Total monthly revenue lost: $13,000
What happened: We took on some bad customers. And to be specific, we mean bad for us. We like being partners in marketing with our clients. We don’t respond well to being micromanaged. And some clients need more client service attention, or a “pull-lever-execute-here” type of engagement. Neither of which are necessarily bad, just not our style, and we’ve learned that we often don’t end up satisfying what they need.
Lesson learned: After some messy breakups (one even threatening lawyers), we realized we perform really well with a specific type of client. Now we look for that in every sales call. If we don’t vibe with them, or think they won’t vibe with us, we pass them on to other agencies we know who better fit their personality types.