Business and Money Tips

We all know WeChat is such a powerful tool as it has 28 unique useful functions that Whatsapp and Facebook do not have.  Why are people not using WeChat as much as Whatsapp? There are 3 hurdles when it comes to using WeChat: 1. Lack of friends Yes, the reason we use Whatsapp and Facebook so much is that we have many friends on them but we have few friends on WeChat.   We know that in Singapore, 3 out of 4 mobile phone users are using WeChat. This means that there are not few but at least 4 million people using WeChat in Singapore . The question is are your friends using WeChat?  If they are, are you guys WeChat friends?  One way to check if your friends are using WeChat is to simply find them on your phone's contact list. Simply go to 'Contacts' page on WeChat, press the '+' on top, select 'Add Contacts', then select 'Mobile Contact' and press 'Upload Contacts'.  Your WeChat account will simply tell you which of your friends on yo

In our previous article , we talked about the one and only reason to use WeChat is to go back to our Chinese roots.  In that article (you can read it at here ), I mentioned that being an ethnic Chinese, it is important to know and live the Chinese culture.  The other day my friend Divandran, who's has roots in India, asked me how can he as an Indian go back to his Indian roots with WeChat, a predominantly Chinese tool.  I told him, "Yes, of course, you have Chinese roots in your blood".  He was shocked!  We all know that the word 'Chinese' is not a racial or political term. In fact, if you look at China's history you will realize that throughout its 5,000 years of unbroken civilisation, there are many non-Chinese that invaded and ruled China. Some even established large dynasties lasting several hundred years, like the Jurchen's Jin Dynasty (109 years), Mongolian's Yuan Dynasty (97 years) and Manchurian's Qing Dynasty (268 years). If you lo

You got a problem in sales. Your product is not first in its class, nor is it second. Maybe your product is outmoded. Or it hasn’t been positioned correctly.  Maybe it is competing in a very crowded market. It doesn’t matter the reason.  The fact is people are not going to buy your product, no matter how you sell. Welcome to Selling Sand to the Arabs, the situation faced by people from selling ice to the Eskimos to selling hot weather to Singaporeans. If you are now selling a product that few have, like iPhone, or you are selling something at the lowest price, like Xiaomi, do not read further. This course is for people who want to sell when people don’t want to buy. SELING SAND TO THE ARABS Date: 23 Feb 2018 Friday 9 am to 12.30 pm Fee: $149 each (usual fee: $298)         $99 each for 2 and above         $59 each for 5 and above (80% off) Venue: 89 Short St 09-03A, Golden Wall Centre , Singapore 188216 3 MRTs: Rochor (3 min walk), Bugis 5 min

Yesterday I met a Sales Director from a Fortune 500 company. He commented that many of the so-called sales training in Singapore and Asia are actually motivational and goal setting training disguised as sales training. They often get people on the high during the course but leave them unsure of what to do after the training.  Most of the sales training do not have adequate sales strategies and techniques. They often teach things that even 10-year old kids know: ask questions, overcome objections and close the sale.  We teach people more than that. We often cover situations that people consider impossible - how to Sell the Impossible. Many people consider the following 10 situations to be selling the impossible: 1.      Prospect has just bought from your closest competitor 2.      Your product pricing is way too high to be considered 3.      Your salespeople have little knowledge to close the sale 4.      Prospect has no money to buy 5.      Prospect has no time to ev

As most of us know, the main reason for using WeChat is to get connected with people from China.  Recently one of my friends asked me, "I don't go to China, and I am already very busy serving the Singapore market and have no time serving the Chinese (non-Singaporean Chinese) living here. Can I don't use WeChat?" Well, you don't have to use WeChat if you are not interested in serving the market that uses WeChat, which is mainly the non-Singaporean Chinese living in Singapore and the region.  Many of us would think of WeChat as a business tool, and the incentive for using WeChat is to capture a wider market so that we can earn more money and probably get rich. Is it so?  If your reason for using WeChat is mainly to make money and nothing else, I suggest you don't use WeChat.  For sooner or later, your selfish motives will be known to people and people will start to abandon you for being so money-minded. To me, the one and the only reason to use WeChat is

In our previous article (you can read it here ), we stressed the importance of becoming an active WeChat user if you too want to tap into the immense rewards that WeChat offers.  'Active WeChat user' means to use WeChat daily, with 1 to 3 Moments postings a day and adding new friends every day.  There are 5 steps that anyone can become an active WeChat user: Step 1: Make Sure Your WeChat Profile Stands For Something Until you make a dent with your WeChat profile, people will not take you seriously, even if you were an active WeChat user.  To create a high impact profile, upload a professional photograph, like the one I have in this article.  Other than profile photo, you need to describe yourself in a way that makes you stand out. Step 2: Put your WeChat icon on the front page of your mobile phone.   Step 3: Post WeChat Moments 1 to 3 times a day If you are like most people, you post a few times every day on Facebook and find posting daily on WeChat too much work,

I realised that despite being so immensely useful, less than 20% or 800,000 out of 4 million of WeChat users in Singapore use WeChat daily. Why is it so? Firstly, many are frightened by the Chinese language, including many Chinese that studied Chinese as a subject in school all the way to 16 years old.  They told me that since they are not familiar with Chinese, and Chinese being the most commonly used language in WeChat, they have decided to not use WeChat often. Well, to understand correctly, there are total 21 languages that you use in WeChat, including Spanish, Jewish, Malay, Japanese and Korean.  You can always go to "Me" page, select "Settings", then "General", and change the language to the language of your choice. Even with this, some people told me that they still receive many postings on WeChat Moments and since they don't understand Chinese much, they decided not to read them. Well, there is a translate function in WeChat where you

Many trainers teach Sun Tzu Art of War. Some conduct 3-days courses and go very deep into the book.  Others teach you in simple terms.  We at Asia Trainers don't just teach you the art of war, we put the application of the art of war at the centre of our courses.  Since conducting Art of War in 2010, we have conducted Art of War for Leadership, Customer Service, Productivity and Innovation and also Sales.  The most valuable lesson of the Art of War 13 chapters of 5,000 words is found in the 3rd chapter: Win Without Fighti ng. 不战而胜 In war the best thing is to take the enemy state whole and intact; to ruin it is inferior to this. To capture the entire army is better than to destroy it. Hence, to win on hundred victories in one hundred battles is not the acme of skill. To subdue the enemy without fighting is supreme excellence, or simply win without fighting How does it apply to your sales?  1.     "Enemy" here refers to not your competitors but your customers

According to Tencent, WeChat now has 1.08 billion users worldwide in 21 languages. In Singapore, there are 4 million users with 20% or 800,000 active users. Many people use WeChat passively, with many responding to messages too late. What happens when you are not an active WeChat user? First, you will not harness the power of WeChat Wallet, which is not just about WeChat Pay but also free advertising on Groupbuy and other pages only available when you have WeChat Wallet. Second, the less you use WeChat, the harder it is for you to build your brand. Unlike Facebook and Google where you can buy page views and likes, you can only build your brand in a gradual but engaging manner in WeChat. Third, you will miss out knowing the right people. Who would want to accept you as a friend if you only post on WeChat Moments once a month? Fourth, the less you use WeChat, the less you become savvy with WeChat as it is evolving very fast. Soon you will give up and be left out in this fas