Wasting time in your business

Ahhh Time Wasters. Would we not love to remove them all, forever.

Lets be honest though, sometimes time wasting isn't the intent, it just works out that something both parties are trying to achieve wont work out, there's no "meeting of the minds" or an agreement cant be reached. These are not the time wasters your referring to though I'm sure Jim (even though we would love to cut out the ten meetings it took to figure out that things where not going to work out!)

I think the ones you mean are the purposeful time wasters. The ones who never had any intent of using or paying for any service or product. The milkers, tire kickers or leeches, whichever term you prefer. There is no real way of spotting them I think but common sense and a bit of a hard nose can help.

I find that most start the conversation with some sort of incentive. For example "Lets do a good deal on this project and I will have ten more to come after it" or "I have lots of high net worth contacts that I can put you in touch with if you do a cheap but high quality job". This sets alarm bells ringing straight away! Why feel the need to tell me this in the first place!

I sort them out by replying "Well, lets do this, I will do this job for double price and then half price for the next two" or "Really? So lets get those deals in first then we can see to accommodating you for the excellent referrals!"

As you can imagine I am left in peace to get on with real and profitable clients quite quickly.

The other side of the coin is of course the unprepared lot (most of us to be honest). They approach web based projects with some half assed idea scribbled on a cafe napkin, no business plan, no marketing strategy and ultimately, no money to see it through. Then they offer youy 50% of the IDEA if you do all the work for the next 12 months for free...

Seriously now. Why the hell would I need that in the first place...

Thats my couple of centimos anyway Jim!

in reference to: Time wasters and your business! | Marketing Blog (view on Google Sidewiki)