CHAPTER 1
The Red Velvet Rope Policy

He who trims himself to suit everyone will soon whittle himself away.

—Raymond Hull

Imagine that a friend has invited you to accompany her to an invitation-only special event. You arrive and approach the door, surprised to find a red velvet rope stretched between two shiny brass poles. A nicely dressed man asks your name, checking his invitation list. Finding your name there, he flashes a wide grin and drops one end of the rope, allowing you to pass through and enter the party. You feel like a star.

Do you have your own red velvet rope policy that allows in only the most ideal clients, the ones who energize and inspire you? If you don’t, you will shortly. Why?

First, because when you work with coaching clients you love, you’ll truly enjoy the work you’re doing; you’ll love every minute of it. (Well, almost every minute of it. It is work, after all.) And when you love the work you do, you’ll do your best work, which is essential to booking yourself solid.

Second, because you are your clients. They are an expression and an extension of you. Do you remember when you were a teenager and your mother or father would give you a hard time about someone you were hanging out with? Your parents may have said that a particular kid was a bad influence. As a teen, you may have thought about how unfair that felt, but the truth is that you are the company you keep. The people you spend time with, make a significant impact on your state of mind and how you feel about yourself. Let this be the imperative of your business: choose your clients as carefully as you choose your friends. This is of critical importance in a coaching business because of the deep bond you will have with the clients you are serving.

The first step in building your foundation is to choose your ideal clients, the individuals or businesses with whom you do your best work, the people or environments that energize and inspire you. I’m going to help you identify specific characteristics of individuals or organizations that would make them ideal to work with. You will then develop a rigorous screening process to find more of them. I’m also going to help you prune your current client list of less-than-ideal clients.

When I began my coaching business I would work with anyone who had a pulse and a checkbook. Then I began to consider what it would mean to choose my clients. What it would mean to work only with clients who were ideal for me. And thank goodness I did. Now I live by what I call the Red Velvet Rope Policy of ideal clients. It increases my productivity and my happiness, it enables me to do my best work, and I have more clients and referrals than I can handle by myself. And so will you.

For maximum joy, prosperity, and abundance, think about the person you are when you are performing optimally, when you are with all the people who inspire and energize you. Now think about all of the frustration, tension, and anxiety you feel when you work with clients who are less than ideal—not so good, right?

Wouldn’t it be great to spend every day working with clients who are ideal for you, clients whom you can hardly believe you get paid to work with? This ideal is completely possible once you identify with whom you want to work and determine with certainty that you will settle for nothing less. Once you do that, it’s just a matter of knowing which of your existing clients qualify and how to acquire more just like them.

1.1.1 Written Exercise: To begin to identify the types of clients you don’t want, consider which characteristics or behaviors you refuse to tolerate. What turns you off or shuts you down? What kinds of people should not be getting past the red velvet rope that protects you and your business?

Dump the Duds

Let’s take this a step further. I suggest you dump your dud clients. I can just hear your shocked protestations and exclamations. “I thought this was a book about getting clients, not dumping them!” I’m referring to the dud clients—not all of your clients. It sounds harsh, but think about it. Your dud clients are those you dread interacting with, who drain the life out of you, bore you to tears, frustrate you, or worse, instill in you the desire to do them—or yourself—bodily harm, despite your loving nature.

You might think that because you’re in the business of making people (and companies) better that you have an obligation to work with dud clients until they’re not dud clients, but that’s a fallacy. The best coaches in the world work with the most motivated clients. Think about highly paid sports coaches or million-dollar executive coaches. The higher the quality of the client (which is of course a subjective measure), the greater the impact the coach can achieve.

I’m well aware of the many reasons you think you can’t dump your dud clients, and I know this can seem really scary early on, but hang in there with me. Embrace the concept and trust that this is sound advice from a loving teacher and a necessary step on the path to booking yourself solid.

Why have clients, or anyone for that matter, in your life who zap your energy and leave you feeling empty? In the first year of being in business on my own, I cut 10 clients in one week. It wasn’t easy. It required a major leap of faith, but the emotional and financial rewards were astonishing. Within three months, I had replaced all 10 and added 6 more. Not only did I increase my revenue but I also felt more peaceful and calm than I ever had before, and I enjoyed my clients and my work more.

When I asked myself the question, “Would I rather spend my days working with incredibly amazing, exciting, super cool, awesome people who are both clients and friends, or spend one more agonizing, excruciating minute working with barely tolerable clients who suck the life out me?” I had no choice. I knew the temporary financial loss would be worth the payoff.

I know using the phrase “dump your dud clients” suggests that there is something wrong with them. But that’s not necessarily the case. Well, in some cases you may have a real problem client on your hands, but most of the time, they’re just not right for you. Clients who are not ideal for you could be ideal for someone else. I like using the phrase “dump your duds” because it might make you uncomfortable. It also trips nicely off the tongue.

Keep in mind that you don’t need to create conflict and fire clients. You just need to help them find a better fit. You can be tactful, diplomatic, and loving. You can even attempt, when appropriate, to refer them to a colleague who might be a better fit. Whenever possible, keep it simple. Try, “I’m not the best person to serve you.” Or “I don’t think we’d be a good fit.”

Are you always going to get a positive response when dumping your dud clients? Maybe not. If the first thing that comes to mind is, “I don’t want anyone out there thinking badly of me,” I’m with you. I want everyone to love me, too. But living life fully can require difficult conversations and you can’t please everyone. To even try is an exercise in futility, as the following Aesop fable demonstrates.

The Old Man, the Little Boy, and the Donkey

An old man, a little boy, and a donkey were going to town. The little boy rode on the donkey and the old man walked beside him. As they went along, they passed some people who remarked it was a shame the old man was walking and the little boy was riding. The man and boy thought maybe the critics were right, so they changed positions.

Later, they passed some people who remarked, “What a shame! He makes that little boy walk.” They then decided they both would walk.

Soon they passed some more people who thought they were stupid to walk when they had a decent donkey to ride. So they both rode the donkey. Later, they passed some people who shamed them by saying how awful to put such a load on a poor donkey. The boy and man said they were probably right, so they decided to carry the donkey. As they crossed the bridge, they lost their grip on the animal. He fell into the river and drowned.

The moral of the story? If you try to please everyone, you might as well kiss your ass goodbye.

When considering whom you want to work with, look for qualities in a person with whom you resonate, so don’t limit yourself to just thinking about the clients you don’t yet have. Your Red Velvet Rope Policy is a filtration system that lets in ideal clients. However, you can choose to loosen or tighten the rope at will. I’m not (necessarily) asking you to turn away your very first clients. I understand what you’re up against. When you start your business, if you feel that you’d like to keep your red velvet rope a little looser so you can work with more clients, go right ahead.

Just make sure you know what is ideal and what isn’t ideal about the people you’re letting into the VIP room. As you become booked solid, you’ll tighten your red velvet rope and become even more exclusive so as to work only with those who energize and inspire you—and most important—enable you to do your best work.

1.1.2 Written Exercise: Now take a good, hard look at your current clients. Be...