Hey, fellow entrepreneurs, welcome to the Buckets and Boone Gates Studio with Kim White, Jill Olish, and many other brilliant entrepreneurs. Determined to solve world problems for entrepreneurs, this community is changing how we look at the big things we do on our business adventure and sharing from their own lives ways to protect our time, money, and bandwidth. This show is designed for you, the entrepreneur, to hear behind the scenes stories of real business people across the globe and learn what is possible for you. Keep listening to join today's juicy conversation with Kim and Jill. Welcome to the Buckets and Boomgate studio. I am Jill Olish and I am joined by the fierce Kim White. Kim, I'm glad to be on the podcast with you today. I love when we podcast together, Jill. Well, if you've ever signed a client and instantly regretted it, you are in the right episode. we are talking some spicy things and we are talking about client fit and how to say no kindly but clearly let's dive right into our confessions today kim when was there a time that you had a client that wasn't a good fit Unfortunately, I can give multiple examples, and I will say we are going to change the names to protect the innocent around here. I do think that there is one thing, though, that I'd like to mention right up front is a lot of times when you are about to sign a client on or you have someone in. So let's separate this to customers are by products, clients by services. So if you have a client based business, a lot of times you have this gut check of I need the money I need to, I need to make a sale. However, I have a bad feeling about this. Go with the bad feeling and say no. Let's just put that out in the beginning. Because I have never overridden my gut feelings to a successful end. It's always been not a good end. And we know for sure that money does not make up for bad experiences. So that's a big piece of what this episode is about. So I do want to say that. I had a client, so these are different stages, but I had a client I knew better than to say yes to, but my heartstrings were pulled. They needed the solution we have. They needed help. I knew we could help them, but I also saw signs that they weren't going to listen. And to be honest, if someone doesn't listen, you can't help them. They are throwing their good money after a good solution and won't get a good outcome because they are not in the space to listen. So that is one kind of client I have encountered and had, had to what we call around here, graduate them eventually. And graduate just means I am not firing you. I'm not kicking you out. I'm not being mean to you, but I'm not the solution for you. So for your best interests, it's graduating you to someone who can help you. So that's one. Another instance is I had a great client who was the right fit, who actually fell off their own wagon. Like they got sidetracked and became a not right fit. because they were having high demand. They were very high maintenance based on their panic mode of what they were doing, not based on, you know, common sense and business sense of we need to do these things to make things happen. And so it turned into another graduation eventually. And I'm very, I want to be very clear. Someone doesn't mess up and I graduate them. It is a long term thing because I want to make sure it's not just a tiny season or something going on. I'm very much don't want you to take away from this episode that I just if you don't do what I want, you're out of here because that's not the truth. The truth is, though, if I really can see I am not the solution because someone is not going to listen or implement the things, I don't want to waste your money or my time. I want you to get who you can work with. So that in just to kick off this with with the juicy and the spicy is that. We really do. Take very much precaution when we are signing on any kind of client. Right now our client roster is full and it stays that way. Most of the time we have a waiting list. But it's very important to us to have different options for someone who is coming in who needs help. And so we're going to talk about all those different things, I think, through this episode. But I just want to put that out there first, Jess. I called you Jess. Oh, my gosh. Hey, Jillo. Okay. Let's get back into this so I can. Oh, good. Oh, my goodness. So sometimes we say yes. because of money sometimes we say yes because we're very flattered that someone asked us you know to be our client sometimes we say yes because of fear oh my goodness if i say no there's going to be a problem sometimes we say Yes, because of scarcity. We're afraid we're not going to have enough clients. And let me be very clear. I'm lumping all of us, you listening and Jill and I all together when I say this, this is not me saying this is why we take clients. This is just the feelings we can have. But the red flags that I have ignored ended up with the graduations I just taught. And it breaks my heart every time. We don't do disrespect around here. That's one thing I think every one of you should put on your list of you don't do disrespect. You don't do boundary pushing. And if there's not an alignment of values. So if one person thinks it's okay to be completely transactional, and one person thinks it needs to be relationship-driven transactions, you're going to have some head-butting. You're going to really have some problems. It costs you with stress. It costs you with resentment bubbling up. You start resenting them because they're not, you know, you didn't take time. Really, you have to take the responsibility. But that cost can be overworked. And this is one little phrase that I think is actually amazing and horrible at the same time. Can that be Jill? And that's mission drift. If you start taking on clients who are going against the mission that you created your business for and they are creating this space of you're moving your mission to suit them. You have to be very careful because you will ruin your business and what you set up Now, if they're a good influence, I'm not saying it can't get better. But if you are drifting in your mission of, well, I really want a relational business, but it's okay if I have these clients who are transactional. It can cause a lot of harm and it can cause a destroyed business. It can destroy you and the business in the process. So be very, very careful. Yeah. I've lost some good sleep over this. those red flags and stress. And, you know, I think for me, sometimes those discovery calls that we'll call them when you, you know, you set up with someone who's a potential client, and they present to you what they're looking for. But by the time you're like, Yeah, okay, let's move forward. And you get together again. And it's a whole different aspect. We know, either they want more work, like you had said, done and you know, it's just totally different. That's when it's like, all right, maybe I made a mistake here. Like, what did I not see in that first call together? You know? So I've, I've been in that position where I've said yes. And then I had to like really back out by the time we get back together, because it's just not there. There was something lacking in the first meeting. And it takes practice. We should also interject that it takes practice to get to where you can tell if someone is the right fit or not. So if you have clients that are not the right fit right now, don't panic. Like, this is something you can learn. This is something you can practice and you can grow in. I just want to make sure nobody's discouraged by if they have taken on the wrong clients. Yes. Yeah, because not every paying client is a good fit for the sexy businesses that we are trying to build, right? Exactly. Exactly. Kim, I love that you have so much experience bumping your head, right? And you want so badly to share it. And I love that we have the podcast to be able to do that because you're doing it in hopes that it helps us listening to not bump our heads as hard. So if you are listening and If you're anything like myself or Kim, you'll hear these stories and still go and miss some red flags because we're still doing it, you know? Absolutely. Like you said, Kim, it's going to take practice. So for us who are listening and want to be aware of red flags, even if we end up saying yes along the way, what can we do to look for good fit clients? Yeah. Well, I think that there are four categories and there's some other things, but I think if you stick with these four categories, it's a good start. First, I think it's your values and your attitude. And you did notice I said your attitude, right? It's not them first, it's you first. You have to make sure that you make a list of the things that you will and will not accept as a client. And it's the characteristics. So values and and my attitude have to be right. But the values and attitude of theirs has to be right, too. If there's somebody and I'll tell you ours, I'll go along this list and tell you ours. One of the things that I won't do is someone who's not grateful. Someone who is very entitled is not a right fit for me. We will butt heads in a way you don't want to butt heads with. So in your list, in your category, start with one, values and attitude. Check yours, check theirs. Make sure that you're respectful. They're respectful. If they bring up something in you, that causes you to feel like, oh, we're going to butt heads in a bad way, listen to that. Don't ignore that. And they take responsibility. Here's another thing that we just won't. We won't take clients who are, well, it's always your fault. It's always their fault. It's always this fault. If that's the case, they won't, I mean, they won't last around here. They will get graduated because if you don't take responsibility in your business, you can't change things. If it's always someone else's fault and life is happening to you, You can't change that. But if you think about your responsibility in it, there are responsibilities in everything that we do in our business. If they're taking responsibility, that's a great place because that means they're going to be open to coaching or to feedback. If they're not open to it, they should not be a client. Number two category is readiness. Do they have the basics in place, depending on what you're offering? Around here, we'll take someone with an idea and help them put it into a business, create the entire process. But make sure that if your business you know, that they're ready for you, that they are actually ready for what you're offering them and that they understand the work involved because we do look for easy buttons around here to help each other. We do support, we do that kind of stuff. But I will tell you at the end of the day, putting a business, Together that is successful is not for the faint of heart. It does require work. It does require certain things for you to understand and make happen. So I think that's important. Number three category is boundaries. Boom gates is what we call them around here. Do they respect your time and do they communicate well? Sometimes this falls on us because, again, we have to take responsibility. If we're not communicating well, that can be a problem. But make sure they're actually able to communicate. I have had lots of people in my life who I will send them a message and they'll just send back the letter K. Well, does that mean you understood it? Does that mean you're going to implement it? Does that mean you're, what does K mean? Like, I can't find a definition for K. And so if that's their mode of communication, you got to set that up front. You can't send me K. You can say, okay, I'll try this or okay, I'll implement this or let's talk about it. But you can't just send me a K because that doesn't fly with me. I don't know what K means when you say it. Um, they, they have to not demand twenty four seven access. If you've listened to this podcast ever, you probably know about pumpkin o'clock. I go to bed at a certain time and I cannot I'm not worth it to you to ask me things after pumpkin o'clock. That's the end of my day. I'm getting in bed. I have all my phones turned off. Because I am not going to answer with bad answers. I'm not a doctor, unless you are a doctor listening. If you're not a doctor, then turn your phone off. Have those limited things and say it up front so that it's not a missed, you know, expectation that they expect this. I always laugh and say we're on speed dial, but during this time. Like, it's not all the time because we can't. We won't be able to function as a human. So very important. And number four category is energy. So we call it bandwidth around here. That's part of what, you know, our capacity is about. But you... When you have a client that you dread when they're coming up on your calendar, that's not a right fit. That's a hard one. So if you feel pretty neutral or all the way too excited before a call, that's like a sign of a right fit. But if every time this person's name comes up, you get this, you know, you just don't know what they're going to come up with. And it's not the exciting kind of things that you're figuring out together. It's the, you know, it's the excuses. It's the, I can't do this because it's the, it's all of that. Be very careful with that. And are they someone you would be happy to introduce them to other people, you know, in your business or your friends, or are they someone you don't really want anyone to know you're associated with them? a very big tell for your checklist of if you're if you wouldn't introduce them to other business associates maybe you need to think about it a little longer so you can use this list like joe was talking about earlier before discovery calls you can go through your list this is how you keep you on track let's go through your checklist and remind yourself after a call debrief with somebody about about it like a trusted partner a trusted team member a trusted someone debrief this is not a gossip that i'm talking about this is that let's figure out if this really is the right the right call to make um i think that when you are using this checklist actively it's a way to practice but it's also It's also a way to, well, let me give you an example. I know when I meet someone who is flaky, who is flighty, I did this and then I did this two months later and then I did this two months later and then I did this two months later and they're all different businesses. That's usually not my flavor. The reason being is I need hardheaded. I need the ones that are tenacious in the same coin. One side's hardheaded, one side's tenacious. It's the same characteristic. I need to know you're going to fight through the hard times. I need to know you're going to really want to stick out the business you're creating because if you spend all these hours creating a business and then you just walk away from it because, oh, well, it got too hard. I don't wanna play. I don't wanna do that because we're here to make an impact. We're here to help people have successful businesses. We're not here just to serve clients for the sake of building a bunch of random businesses. We're here because we wanna make an impact in this life and in this world. And if you are someone who is making an impact or wants to make an impact, I can tell that when I'm talking to you, you're going to say certain things that are going to show that. So I think that's just really important for y'all to know some real life examples from our list because we have a cheat sheet. Yeah, this checklist is gold. So keep this list written down as a system. So you're not trying to remember it because I know when we get into those moments. We get a little nervous talking to other people, trying to sell our businesses and that we can help someone. So having that checklist handy. And then, like you said, even talking it out afterwards, a lot of us are verbal processors and need to like believe ourselves when we start talking about it, you know? We did talk a little bit about having systems in the last episode. So if you want to go back and listen to episode one, fourteen, you can check out some of the systems that we had talked about in there. I know for me, I am such a yes person. That I will, I will say yes, you know, without looking at those red flags. But there are those potential clients, both good and not good fit ones that we have to say no to. Kim, I know that you're very practiced on saying no with a full client roster for the past few years now. How can we practice saying no gracefully? I think gracefully is the key, but I will say you and I have had this conversation privately. We're just going to say it out loud on the podcast, but you know, when you say yes to someone and then you have to come back and say no later, that's way harder. If you have any kind of you know, drawback or, or feeling say, say, wait, I will let you know. I think that that's a very important thing rather than saying yes. And having to say, no, I only know this from experience. Let me say that. So when you say that Jill, it just reminds me of the times that I've had to have horribly hard conversations after the fact. And it taught me to not say yes. like right out of the gate because i get excited if no one else knows this i'm very excitable so when i get excited i'm like yes yes but the problem with that is is a lot of times it's not for the right reason yeah so we have to watch ourselves to not you know cause others harm either If they're not a right fit at all, I think these are some things you can do. If they're not a right fit at all, don't be rude. You don't know that something might change or they might know someone that is the right fit or you don't know that you can't help them. And so I'm going to give just a little example from our community. If someone is not a right fit, they're still welcome in the community, the free community. It doesn't mean that they're not a right fit for the community. If they're not a right fit for being a client, maybe they're a right fit for being in the masterminds. Maybe they're a right fit for being in a specific class or whatever. It doesn't mean that I'm saying, no, don't ever talk to us again. And I think that's kind of, we get that all or nothing feeling of, well, if you're not the right fit, no, never, you know. There are some people who have said too much in a conversation that don't mind lying or cheating or stealing those are the never the right fits i'll say that but if they're someone who you know maybe your personalities don't mesh maybe they are not a good listener yet maybe they are you know not ready yet i think that that goes into a different category than the if you're a liar or a cheat or a thief or whatever you're never going to be a right fit in this community there's no way you'll last But if they're not a right fit, you have to have this conversations with, you know, either giving them some other options or explaining a little bit. If I can't serve someone, like if I'm not the solution for someone, I will absolutely tell you because there's no reason to waste your money or my time doing something that's not going to work. So you have to look at the bigger picture. When you're thinking of these things, if it's not the right time for them, this is a whole different thing. Sometimes someone comes to us and they're not ready financially. Like they can't afford to be in a mastermind right now or they can't afford to be a client. Our clients are not afraid to pay what we ask because they know the outcome. But if you are brand new and you're trying to start your business, sometimes being a client is not the right answer if you don't have the money. If you're bootstrapping, which we suggest, other episodes have talked about bootstrapping, then maybe you need to go to the not yet and work toward that. And the not yet is... Join the community and go to all the things. Implement the things we tell for free. This podcast is full of things that people could change their businesses with that don't cost anything, cost you to listen. So that's the first thing I'm going to say, because if you listen and you implement the things, it won't be very long until you will have the money to become a client if that's really what needs to happen. So just want to say right timing is very important. If it's a boundary issue, a boom gate issue, then I think that this is something that has to be set up front, has to be dealt with up front, and there has to be an if-then. If you don't respect my boundaries, then you are not going to stay a client. If I give you a six month contract, And at the end of that six month contract, you have never respected those boundaries. Then I won't be able to continue. So giving them even those kinds of things, if they're not there, you know, if they're not respectful of your boundaries, they're not the right fit for you because at the end of the day, I'm going to keep saying this. If you don't build a six sexy business to support your sexy life, And you let everyone come in and dictate. You let your inbox dictate to you. You let clients dictate to you. You let all the circumstances around you dictate to you. It's never going to be sexy. It's always going to be you're tossed here and there. And that's a horrible feeling. So the relief that can come from that horrible feeling is those aligned no's. The long-term respect it creates is I have had people asked to be clients who were not ready that later became wonderful clients. I've had clients who have been graduated, who started out as wonderful clients. So here's the life lesson of this whole podcast. I feel like is give yourself grace, give them grace, but be very clear with your boom gates, your boundaries, And keep your word. If you say, don't call me after this time, and then you let them call you sometimes after that time, you're actually telling them you don't really mean what you say. So I think those are all really important things, Jill, that we try to live by. Yeah. I love that added, though, keeping your word. Then what was the whole point of all that you just established? Yeah. These red and green flags, key piece of being honest, the key piece is being honest with yourself. Because if you're not honest with yourself, then how are you going to even, you know, keep your word then with the checklist? Like, and making sure that you're not saying yes to the wrong fit people. Yeah. Kim, you've said this recently. I can't remember if it was here or in the community conversations roundtable in the My Sexy Business community, but living in the peace of it is the beauty of that honesty. So as you're listening and realizing these things aren't so peaceful with one of the decisions you might have made on a client, it's okay. We want you to walk away with a win with some peace. So we'd like to try and give you something that you can do today to try and live in that peace. Kim, what do we got? So sexy homework today is, you know, again, I think the planning of things is so important. So define what it is that your green flag list is, you know, the qualities of your best client. If you could pick one of your clients, this is something I did a lot of years ago. I picked my very best client and then kind of broke down. Why were they the best clients? I went through and found the characteristics that I appreciated. And then I thought about my worst client and thought, OK, I really wouldn't choose to have this again. So the red flag list is the things you won't put up with. The green flag list is the things that you appreciate about your best client. And then you have this. little, you know, mini checklist again, you know, I still want you to do the four categories from above, but this is like your mini list. You can keep it near your computer or where you can grab it quick out of your purse, whatever, you know, whatever it is on your calendar so that you can remind yourself. If I hear these words in a conversation, this is a red flag, right? So if somebody says, well, I did this, but I quit, and they say that multiple times, I know that that's red flags for us. But if I hear green flags of I'm so grateful for, I messed this up, but this is what I did to try to fix it, those are actually green flags for me. They're signs that their character is what I'm looking for to connect with and to help. So I think that that's a important thing. What are your red flags? What are your green flags? And keep it close where when you answer a sales call or you have a discovery call or you, you know, do whatever it is, email, text, whatever the messaging, communication, whatever. Pay attention. Pay attention to that list. Great. Well, let's recap a little bit. Not all money is good money. we don't want that to be painful for you in trying to get the money. Right. And saying no can be an act of service. So you're probably helping them out too, by helping yourself out by saying no, because you can always make a referral to someone else that could help them. But yeah. So if this episode helped you in making these decisions, distinctions between red and green flags uh share it with someone who a business friend who could benefit from some red and green flag help with their clients and next time we'll be talking about weekly ceo rhythms i want to say thank you again so much for listening in because we couldn't make this podcast better without you so we hope to see you next time love y'all Thank you for joining Kim and Jill in the Buckets and Boomgate studio for today's conversation. Don't forget to follow the show for future juicy episodes, and they can't wait to chat with you next week.
