Evan Carmichael explains why early-stage founders must accept "good" customers who pay bills, even if they're not ideal. Bad customers force you to compromise your values. Once you hit survival, you can refuse them and focus on premium clients who align with what you actually believe in.
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Should you work with non-ideal customers? This is going to be a problem that you face in any business that you start. You're going to have the customers who love what you do, who get the value that you provide, and are willing to pay you what you're worth. And then you're going to get other customers who like your service, like your product, are willing to pay you a certain amount, but they're never gonna be ideal customers. And that's gonna be most of your customers at the start. They're people who, they don't quite get it, you know, and they're not, they're very price conscious. Like if you were to increase your price by 10%, they're gone. That's not an ideal customer for you. So the challenge for how to work with ideal customers for me depends on what stage you're at in your business. Okay, this question comes as a result of somebody writing me a question. This was from my newsletter reader Ijeoma. Wow, hope I pronounced that right. Sorry for the pronunciation there. Basically, she has a dress company. She designs dresses and fabrics for people, but 90% of the people who come into her are not ideal customers, and she doesn't know what to do. The problem here is it will really depend on what phase you're at in your business. For me, what I recommend entrepreneurs doing, the first thing you need to focus on is getting past survival. Getting to the point where you have enough money to put food on the table and pay your bills. I have a whole set of guides that help you do that, but you have to get past survival because it's great to have the big vision, the big idea. I want that for you, but if, if you run out of money you can't support, you know, your mortgage payment or your rent or pay your electricity bill, you're gonna have to go back and get a job. So step number 1 is get to survival, whatever that takes. How much does that mean for you? And that's not living luxuriously, it's survival, okay? It means I don't have to get a job. That's goal number 1. And so that means working with less than ideal customers. And the question is, should you, would you rather work with less than ideal customers or would you rather be at a job? For most people, they'd pick running your own business but with less than ideal customers, okay? You have to make a judgment call with each person. I remember an example when I was starting my business, I had a, I was growing, okay, like for Evan Carmichael.com, I was seeing traction and I got an offer from a big computer company. I won't say the name, doesn't matter. And they basically wanted me to be a pitchman for their company and saying, we want you to go out and say how great our company is and tell everybody on your list and on social media. You tell everybody about how great we are and that they need to buy our product. And they were throwing a lot of money at me, and like, wow, this is a lot of cash. But it just, it didn't make me feel good. You know, like, it was too far. It violated my belief system because I like sharing stuff with you guys that I use, that I believe in, that I think you can get value from. I don't want to say, "You need to go buy this computer because it's the best computer in the world," if I'm not using it and I don't like their product. And so I had to say no to that, even though it meant giving up a big chunk of cash. And that was That was hard, but I believe that there were better opportunities on the horizon. So there is a little bit of a line you have to walk. I would say don't take on a customer who makes you do something that goes against what you believe in. Okay, if they are making you do something that's against your values, then they're not a good customer for you. Okay, that's a bad customer. Then you're going to have good customers, and then you're going to have great or ideal customers. And a lot of times your business will start with a lot of good customers, and they're frustrating and they don't get your value. But what they do is they help get you to that point of survival. And once you pass survival, you can leave them and focus on the better clients. And then you can afford to be more selective and more picky. And hold out for the really good clients, the ideal clients. And in that process, you get better at what you do, right? While you're working with the good clients, you get more skilled. You learn how to deliver more value because by helping them, you are getting better yourself. And then you have more to bring to an ideal customer, to a great customer. So to summarize my advice, ignore the bad customers. If they make you churn in your stomach and you go to sleep not happy and you're fighting your beliefs, ignore them. They are not worth it for any price. Keep the good customers who will get you to your point of survival and then start focusing on the great ideal customers. Believe. For those of you watching, you like the video, please give it a thumbs up below. Subscribe to the channel if you want to see more videos like this. And let me know what you think. Leave a question below. Ask me a question about your business. Let me know what you thought of this video. I'll make a video response. Thank you so much, and I'll see you soon.
