Maintaining Solid Client Relationships More Important Now Than Ever

Maintaining a good relationship with your clients just seems like common sense. The funny thing is, many consultants (and other business owners) regularly fall into the trap of creating an adversarial relationship with a specific client from time to time. This can ruin an otherwise fruitful relationship for no good reason. Often, the reason boils down to simple pride. Now more than ever, maintaining or fixing damaged client relationships is critical. Here are a few tips:

The client is always right.

This is one of the more annoying truisms out there. Nonetheless, it should be a core part of your client relationship strategy. In the end, you are in business to serve the client. Even if the client is wrong about a specific point, if you really listen, what you will hear is what they really want now. In the end, isn’t our job to serve the client? Sometimes people change their minds and often they don’t like to admit it (especially if they believe it will increase billable hours). Find a way to accept the client’s position and be constructive about any differences. No matter how right you are, in the end it just doesn’t matter. So why worry about it?

Provide value beyond what was agreed to.

Most of us (unless you own a monopoly) have to compete at some level. Competition can be stiff, especially in service industries where the differentiating factors that separate one vendor from the others are so hard to see. One of the ways to make sure that your firm excels is to exceed expectations as a matter of policy. Now, sometimes you’re going to fall down. In the end, the client is much less concerned with you making a mistake as they are with how you handle it. If you make a mistake be honest about it and do your level best to make the client whole (and then some). The client will trust you even more and that is a good thing for everyone. If you don’t make a mistake, make sure that you provide services beyond what is called for in the contract. This can be as simple as advice or not billing for something that you could have. From time to time I get asked to deliver something that was not called for in the agreement. Sometimes we won’t bill for this to help keep the client on budget. Your client will be appreciative at your helping keep costs down and will be more likely to hire you again or recommend you to others.

Reach out to clients as often as you can.

Clients want to know that their vendors are thinking about their business. Besides, there is no better way to build a relationship with your clients than to talk to them frequently. In order to add value you should be truly engaged in your clients industry. That might include reading trade publications, researching what their competitors are doing, etc. This will provide you with opportunities to reach out and open non-project oriented discussions with your clients where you can not only add value, but will most likely learn what your client thinks about key issues. This may present an opportunity to up-sell other services as well. At the very least it presents an occasion to support your client and provide extra value.

These tips might seem obvious and easy to do. But the fact remains that most service providers fall down here as they are too busy chasing new revenue. Your existing client base is your core. Every day you should try to think of a way to add value for them. It will make your business more stable and your clients happy. These happy clients are the ones that will ultimately support your own company’s growth through recommendations and referrals.