Most of us heard about the classic sales flywheel. You render your service/build your product, you market it and attract new clients, close the deal with and so on.But from my experience, it's not as simple, especially for service businesses.There are different types of clients, and understanding this simple helped me a lot. Those who are financially lucrative may not end up being great portfolio items and vice versa. Of course, clients who ensure decent invoices and amazing marketing do exist. But they are usually rare and hard to land. Let's break it down why:They're in a very crowded and competitive space. Everybody wants to work for themThey may want to keep the work confidential and don't allow portfolio displayThey can whitelabel your servicesI like to think of it in terms of time. Present vs. Future rewards, As mentioned above, the best clients provide both types of rewards but are hard to land. My strategy is to balance efforts and not focus just on these clients but make a good mix of other types of clients in the first place.Let me present it in the context of digital product design and dev agency.Client A - a bootstrapped fintech startupPresent rewards are lower because founders have to allocate money carefully, and the company doesn't have. But, future rewards are high. You can create a beautiful interface, market it in your portfolio, receive a shoutout from founders on Twitter, get attention from other larger companies. You can create your best body of work and market it best you can because your incentives and founders' incentives are aligned.Client B - a small/mid size heavy industry companyPresent rewards are high. They can afford to pay well but struggle to attract top talent. Their industry is less sexy and probably lag behind in hiring practices and general expertise. They will be happy to pay very well to solve their niche problem.Future rewards might be low, though. If you design interfaces, you have to design for the target persona. Chances are the end-product does not look good enough to market it and show your expertise because your job was to solve a problem, not create unusable bell and whistles.Also, likely, they wouldn't want you to market what you've done for them to their competitors. So again, future rewards are low.--Now, the key is to design your client base, so you have a healthy mix of A type and B type. Don't get me wrong, you should still look for those who have A and B features, but in my experience, it's easier to land one A and one B, than a client who has both benefits.You have probably noticed one more insight that emerges from this reasoning. Some clients are neither financially attractive nor interesting marketing-wise. Unless you're in a situation where you really need that client to pay bills, say no. You'll be surprised how much good it does to your business. Focusing on the right clients will be your supercharger.Final thought:Present rewards are symmetric (except for equity). You do X, you get Y. Future rewards have an upside nature. It's your leverage. Nobody will promise you the outcomes of portfolio display, marketing, and referrals. Go full leverage mode, and you may find yourself in a situation when you can't pay the bills.That's why I encourage you to build a healthy mix of client types.I hope even though you might be in a different industry than me, you'll find some food for thought in this post. see hubwealthy.com/wealthy
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