No matter what the circumstances, whether it’s helping a loved one or helping a client achieve their dream, there are no faults in being kind & lending a hand.
However, as a leading digital marketing consultant, I myself for over a decade have fallen into the trap of always doing a little too much. And guess what? It, unfortunately, hasn’t sometimes worked in my favour with people’s greed getting in the way, resulting in some heated discussions, & even a 1* star review – we’ll talk more about that later.
But now I’m making a change in the way I sell my services & win my clients & am beginning to master the act of not overdelivering. And you can do this too with just a few changes in practice & handling hot-headed moments differently. Keep reading to discover the steps to make.
Understand that Time Equals Money
Admit it, we’ve all done things out of the kindness of our hearts but in business, it’s important to remember that time costs money. After all, you’ve got business overheads & wages to pay.
My advice is that you put to your client a realistic budget which covers their initial requests, & advise from the off that any significant work will be billed for additionally. By putting this out there at the beginning you’re providing clarity & they won’t be disappointed or agitated later on down the road.
Use Your Worst Experiences as Learning Curves
As I previously touched upon, my agency in the past has received a 1* star (& pretty brutal) review. At first, this really hit me & my team & it left us questioning what had we really done wrong?
Well firstly, I have great faith in the experts that work for me & the services we provide, so I know that they would never do anything to jeopardize our reputation. Therefore, on this occasion, we’d identified that we simply had done too much & as soon as we said no to a client’s demands things turned pretty nasty.
Our emails blew up, heated phone calls were had & we even took time out of our weekends to try and resolve the situation – something that I will never ever do again!
Following what seemed like an eternity of anguish (from the clients’ side) we understood that all was resolved until that dreaded email came through from Trustpilot. But instead of crying over it & pushing it aside, we dealt with it by responding & we’ve never felt stronger.
You’ll be glad to know that we’ve not heard from the client since, but they will never be forgotten. And we thank them really as they are the reason behind the switch up in our practices, policies & proposals & we’ve not found ourselves in hot water since.
Hire an Account Manager
Great service comes through great organisation & excellent communication, but when you’re constantly on the road like I am, keeping both of these at an even level is a tricky one. Hence, why I hired myself a brilliant Account Manager.
Now, this role goes so much further than sending daily emails or taking phone calls, they also manage the team, their diaries & their list of tasks during your absence. It’s a pretty important & hectic job, to say the least.
Since hiring my Account Manager I’ve seen a huge change in my own workload, but in also how we manage clients’ expectations & her organisation means that no stone is ever left unturned.
By Hannah having daily communication with my clients, she’s able to outline & rule out what is & isn’t involved in a project way before it gets in the developers’ hands & it’s too late to turn back & say no.
In some circumstances, I understand that hiring an additional person may not be possible so as an alternative I’d advise signing up for a great CRM program where documents can be kept on file & conversations can be archived.
Just Keep Going
During testing times you may feel like you want to throw in the towel, & I get it because I’ve felt the same. But don’t let the client overcome you, these blips are thrown at us to help us grow as business professionals & to make us better.
Life goes on after all!
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