High Maintenance Clients
In this article, I’m going to show you my approach to dealing with the clients every freelancer faces but dreads facing: the client who wants constant attention and time spent on them. The micro-manager and pedant.
Like I’ve said, most of us have experienced this, and if you’re going to freelance for any length of time, you will run into a client like this every now and then.
Here’s how I deal with them.
Disclaimer For All The “4 Hour Work Week” Guys
Sometimes I browse the net and see people who are on the surface freelancers but always complain about a lack of clients. Some of them, when they get a client, then bemoan the fact their client wants them to actually work.
“Does anyone else hate it when clients don’t understand that deadlines are flexible and it’s real hard to work when the beach is so tempting?”
I’ve spent too much time talking about the four-hour workweek crowd, so I won’t reiterate. However, if you think freelancing is the same as not working, then it’s time to get a reality check. If you agree a deadline with your customer, then stick to it. When you agree a price, stick to it.
Generally, if you’re a professional and you act like one, you’ll run into fewer problems. The reason I bring this up is because it leads into the first real section of this article.
The Key To Successful Client Relationships Is The Relationship
Your client is not your buddy. They have their goals – and chances are their goals are at odds with yours. They want you to do as much as possible for as little pay in as little time.
You obviously want to do as little as possible at your own pace for as much money as possible.
This sort of thing isn’t an excuse to say “Woe is me” or perpetually not do any work. It’s just part of being an adult.
If you act like a professional, then 90% of clients aren’t going to give you trouble. Everyone knows there’s a balance and you get what you pay for, and 90% of people are happy with that.
In this article though, we’re talking about the 10%.
(Here’s a caveat to that: 1% of your clients are going to be complete arseholes. In any avenue of life, there are people who are scammers, cheats and liars. They are unavoidable and your only goal with them is to discover what they are and then clear them out ASAP. That’s a different subject though.)
10% of clients aren’t scammers and they’re probably not bad people. They just don’t understand where boundaries are set, what they can and can’t get away with and what’s reasonable.
On the low end of the freelance scale, this is mostly caused by people dipping their toes in the entrepreneurial waters and not realising you can’t hire a guy full time with unlimited revisions for $10.
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room when it comes to getting these high maintenance clients to agree to a better relationship with you.
It’s All In The Relationship
I had a client once, way back before I was a writer, who used to ring me all the time when I worked for him. Now, this was still freelance, so he wasn’t my boss. But you wouldn’t think so.
I’d get emails multiple times a day. If a project lasted two weeks, then I’d get a “debriefing” phone call every day. He’d check my work and go through every single element with me to describe whether it was good, what needed doing, and what could be done.
Needless to say, when a client has that attention to detail, you become despondent and miserable, waiting for the project to be over. But guess what? It isn’t. These projects drag out because what should be a ten hour job becomes a fifteen hour job due to “little extensions” and ten extra hours of talking on the phone.
Many freelancers experience this high maintenance client. Here’s what I learned about this experience:
It was entirely my fault.
Not because I’m a masochist or because I signed some stupid contract that said I should slave away, but because I didn’t set the parameters of the relationship and I didn’t at any point have the guts to say, “Hang on a second… you’re not my boss.”
With any business relationship, you need to set certain things in stone:
- What you’re doing
- When you’re doing it
- How you’re doing it
- The milestones (If it’s a longer project)
- Payment (amount, and terms)
Sometimes, I’ll get a client who wants me to sign all kinds of massive contracts and things – even for simple projects. I’ve always found the practice bizarre. Let’s talk about this.
Contracts?
A contract is considered by many to be a mythical document bestowed with magical power. It’s not. It’s a simple agreement. Assuming you’re not intending to go to court, you don’t need to have a lawyer write up some fifty-page long agreement for a project and you certainly shouldn’t sign anything that looks overly-complicated from a client without knowing what’s in it.
I don’t really do “complicated contracts” and neither do most of the people I’ve worked with.
Here’s the thing. A contract is an agreement. A written contract is an agreement. An email is a written contract.
For most of my clients, I simply write an email using something like the list above, and write at the end, “Here are the details… if you disagree with any of it, let me know. Otherwise, this is what’ll happen and this will serve as a contract regarding the job.”
They usually agree and we go all the way on that. It’s the 21st Century equivalent of a handshake contract and if you’re working with reasonable people, then it’s all you need.
Overly Demanding Clients
Written into all the above are things that are reasonable for both of you. There’s no need to have constant email updates if you’ve set the roadmap. Being pre-emptive will kill most of these demanding clients because you’ve told them what will be done and when.
A lot of clients are just scared you won’t deliver. Give them a clear road map.
Now, as far as constant contact and updates on their part, I’ve got two things to say:
- Charge more.
Lower paying clients always want more than higher paying clients. It should be the complete opposite but it’s not. Charge enough that in the course of the project, you make more money than they can waste your time with.
- Make it clear what your terms for contact are, and stick to them.
To go back to my example from years ago, if I had a client who constantly called me out of hours and emailed me overnight again, I simply wouldn’t answer. After the first time I got a “missed call” I’d send an email saying, “Sorry but I only work these hours.”
Same with hundreds of emails. Be prompt and professional, but don’t spend all your time answering them. If it’s something that’ll be answered over the course of the project, just ignore it or send a simple “I’ll work on that later” response.
Finally, let’s talk about the third and biggest thing you can do with high maintenance clients.
Charge Them More
If people want a guaranteed amount of your time, then offer a retainer that guarantees that.
When clients need consulting, then charge them by the hour.
This is why setting the relationship is so important early on. If you say you work 9-5, Monday to Friday and a person calls you outside those hours, then they know they are pushing their luck because of the terms they’ve agreed to. At that point, just say, “Out of hours consultations are X.”
It’s the same with work to a short deadline. If someone calls you and says, “I need this in 24 hours” and you normally take a week, there’s nothing wrong with saying “OK but it costs double.”
Some people want to step over the line. If you make it costly, then they won’t. If they still do, then at least you get paid; and sometimes you’ll get paid handsomely.
This can be as extreme as you can get: I know of some direct response copywriters who have waiting lists for their services and have clients book them months in advance. None of those guys allow people to skip the line or waste their time on the phone without paying a lot for it.
Final Thoughts
As a freelancer, you set the schedule and the relationship. Don’t allow it to escape you.
To summarise:
- Most of your troubles come from not setting a relationship
- You don’t need an expensive contract. Just say what is included in your terms and what isn’t
- (Uphold your end of the bargain and be a professional)
- Charging more will get rid of most people who are too demanding
- If the person still persists, treat your time outside the agreed scope as an upsell
- Charge a lot for that upsell
- Otherwise stick to the terms of the relationship. The client isn’t your boss and doesn’t decide what to do with your time. Don’t let them.
The above is a pretty comprehensive view of how I consider my relationship with clients. You can do all of this while still being totally friendly, and like I keep mentioning, most clients- especially if you seek out good ones – will understand all these things intuitively and not give you any trouble.
Whilst not every job you do will be a handshake contract type of job, the spirit of the handshake contract is a good one. If you don’t trust your client to do what they say or the client doesn’t trust you, there’s probably something more fundamentally wrong with the business relationship that needs addressing.