Setting Boundaries With Clients

Lauren Golden of The Free Mama shows virtual assistants & administrative consultants how to set boundaries with clients in their freelancing business.

If you’ve been working your way through the modules of The Free Mama Movement, you might already be fielding client inquiries — which is AMAZING.

And maybe you’ve had a potential client come to you and ask for a proposal. So you wrote a proposal and sent it. And then the client came back with even more ideas and questions. So you addressed all of those. And then the client came back AGAIN, with EVEN MORE questions, and you’re just not sure what the heck to think anymore.

Mama, you are NOT alone.

You’re not the first freelancer to face this issue, and you won’t be the last. I’ve been there, too — which means that I can give you some practical advice.

When you’re dealing with a potential client and you don’t yet have a contract in place, you want to be careful.

On the one hand, you don’t want to give away hours and hours of your time writing proposals, strategizing ideas, and having inquiry calls when you’re not getting paid.

On the other hand, you don’t want to walk away from what might be an amazing contract, once all the dust settles.

What’s a Free Mama to do?

You need to pay attention to three things: boundaries, communication, and expectations.

Your potential client may be new to this process, and likely isn’t trying to take advantage of your time. She’s overworked and overwhelmed, and she has a lot of ideas. Your job is to reign her in with boundaries.

You can explain politely and respectfully, “I would love to start helping you and take some of this off your plate. In order to do that, I need you to sign this contract and make an initial payment. Then, I can start digging in, and we can revise the agreement if needed in a month or two.”

It’s also REALLY important to be clear in your communication with potential clients, and set expectations appropriately.

Be up front about what is and is not included in your proposal — and set up a way to cover yourself if you’re asked to do something outside the scope of work you’ve agreed on. For example, you can say, “Any additional tasks not included in this scope will be billed at an hourly rate of $X,” or “Any additional work will require a separate agreement.”

Once you start working with clients, you might find that you’re still dealing with a little bit of their craziness. Part of your job is to help them work with you most effectively. Once more, boundaries, communication, and expectations are key.

If your client keeps sending you messages on Facebook, but you’ve asked her to send work via email, train her. Reply to her messages from email, and reiterate that this is the communication channel that lets you ensure you don’t miss a task.

If your client texts you at midnight, don’t answer. Answer via email during your normal work hours, and let her know that she can expect to hear from you via email during your normal work hours.

If you see that your client has overlooked something, don’t just sit back and wait for the train wreck. Get in there and do what you can to fix things before they’re a problem. If you do that, you will have a client who loves you forever and tells everyone else how amazing you are.

Remember, you want to be professional — but not subservient. You’re a business owner, not an employee, and you need to act like one. So don’t be afraid to be proactive, to speak up when needed, and to ask for what you need (respectfully, of course) in order to get the job done.

You can always ask for feedback if you’re not sure exactly how to phrase something to your client — we’ve got a whole community of mamas who will help you.

You can rock out the work, mama. It just takes some practice to navigate the wild world of clients — but you can do it.

 

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