At some point, I started selling courses on copywriting because I had discovered that there was actually money in helping people learn how to write words that could make people buy.
But before I started selling those courses, I had to learn how to sell first.
That was how I came across a course called 72IG WhatsApp Marketing.
It was an affiliate marketing course that taught people how to sell products and courses through WhatsApp. The idea was simple: generate leads from different platforms, bring them to WhatsApp, nurture them, build trust with them and eventually make sales.
At that time, I was very interested in anything that could help me make money online.
In fact, one of my friends made me borrow ₦12,000 just to pay him to buy the course for me.
The way he sold the idea to me was convincing.
He told me that if I learnt the course properly, I would be able to start paying my school fees myself from my second year without depending on my parents.
As a student, hearing something like that was enough motivation for me.
I borrowed the money.
But something happened that I wasn't expecting.
Instead of buying the 72IG WhatsApp Marketing course for me, he bought a Fiverr course.
I was mad at him.
I couldn't understand why he would do that after I had specifically told him the course I wanted.
He tried to convince me that freelancers were making more money on Fiverr and that learning Fiverr would be better for me in the long run.
But I wasn't interested.
I still wanted the 72IG course.
The problem was that he later told me that the 72IG course was going for ₦75,000.
For me at that time, ₦75,000 was serious money.
There was no way I could just bring out that kind of money to buy a course, especially as a student.
So I started looking for another way.
I began searching online for people who had already bought the course.
I wanted to find someone who could give me access to the course or at least show me how I could get it without paying the full amount.
While searching, I discovered something interesting.
Most of the people claiming that they had the course didn't actually have it.
They were just marketing the course.
They were trying to get people interested, collect their money and then probably use the money to buy the course or earn their affiliate commission.
That was affiliate marketing.
It was actually funny because I was searching for the same thing while people were busy trying to sell it to me.
Finding someone who genuinely had the course wasn't easy.
But after some time, I finally found a real person who had actually bought the course.
She had the course but she was still trying to figure out how she could make it useful to herself.
I approached her and told her something that eventually changed everything for me.
I told her to share the course with me.
I explained that I was very good at sales and that I could help her make money from the course.
My offer was simple.
I would take the course, study it, use what I learnt to generate sales, and give her 70% of every sale I made from the course.
She didn't hesitate.
She agreed.
That was how I eventually got access to the 72IG WhatsApp Marketing course for free.
I was happy because I had finally gotten what I wanted without paying ₦75,000.
So I started studying.
I went through the course carefully.
I was learning about generating leads, talking to prospects, nurturing people on WhatsApp, creating offers and getting people to actually pay.
But something else happened while I was studying.
I realised that I didn't necessarily have to become an affiliate for someone else.
I could create my own offer.
That was when I decided to start selling downloadable copywriting eBooks.
At that time, whenever I offered to teach someone copywriting, I would introduce them to one of the eBooks.
I would explain what copywriting was, tell them how it could help them make money and show them the benefits of learning it.
Then I would direct them to the landing page where they could buy the eBook.
The eBooks were going for around ₦2,000 to ₦3,500 each.
And surprisingly, people were buying.
In just one year, I sold 43 eBooks.
I still remember those days.
Sometimes I would be on my way to lectures and my phone would suddenly vibrate.
I would check it.
Payment received.
Another person had bought an eBook.
Another person had bought an eBook.
The joy 😊
There was something different about seeing those payment notifications when you were still a student.
It made me feel like I had discovered something.
I was using payment channels like Paystack, although Remita was my favourite at the time.
I wasn't just selling an eBook.
I was selling a dream.
I was telling people that they could learn copywriting, help companies write better sales copies and get paid for it.
I genuinely believed in the opportunity because I had seen how words could influence people to take action.
And that experience taught me one thing very early:
Sometimes, what you initially set out to learn may not be what eventually makes you money.
I went looking for an affiliate marketing course because I wanted to learn how to sell other people's products.
But what I eventually learnt was how to create my own offer and sell it.
That ₦12,000 I borrowed didn't immediately make me start paying my school fees like my friend had promised.
But it introduced me to something much more valuable.
It introduced me to the world of online selling.
And from there, I started learning how to turn knowledge into something people were willing to pay for.
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