Management Business Development - Fire a Client, It's Good For Business

Any gardener will tell you the best way to keep a plant or a garden health is to weed, nurture and prune. The same thing is true for your business.

The healthiest businesses are the ones with the most productive clients. What do I mean by productive? Well, clients that over time become more self-sufficient and can use the systems that you put in place for them. They can place an online order without assistance, reconcile invoices, track their projects, provide timely feedback when asked, they can actually make a decision and follow through on it and they pay your invoices upon receipt.

Now, I have many productive clients and I'm certain you do too. However, we all have the other kind also. You know, the ones that always need hand-holding, the ones who refuse to use ordering systems, trouble ticket and service tracking systems and they don't pay on time either. These are the clients most likely to be on your phone, in your email or at your door constantly complaining about every little thing.

They are the clients no one wants to talk to because you can never make them happy no matter how hard you try, how far you bend the rules or how often you bend over backwards for them. They seem to spend every waking hour looking for ways to get under your skin, always demanding concessions or refunds or add-ons to orders.They continuously throw veiled threats about going to the competition if you don't kiss up to them.

My response...after trying to educate, plead and honestly trying to get them into the fold, if they truly won't go along with the program, I will fire them. Now if they are your only client, or if they are your largest client, this can be tougher to do but if your business is built on the back of one or two clients you have bigger issues anyway.

A couple of years ago I had such a client. No matter what we did we could not please them. There were several different levels of management that all had their hands on our contract and we were expected to report to each of them. They didn't communicate with each other and no one would take responsibility for being the sole point of contact, it was frustrating and according to them it was OUR fault.

We called a meeting to discuss things and as I walked into the meeting, their opening line was "we're very unhappy with your service levels and your lack of responsiveness". I actually had trouble keeping my temper, however I already knew the outcome of the meeting.

My answer was very short and to the point..."I'm sorry but I respectfully disagree with your statement. We've been overly responsive to every request from all five of your department heads who do not communicate with each other and routinely ask for conflicting things. We have tried to resolve this situation however I no longer have any interest in doing so. Here is our letter of termination, you'll need a new vendor in 90 days. We'll continue to do your work per contract until you make a new vendor selection. Please contact me with the name of your new vendor so we can make a smooth transition for you. Thank you for your time and your business to date. This meeting is over. Have a great day." We stood up, shook hands and left the meeting room.

They were shocked, obviously they didn't think we could afford to lose $100K in business, nor could they fathom being fired.

The move was great for business. Other clients heard the news and realized that they were much smaller than the client we just fired and suddenly issues resolved, bills got paid timely and our collective management soul felt refreshed.

Look at your business garden, know when it's time to nurture your clients, prune back on services or offerings and when it's time to pull out the weeds that are choking the good strong plants.

Bob Holdsworth is the founder of The Holdsworth Group. He is a successful entrepreneur, a marketing and business growth coach who specializes in getting his clients and their businesses UN-stuck. If you want to learn how to "Do business on your own terms!®, you want to talk to Bob. He is also the author of several nationally published articles, a sought after speaker, a veteran paramedic, a very happily married husband, the dad of two awesome twin boys, a dangerous golfer, avid reader and is severely allergic to neckties.

Bob's offering his '30 Day Business Success Series'. Go to http://www.BobHoldsworth.com where you can claim his FREE 4-part video series that includes the #1 Secret to Small Business Success.

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