira within 30days. Yes, that is “possible”. It is done by sending fraudulent messages to unsuspecting people telling them funny stuffs to get them to reveal their bank financial details or part with some cash. I have received several SMS congratulating me that I have just won a million naira from my telecom provider. The sender name reflects the name of my Telecom Service Provider or her code, however, I knew they were fake because my telecom provider will never inform you that you have won a gift via text message. Instead, a phone call will be made and there will be announcement on the electronic or print media. So when next you receive a text message claiming to be from any of the Nigerian Telecom service provider informing you that you have just won a million naira, remember, this post ;-). That is Bulk SMS being used by a con-artist to dupe you. If you’re greedy enough, you would have coughed out some cash before realizing that you’ve been defrauded.

Ok, enough of the gist. I guess it is high time I go get myself a Bulk SMS reseller account. Who doesn’t want to be a millionaire? For future updates to this post Bulk SMS resellers in Nigeria subscribe to my RSS free updates.

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Posted in Entrepreneur, Investing, Nigerian, small business, Tips & Tricks | 147 Comments »

When A Client Goofs, how do you handle it?

Wednesday, September 23rd, 2009

When a client goofs, how do you handle it?

Every successful entrepreneur understand that the phrase “The Client is always right” is a mere political statement to boost the ego of the client. Often times the client is ignorant and dead wrong. But who dare say that to his face. Since the client is the one holding the purse, he has to be praised like one of those monarchs of old and tactically guided to make the right decision. I guess that is why another phrase says the “client is King”. Else, he will get offended and go to the competitor. I’ll share with you a life-story from my friend, Leke who works in a construction company. I believe his story will teach you one or two useful lessons as an entrepreneur on what to do when a client goofs (by the way to goof is to make a silly mistake). Here is an excerpt of what he sent to me, though edited to reduce the length, the gist remains the same.

Yesterday, I had to combat with the mess created by an ignorant client. He earlier requested for a proposal on a project he want my company to execute. We sent a detailed proposal and gave three different options with different cost implications. In his own wisdom, he decided to create an entirely new fourth option by mixing features from two different options. Economically, it sounded like a good idea, but from professional experience we advised that it was too risky and if anything goes wrong, he will end up with a bill higher than any of the three options initially sent to him.

Did he listen? No, he argued and claimed that he was better off with his idea and we should go ahead because he was certain that it will work out fine. From his argument, it was obvious that he was more interested in the cost reduction being offered by his new option. He totally discounted the risk factor that ought to be built into the new option. After a long time of trying to persuade him to change his mind, we consented to his wish but requested that he put the decision in writing to be signed by all. That was done and there was warm hand-shake after the deal was sealed. However, I was very uncomfortable and I told my boss so.

Twenty four hours after the deal was sealed, the project started and everyone were busy working towards delivery on schedule. However, just about 60% into project completion, there was a hitch. A firm handling a particular aspect of the project has suddenly pulled out, claiming they cannot meet up with their promise due to some technical fault in their equipment (they never mobilized to site). That was a stupid thing to say after receiving mobilization fees, and of course they were part of the project design and planning. I will like you to note that in our initial proposal, we ensured that all parties involved in the project were capable firms and they were having enough stake in the project to warrant full commitment.

Unfortunately, the new option the client created introduced a new firm who we didn’t know much about (a competent firm was removed with the excuse that their charges was too high). During the negotiation meeting I pointed out the risk of using a firm that is not known, but the client was vouching for the new firm’s competency (that to me was a dumb thing to do). Well, the firm’s failure was at a critical moment, the entire project was getting messed up. A colossal loss was staring the client in the face and my company’s corporate reputation was at stake too.

I was summoned by my boss and asked to give a quick review of the project. Was I furious? You could actually feel the heat emanating from my face. After narrating the whole incidence all over again and showing evidences that the client was warned but he refused to take my advice, I expected my boss to write a stinker to the client telling him to go clean up his mess. My boss did otherwise.

He reminded me that the client remains one of our major clients even though he has made a stupid decision that resulted in loss of fund and time. So, I shouldn’t be upset and rub the blame deep on the client. Instead, I should note that it is at such a critical time like this that a business relationship with the client can be further strengthened. He told me plainly that I have no fault whatsoever and my team has acted in line with our company policy, however, I’ve got to clean up the mess created by the client. He told me to go back to the drawing board with the assumption that the mistake was mine since that is the only way my creative mind will agree to bring forth a solution. I didn’t like it, but I knew he was right, so I went back to my team and we started brainstorming on how to salvage the situation with as little fund as possible.

Kudo’s to my team member for their cooperation. We came up with ideas I never thought of before and the whole mess was cleared up. Then came another shocker. I wanted to pass the bill for the repair to the client, but my boss stopped me and instructed that it should be shared 50:50. So, the client was not only saved from a colossal loss, but was actually getting free consultancy from my company while paying only half of the cost of repair. It took some time before my brain could accept that, I was really upset and wanted to tell my boss it wasn’t fair and I personally consider it stupid. Even if the client is important, must we be held accountable for his mess?

Well, it was a good thing I held my tongue. I would have needed to apologize later to my boss. Today, we receive a thank you note from the client and a fresh request for a quote for an entirely new project. The client followed that up with a telephone call promising to always adhere by our professional advice. Looking back now, I understand why my boss, took the decisions he took. Maybe that is why he is the boss and I still report to him. I just wanted to share this with you.

Please extend my warm greetings to…………

I believe the story said it all. Even if your client goofed, it is not wise to rub the mess on his nose. Here are the lessons I got from the story.

• That the client is considered a king is no assurance that he will act wisely.

• When the client goofs, you need to handle the mess created carefully.

• Relationship is more important than short-term profit.

• Never show your anger to a client else you lose them to the competitors.

That’s it. When next you feel like boxing a client for goofing, remember that he holds the purse, so you must treat him like a king even when he is acting plain stupid. I’ll love to know how you handle difficult clients especially after they have created a mess by ignoring your professional advice. Please share your story in the comment section. You can get future updates to this post When the client goofs by subscribing to my RSS feed. Cheers.

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Posted in Entrepreneur, small business | 2 Comments »

Sow Quality Service, Reap Great Profit

Saturday, September 19th, 2009

An essential principle of business success is Sow Quality Service, Reap Great Profit. If you really want to be rich in life, you must change your orientation from that of a grabber to that of a giver. Instead of thinking and devising ways of getting more from your customers, think and device ways of giving your customers more than they paid for. If you give quality service, you will eventually reap great profit. That may not seem like a sound business advice in this period of global economic crunch, but take it from me, this business principle works even now.

Poor Service Eventually Brings Bankruptcy

I get bothered when I see businesses attempting to increase their profit by cutting corners, capitalizing on consumers’ ignorance to cheat them. The truth is that those entrepreneurs are not wise. You may record a high profit today because you succeeded in cheating a customer, but be rest assured that the customer will eventually discover (even if it takes years) that he or she was cheated and will never patronize you again. If your business is undergoing financial crisis due to the global economic meltdown, it is time you start giving your customers more than they deserve, that way, they will stick with you until the trouble is over. I will share two story with you to buttress my point.

The Nameless Restaurant

Last week, while out of the office on an official assignment, I saw a little restaurant. It lacked all the Zeon signs and gorgeous display that makes eateries in Nigeria cities stand out. However, the place was filled with customer and my colleague volunteered to give me a quick lecture. He explained that even though the place doesn’t look beautiful (it was indeed plain looking), the quality of food being offered there is better than that of bigger competitors. Bankers, oil workers, businessmen etc (with their designer suits, babariga) prefer eating in that small spot instead of the bigger ones because of the quality of the food and the attitude of the staff to customers. So the customers come from far distance and park their Porsche cars to eat in that plain looking restaurant, the bigger competitors must be envious. The place doesn’t have a name, but I can’t forget the location.

The New Zealous Commenter on Nigerian Entrepreneur

Well, an incident this morning reminded me of that restaurant. As I was checking the back-end of my blog, I noticed a new commenter who took time to drop high quality comments. Even though I wasn’t in the mood to go checking other people’s blog, I couldn’t help but checkout the guy that was zealously dropping comments that are best described as half-posts.

Each comment was his personal view expressed with all sincerity. He wasn’t sounding like a praise singer, a keyword back-link seeker or a con-artist advertiser. I believe one of the reasons it made so much impression on me is because a lot of fellow Naija brothers have been trying to use my blog as a free advertisement board. They advertise their wares in a most annoying manner. Some do it in such a way that I really get angry and delete such comments (no matter how busy I am, I still moderate comments as much as I can, I hate spamming).

Well, since I wasn’t in the mood to spend time on the net, I dropped only two comments on that fellow’s blog. He didn’t ask for it, but I know he deserve more than those two. I’ve made up my mind to repeatedly visit his blog and add my little contribution to his blog.

To be successful, give quality service first, then expect great profit

The lesson from the two stories is to; Give Quality Service, Reap Great Profit. Ask any successful entrepreneur, he was first a giver before he became a receiver. Forget about grabbing and cheating your way to the top, even if you succeed at it, you won’t stay there long. If you doubt me, you can ask those Nigerian bankers who are currently singing to EFCC.

Thanks for visiting my blog you can get future updates to this post Give Quality Service, Reap Great Profit by subscribing to my RSS feed. Cheers.

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Posted in Entrepreneur, small business | 3 Comments »

How Needs Give Birth To Business Opportunities

Saturday, September 12th, 2009

Have you observed that needs often give birth to business opportunities? If you haven’t it is time to take a look around you. While a lot of people are getting depressed because of the global and local economic crunch, some guys and gals are actually making money from the present situation.

Human beings are quite creative. I’ll share a practical observation that I made with you. I live in the part of a city where the roads are so bad that individuals often prefer to park their private cars and use commercial vehicle (just to save on maintainance cost). As the situation got worse, (the government agencies simply closed their eyes to commuters plight), some smart small scale entrepreneurs started importing motorcycle and were giving them out to jobless young men on hire purchase. That was the begining of okada business in my community.

Those entrepreneur made so much money while the okada business last. Unfortunately, some criminals took advantage of the situation also and started using motorcycles as quick-get-away vehicles for their criminal activities. It became an everyday occurrence to hear story of people being robbed or assaulted by motorcyclist. The complain from the public was so much and the only solution the state government could think of was to ban the use of motorcycle altogether (never mind the fact that it sounds funny that it is now unlawful to use a motorcyle in my neighbourhood).

The ban was a great misfortune to many entrepreneurs and many youth who earned their living via okada business were thrown back into the unemployment club. While some entrepreneurs went home counting their loss, the smart entrepreneurs went home brainstorming on the next opportunity to catch on. For your information, the roads are still as bad as before.

Well, those smart entrepreneurs settled for a new business with TRICYCLES. We call it “KEKE NAPEP” At first, people were reluctant to enter the tricycles (human beings naturally resist changes). Well, it wasn’t long before we were forced to change and embrace keke napep as the best means of moving from one point to another.

The reason being that they are better at navigating the bad road and they also find it easy to pass in-between on-coming and on-going vehicles whenever there is traffic jam. The CAB-DRIVERS in my neighborhood hates those tricycle with passion. As far as they are concern the tricycles are business spoillers. They carry more passengers than the taxi (you may not believe it, but some carry as much as 6passengers beside the driver, that is Naija for you) and also make more trips per day.

Why am I discussing this? Well, I have being facing a lot of challenge with my online businesses. The soucrce of the challenge is just my ISP (Internet Service Provider). My company relies heavily on internet for communication with clients. Unfortunately, after dishing out a whooping sum of $200 per month (thirty thousand Nigerian naira) per month as rental for VSAT internet connectivity, we are stuck with a bad service provider that gives excuse instead of quality service. It is not easy to dump the ISP and go for another because they are still the best available in my neighborhood, and our present subscription covers several months.

So, I’m just praying and looking for an opportunity to get rid of them. When I get the right opportunity (I’m really on the look-out for it), I’m going to start an ISP company to serve my community.

If you’ve been wondering why my posting hasn’t been consistent, now you know. I’m not quitting blogging, I’m just fighting the challenges hindering me from getting online as I want to.  However, I’ve been busy exploiting some offline business opportunities too. I do really believe in multiple streams of income, so I have several baskets for my business eggs, not just one. Are there needs around you? Think deep, those needs will birth business opportunities for you. Cheers.

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Posted in Entrepreneur, small business | 3 Comments »

How To Choose A Web Hosting Company

Tuesday, July 7th, 2009

How To Choose A Web Hosting Company

If you are wondering how to choose a web hosting company, then read this article. There are thousands of web hosting companies doing business online. Each one have mouth watering hosting packages and makes reassuring promises to keep your business online 24/7. Making a choice among these can be quite difficult. How can you know the one that will truly provide your business the much needed excellent hosting solution at an affordable price?

Web Hosting Server

Web Hosting Server

Big business enterprises can afford to own their own web hosting servers or pay for dedicated web hosting servers. This is not an option for most small scale entrepreneurs. Small scale business owners especially the home based business owners often have to make do with shared web hosting due to their small business budgets. This article is meant to provide help for such entrepreneurs.

What are the qualities to look for in a web hosting company?

1. Excellent Customer Support: Your hosting provider should be there for you 24/7 and give you instant access to the technicians you need to solve your problem. Ask them how long it takes for them to typically respond to your problem. A good test is to call them in the mid night to check if you get to a live, level 3 support. There must be provision for Live Chat as this tend to be more efficient in helping to troubleshoot website issues than phone calls or email. Go ahead and use their ticket system for pre-sale support, taking note of how many hours it takes them to attend to you. If their response time for sales is slow, then you can be rest assured that their response time for technical support will most likely be worse.

2. A Sound Infrastructure: Check whether they offer a multi-homed network powered by multiple bandwidth providers to ensure redundancy. Some offer a 100% guarantee on its network availability or network uptime. Getting information about this is not easy though. You may need to spend some time doing research about the web hosting company you have zero on. Read reviews and comments about their services in forums. Avoid website previews as they are often bias. A good place to get information about webhosting companies and their performance is webhostingtalk.com

3. Financial Stability: If you’re running very critical operations, you can’t afford to be with a hosting company that may not be in business in a few months. Check to see if the web hosting company is a one-man business being operated from a bedroom. There is nothing wrong with doing business with such as long as he or she is a reseller for a reputable web hosting company. However, you will be doing yourself a disfavor and courting trouble if you host your business website with a sole-proprietor who owns the servers he is using for business. Web hosting servers cost a lot of money and as such cannot be easily run by small scale business. Incorporated businesses tends to be more reliable.

4. Scalability: Be sure your web host company can easily upgrade your hosting package as your business grows. There should be provision for migrating from shared web hosting packages to dedicated servers or virtual private servers. Ensure the web host can accommodate e-commerce and storefronts, wireless capability, blogs, forums, chats, online interactive helps and anything else you may need to add onto your site as your business expands. The last thing you want to do is change host mid way. It is never an easy nor smooth experience moving your website from one hosting company to another.

5. Provision of Regular Backup: Ensure that the web host company is willing to make regular backup of your website which will be kept on a separate server. This will help to reduce the recovery time in case of a server failure. You need to make enquiry about this as some web host may deman extra payment to provide such service.

Pitfalls to avoid in choosing a web hosting company

Avoid like a plague, free or very inexpensive web hosting services. They often end up creating headache and heartache for entrepreneurs, with bouts of server downtimes. As a small business owner, you don’t want to start spending hours on phone or chatting to find out why your website is not up. Having paid for the web hosting service, you will love to focus on your core business and grow your business. Chasing after web hosting technicians and doing follow-up on support tickets will not increase your revenue. Also note that you are likely to have significant limitations in storage, number of email addresses, FTP upload, ability to install scripts etc when you choose a free web hosting company or a very inexpensive web host.

Avoid web hosting companies whose data centers are located in volatile areas. You don’t want to loose your online business website due to civil unrest in the location where the data center of the company is located.

This post is not a review of any web hosting company. Therefore there is no link to any web hosting company. If you have experience you will like to share as a user of web hosting services, kindly share it in the comment section below. You can get future updates to this post, How to choose a web hosting company by subscribing to my RSS feed. Cheers.

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Posted in Entrepreneur, small business | 20 Comments »

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