How to unveil your potential. 

Long time ago, a tourist asked me on how to recognize one’s potential. I simply replied to him, “to every human, there is a measure of potential.”

But many people still fail to realize that everyone has got potential in him. 

What do you understand by the word, ”potential”?

Potential can be defined as a chance or possibility that something will happen or exist in the future. In other words, is a quality that someone has knowingly or unknowingly that can be developed to make it better. Also, it is an inbuilt ability in someone that can be developed to help that person become successful. 

Often times, I asked myself if I have what it takes to be a writer.

Why? Because I’ve never written anything before. 

My friend once advised me to go into writing. I laughed him off. I said it’s not my way. I gave many excuses. But there’s one thing he said that struck a chord in me, ”you don’t know what you can do until you try.” I definitely agreed to that statement. 

I decided to give it a try. I wrote my first article but it was full of blunders. I didn’t bother to post it because of the fear of being mocked. He gave me the push – just do. 

I summoned the courage and published it. But to my surprise, no one cares about the blunder. All that matters was the message. That’s when I realized that what we fear most times doesn’t really exist. 

Imagine what you would have achieved if you had not let fear gripped you? 

Fear is a killer of potential. Fear has buried much destiny. Many youths out there have the potential in them, but the fear of what the public would say have turned their dreams to a mirage. Does it really matter? 

The truth is, you can never overcome what you fear. 

How to unveil your potential. 

• Face your worst fear: There is a saying that everything you ever wanted is on the other side of fear. I agree. Until you learn how to face your fear, you can never unveil your potential. Action fights fear. By taking small steps, you’re building evidence to show that you are more and can do more than you think.
• Take a step: They said the journey of a thousand-year starts with a step. Wow…..I love this. Nothing starts until you start. If you pause, things paused. When you start, things start. No destiny achievers remain stagnant, they take a step. I understand that when you start, you might come across many obstacles. Even your parents can tell you it’s impossible. But always bear this in mind that life gives you option, you make a decision. To every great step, there is a great decision.

• Be determined: Problems are real. Problems come in many ways. Some are minor, while some are big. If you come across any, treat it like it’s your last day on earth. If you want to unveil your potential, you must have a strong determination.

• Be positive: Our doubts are nothing but useless thoughts created by our mind by its filtering process. The more negative information we subject our mind to, the more our brain will filter our thoughts in conjunction with that information. Lack of confidence comes as a result of habitual negative thoughts. Be positive when taking actions.

Note: Nothing starts until you start. Unveil your potential by doing the needful.

 Credit: Adeleke Lekan

Earlier in the year, the US president, Donald Trump rekindled his interest in Google’s activities. Trump has a history of questioning the Silicon Valley giants’ motives and actions, using one alibi or the other. This time it was based on his suspicion that somehow, Google has been helping the Chinese Government to spy on the US and steal intelligence.

It was and allegation that prompted a meeting between Trump and Google’s CEO, Sundar Pichai, at the White House. Where he assured Trump that Google has not been compromised and cannot work for a foreign government against the United States. Trump tweeted after their meeting:

“Sundar Pichai was in the Oval Office working very hard to explain how much he liked me, what a great job the Administration is doing, that Google was not involved with China’s military, that they didn’t help Crooked Hillary over me in 2016 election, and they are not planning to illegally subvert the 2020 election despite all that has been said to the contrary. It sounded all good.”

Trump lost the popular vote by almost 2.9 million, in the 2016 general election and has a claim that it was due to electoral fraud. Now there is a shift in the narrative, with him claiming that he could have lost the popular votes with a little margin or won it after all, if not for the manipulations of Google.

In 2017, the editor in chief of Psychology Today, Robert Epstein, examined how Google might have influenced voters’ decisions in favor of Clinton. He said that the search results may have been manipulated to influence an estimated 2.6 million votes for Hillary Clinton, or even at the maximum of 10.4 million. Trump took it up from there, and his swipe at Google heightened. Although, Epstein explained:

“I’ve never said Google manipulated the 2016 elections.”

It doesn’t matter, Trump has taken his examination as an alibi to aim at Google, and even exaggerated the figures put out by Epstein.

The recent outburst of a disgruntled former employee of Google, Kevin Cernekee, who has been on the news slandering his former company, accusing it of sabotaging Trump’s chances of winning the last election in favor of Hillary Clinton, seems to have revived the grudge. Trump tweeted on Monday:

“Wow, report just out! Google manipulated from 2.6 million to 16 million votes for Hillary Clinton in 2016 election. This was put out by a Clinton supporter, not a Trump supporter. Google should be sued. My victory was even bigger than thought.”

This is one in a series of tweets alleging anti-conservative bias by Google, and a conspiracy to sway votes in the 2020 elections against the right wing. And the recent interviews granted by Cernekee to Fox and Wall Street Journal have upped it. With Trump sharing the video clips and calling them “very illegal.”

With 2020 around the corner, there seem to be unprecedented premonition among conservatives that not only Google, but the social media as whole could be used to subvert the elections. And it is getting paranoid. President Trump has warned that “they are watching Google closely.”

The fear is that the search giants may once again suppress negative news about opponents while presenting searchers with all the negatives about Trump administration. A claim that though it cannot be substantiated, has been held to be true by many, especially supporters of the president.

Google has been in defense of itself, not wanting a loggerhead with the president. But it is becoming inevitable, and in the face of trade war with China, the US government getting into a fight with Google will do more harm than good.

“Show me your marketing strategy and I will tell you how well your business will scale”

Firstly, I would say that I really do not like the structure of small businesses in Nigeria and their approach towards marketing. Then the next thing I would say is that I hate the fact the small business owners have not learnt to stand out.

If you’re out here and you’ve got crazy ideas, you have very good talent, dreams and visions, skills and you’ve struggles with gaining attention in the marketplace, then you did well joining the train.

I’d be showing you the failure of Nigerian businesses in the world today and why you need to step out of the crowd to rule your lane.

Few years ago, once you have an idea, it was very difficult getting the whole world to buy your idea.

No 1. The internet was at its new era in the country and it would cost more to get everyone to know.

No 2. The truth with an idea, a philosophy, a product naturally is that it only seems convincing to you.

There are over 8 billion other people in the world with different problems, different mindset, different thoughts, different things going on in their lives.

So whatever idea/product/content created needed to spend a lot of time before others would get convinced. You will discover that back in those days, despite these difficulties, a lot of companies still succeeded, the likes of Dangote, Innoson motors, Indomie and a host of others.

How did they thrive when there was no internet or there were few people using the internet?

They simply met needs!

Dangote started cement business. Nigeria was filled with huts and tree houses. Civilization had entered the country, people would need to build houses. How would they build houses if not use cement?

Did Dangote need to go to every house in Nigeria to tell them to buy cement? Once Mr A purchases and builds his house, Dangote doesn’t need to tell Mr B, Mr A’s house did the marketing for Dangote and Mr B comes to purchase.

What point am I trying to drive here? Any idea you have, any product, content you have must solve problems for the people concerned.

Was Dangote a genius? Business is all about common sense.

I want you to write this down; “Marketing is common sense paid attention to”.

As the country was embracing westernization, there were lots of big problems surrounding the whole nation. Food was becoming scarce because population was increasing, people were running to white collar jobs and there were fewer farmers. So something needed to be done to preserve food for longer period of time.

That’s when you’d discover lots of new brands came up with new products that could be preserved and re-branded. They didn’t need too much social media.

They used Mass-Media (television and radio). They also used consumers to market for them. That is what facebook, whatsapp all used to get billions of customers and as we dig deep I would teach all of those.

I am just trying to drive a point here which is the mistake most new businesses are making presently.

Write this down as well; “my product must solve a problem”. Now ask yourself, what problem is my idea solving?Is it a present problem or a future problem.

Pay attention. INNOSON MOTORS didn’t just become a billionaire in one night. Follow me, let me tell you his strategy;

Civilization was entering Nigeria, government were connecting roads between states, cities, towns. People need to move from one location to another since the road was made available.

Quick pause: NOTE THIS : “A problem solved creates another opportunity for another problem to be created and solved”

Linking the story with what you just jotted down, Government were creating roads which means they’ve solved the problem of movement. They didn’t solve transportation problem.

A good road is not the only solution to transportation problem. What if the road was long, what if robbers live beside the route? Cars are needed right. But can everyone afford cars? Okay, let’s import motorcycles.

How many other businesses have emerged from the road?

1. Importer of cars and motorcycles
2. Sellers
3. Drivers
4. Riders
5. Mechanics
6. Petrol stations
7. Road safety

And on like that.

So from what I read, Innoson started by repairing motorcycles, then he saved up or probably collected a loan. He decided to start importing motorcycles. Now pay attention. He was not the only one into motorcycle importation back then. But he came up with a plan.

Importing motorcycles through a particular truck would accommodate only 13 motorcycles (for example). That is what all of them were doing.

Then he asked himself;

WHAT IF I DISMANTLE ALL THE MOTORCYCLES OVER THERE THEN REARRANGE THEM WHEN IT GETS HERE, HOW MANY WOULD FIT INTO THE MOTORCYCLE?

They are being charged by the custom per truck so it doesn’t matter how many fits in. He had to employ mechanics to travel to the other border, dismantle, then they assemble back here.

Do you know how much that would bring him?

The problem With Nigerian businesses today is that they’re profit driven alone and I’m I saying your business shouldn’t make profit.

The world has advanced. The problems of before are no longer problems. People have solved them. It is your turn to solve a problem. It could be fashion, poetry, music, food, idea etc

That you’re selling sneakers, you’re solving a problem. It may not be to everyone but to a target set. That you sell Ankara, you’re solving a problem. It may not be to the world but you are set of people.

Now that you have that idea, you really need to understand what works, how things are done in the present world. The businesses of those days had their failures too. But many businesses these days make more mistakes.

People start up ideas and quit. Not because the idea wasn’t awesome or useful but they never learnt marketing. Nobody knew they existed. The market today is so clumsy.

The goal of any business in this present age is to be remarkable. That’s the marketing term. Being remarkable means doing something different or doing the same thing in a different way.