Why I Fired A $10,000 Per Month Client Two Months Ago - WARNING! Do NOT Make My Mistake

I got so many PMs from readers about something I mentioned here in my previous thread http://www.warriorforum.com/offline-...-business.html (which by the way I will start contributing to again tomorrow).

In that thread I had mentioned in passing that I had fired a $10,000 per month client.

I got a lot of questions as to why I had to do that and after having replied to as much as 13 folks why I did what I did, I decided if that many people were interested in knowing it, maybe it was something I could share with everyone else, so here goes.

This client is a major information publisher in my country. Targets the working middle class types with salaries ranging from $500 per month to as much as $6,000 per month.

They were doing okay, but I blew their results out of the water.

I ignored the normal SEO route, re-jigged their advertising. You should have seen what ads they used before. It was HORRIBLE.

I rewrote all of their copy Gary-Habert style, set up a database of customers, segmented their lists by age, industry, income etc.

This business is just this guy, one employee and me as an outside consultant.

I negotiated a 25% cut of all revenue after they implemented. I made sure I handles ALL implementation, but with the owner's okay since all expenses was to be borne by him.

The business went from doing about $15,000 in revenue per month to doing $40,000 to as much as $70,000.

The least I got paid as my commissions was $6,000. A couple of months I got as much as $15,000.

It was like a dream.

Then The Bubble Bust

No, the business didn't collapse.

The owner began to resent me. I would make suggestions on what to do, where to advertise, budgets etc. He would veto them all, argue for hours with me about why it shouldn't be done.

Time passed, Revenue tumbled. The business suffered.

One day, I was so pissed off, I went in and told him he was running the business down.

Guess what he said?

He blamed me.

He said my methods were no longer working. That I had made suggestions that were untenable.

He would call me in the middle of the night, and after muttering an apology for calling so late (the creep) he'd ask mundane questions such as:

"When will the new website be ready?"

"How much did you say we would budget for Facebook?"

Gosh!

Everyday I grew more and more tired of the whole thing.

Worse was I couldn't put a finger on why he was doing all of that.

One day, I couldn't take it anymore, so I decided to end it all.

I told him I no longer wanted to work for him or his business.

Yes, I admit I QUIT!

What was my mistake with this client and what can you learn from it?

I made a lot of mistakes.

1. I made him a buddy. When the going was good, we went out for beer. I visited his house, etc. Big Mistake.

Lesson: Maintain a professional relationship with your client. No beers, no hanging out together in Aspen.

2. I didn't enforce our the agreements I had with him.

In my contract, I had stipulated that my advice had to be followed to the letter. My undoing was that clause letting him to okay any proposal I had made.

Somehow, I don't see how I could have overcome that, but I should have done better.

Lesson: Enforce all agreements. Make sure a lawyer draws up your contracts. Spel out what you will do, and MOST IMPORTANTLY what you won't.

3. Negotiate a fair deal with your clients

Looking back, I think he was resenting the fact that I was taking one-quarter of the profits. He didn't come out to say it, but I believe that was the problem.

Well if he cannot see the value and he had to hate me for making him money, to hell with him.

The good thing about my involvement with this client, is that I retained ownership of all the marketing materials I created as per our agreement, so he could not use my ideas after I had left.

I talked to his lone employee the other day and he said sales had gone back to what it was before I came in.

It beats me. Why do people sabotage themselves like this?

*shaking my head*