Clients not paying for work | A different solution.

[#1]

Hello,

Clients not paying for work: I have seen many value-add comments and commiserations on this forum. I will provide a different solution.

Train one's self in the tactics and strategies.  Google "The New Strategic Selling".  It is the bible, by parable, to those of us hailing from the professional sales sector.  The book was first published in 1988, it has stood the test of time for 30 years as the finest thought capital in the sector of learning.

Pages 82 to 114, in particular, discuss sales tactics of great importance.  There are other sections specifically related to qualifying clients.  Since a client who will not pay for work is by nature, a client who is not qualified to work with, then that means, the client was not correctly qualified as such.

In professional sales, as a co-body of expertise to any delivery expertise: poor client behavior is not attributed to the client.  It is attributed to the sales person as their personal failure.  Their personal failure.  And since we are all sales people first -- to win our work.  By proxy, clients who do not pay for their work are resultant from our short comings, not ours.

I relate this, so that those who choose to examine themselves, not react to this email messaging with rancor or ire, will head to Amazon, buy the book. Read it. Read it again.  Memorize it.  Practice its best practices. 

I have read the book. Read it again, and again, and again -- as I was trained in MH tactics in 1994-95.  25 years.  Perhaps.  Perhaps.  In 68 or so projects.  Those practices are the reason why I have never had a client 'not pay me'.  Never. Have I had a client not pay me.

You now know the finest body of knowledge of selling professionally.  Miller Heiman, The New Strategic Selling (Or its original copy, Strategic Selling works just as well).   30 years of history, expertise and best practices.  One Amazon click and 3 hours of reading away.

[#2]

**edited for Community Guidelines**

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Your profile is actually very impressive. I suspect you haven't had the average freelancer experience in quite a while (dealing with low-paying clients who try to overwork you), since you charge high rates and you're established in your field. 

In fact, your advice may actually be worthwhile for a very small subset of people, including yourself. You have a JSS of 100%, which means your work tends to be excellent and your clients tend to be happy. I can see why you think that a bad client review is always a reflection of your work, because your work is probably usually very good. However, there is a little bit of survivorship bias in this situation. Most of the clients you will encouter have fat enough wallets to pay well for good work, and they don't try to screw you over like a cheapskate client would. Essentially, all of your clients are "good" clients, and aren't of the variety I outlined in a previous reply. For most of us, we come across bad clients on a weekly if not daily basis, and blaming ourselves for such people is a suboptimal solution.

[#3]

He only averages $20k/year on the platform. When you make such a low amount on the site, you will run into fewer problems. When you sell a lot of contracts and generate more revenue on the site, you will run across more problems obviously because you have more projects going on and run into brand new clients more often.

The guy doesn't really tell the truth in anything he posts, so engaging is just feeding the fairy tales.

[#4]

Everyone, I have removed some posts on this thread as it violated our Community Guidelines. These guidelines are in place to foster a healthy discussion among community members. We encourage our Community members to be professional and respectful to one another when posting here. Please, be mindful of the Community Guidelines when posting, or replying to a thread. We want to keep these forums a place where mutual respect and constructive conversation is taking place.

John, as per your question about setting your profile's visibility to public, you may follow the steps in this help article. I appreciate that you take the time to share tips on how freelancers can improve their freelancing business. As a gentle reminder, please know that the Community forums are a place where freelancers and clients can ask and answer questions, search topics, learn, socialize and get updates about Upwork. Let me know if you have other questions.

[#5]

It is unusual to come across a thread that is clearly generating high interest and that nevertheless features one particular poster whose point of view (posts) has (have) attracted a sum total of zero kudos.

[#6]

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Janean L wrote:

It is unusual to come across a thread that is clearly generating high interest and that nevertheless features one particular poster whose point of view (posts) has (have) attracted a sum total of zero kudos.

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the spurns that patient merit of the unworthy takes?