Ilena, my PR Associate, recently shared a story with me about a difficult client experience when she worked with an educational nonprofit. The nonprofit focused in a niche area in special education and was able to get a grant to provide scholarships for those who were working towards relevant doctoral degrees. As Ilena was sending out press releases about the scholarship recipients, she contacted the Philadelphia media about the work the nonprofit was doing. With the nonprofit director’s approval, Ilena set up a phone interview with an interested reporter from a major regional newspaper.

The day of the appointment came and the director couldn’t take the call from the reporter because she said she was busy. There was no emergency or other matter that took her away from the office. The director just said she was busy.  Ilena rescheduled the phone interview twice. She reminded the director about the phone interview twice. Twice the director agreed to the day and time. Twice the phone interview couldn’t take place because the director said she was busy.  As you can well imagine, the interview never took place and not only was a great PR opportunity missed for the nonprofit, but the reporter was extremely frustrated that the director would not keep her appointments as scheduled. That’s the perfect way to get blacklisted by a reporter.

Ilena’s experience brings to mind how some clients can make doing our jobs more difficult. Of course, it would be nice if there was a way to avoid difficult clients all together, but the reality is, we all have difficult customers or clients. The key is how you manage the difficult situations. Here are a few suggestions.

Document & Communicate

Take detailed notes during phone calls and client meetings and save every email to and from the client. I often send an email after a client call or Zoom meeting summarizing the topics covered and next steps. I find that it helps keep everyone’s expectations in line and it keeps everyone on the same page vis a vis the project.  While creating these records can be time-consuming, they are helpful to have when a discrepancy or question arises down the road about how long a project took or how much a client was invoiced.  Having a “paper trail” allows you to point out what was said during a call or meeting and what was agreed upon.

Set boundaries

Do you have a client that calls you night and day or on weekends when you are spending time with your family? While you want your clients to feel comfortable and contact you with any questions or concerns that they may have, you do not need to make yourself available to your them 24/7, 365.  That’s where setting boundaries comes in.  Let your clients know that for non-emergencies, you only take calls during regular business hours. Anything after hours should be sent via email or communicated the next business day.

Maybe you have had a client that think it’s OK to make countless changes and then wonders why their project is taking so long.  This can be prevented by stating up front in your contract or service agreement that your fee includes a finite number of edits or changes. Any additional changes will add extra time and costs to the project. Sometimes a client needs to be reminded of what he/she agreed to and signed off on.

Just say “No”

What should you do if your client makes unreasonable demands?  Just say “No.”  If the client gets nasty or belligerent, let him/her know that you are not comfortable with their tone and language. If the client continues to berate you or complain about your service, process or timeline, it’s time to consider whether working with that client makes sense. Your clients need to know that respect is a two-way street. I recently had to tell a nasty and demanding prospective client that if he was unhappy with our process, I would respect his feelings and we could amicably part ways. And, while ending a business relationship seems extreme, if a client can’t behave in a businesslike manner and treat you respectfully and professionally, then that client is not worth having. I have learned from personal experience that not letting a client go can be very costly. Difficult clients generally take up more of your time and energy, leaving you with less time and energy for your less difficult or more deserving clients. You end up not doing your best work for anyone because you become physically and mentally drained. Don’t let that happen.

Bill Gates said, “Your most unhappy customers are your greatest source of learning.” Being open to learning is a good thing and the best thing you can learn from difficult clients is to put mechanisms in place that will help keep everyone’s expectations in order, minimize the likelihood of extreme discord, and hopefully keep you out of situations where you have to just say “No.”

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