At what point do you tell a potential client No Thanks?

While I am proud of all I have done to build my name and my business, I’m not necessarily super-proud of how, back in the day when I was working to establish Get It In Writing as a leader in the copywriting and marketing world, I was kind of a yes-girl.

Actually I was a total yes-girl. (I’d use another word here, but I consider you to be dignified company and I am sure you get the point.)

I’d take it all on. Even if I hated to do it, didn’t want to do it or thought I wasn’t the best to do it.

Resumes? Sure. (Would NEVER provide this service today.)
Interviewing your entire staff for bios? I’m your girl! (This may be the most deceptive project of all. Writing bios sounds/seems easy but interviewing people and then writing about them for their approval can be a BEAR. Nothing says multiple rewrites more than writing about the person/people who need to OK the writing.)
Book editing? No problem. (I LOVE this work and am very good at it, but it is really not in the realm of my area of expertise/focus: copywriting and marketing — and you can’t be all things to all people.)

So somewhere around 2005 or 2006 (Get It In Writing was born in 2001), I began to gain confidence. To specialize. To know when I was providing a valuable service and when someone would be better off going somewhere else.

And that’s when I began to say NO (thanks, but no thanks) to the time-wasters, tire-kickers, barterers, low-ballers, sample-askers (can you write one page for us as a sample on “spec”) and all-around nudnicks.

And guess what? When I started saying “no,” I started making more money, working with better-suited clients and becoming the business and business-person I always wanted to be.