One Client. £215,000. 28 Lessons.

My biggest consulting client paid me 215K (U.K pounds) over two years.

It started with an enquiry for ONE day of sales training.

NOTE: Most won't read past point 2, that's their disadvantage and your unfair advantage.

Here are 27 lessons I learned from that relationship.

1)You don't need more clients. You need less.

Having ONE client paying over 100K per year meant I wasn't constantly worrying about cash flow or where my next client was coming from.

I could spend more time creating value for the clients I already had instead of constantly trying to find new ones.

Most business owners will struggle to comprehend this because they're so caught up in the cycle of winning their next client.

They can't see the opportunity sitting right in front of them.

2)Chasing more clients keeps you in survival mode.

I've worked with business owners generating serious money who are still constantly worried about where their next client is coming from.

They’re making £30K a month, but still operating like somebody who's desperate to make their first £3K.

This survival mode keeps them burning through 30K of cash per month to keep the illusion alive.

One big influencer had a burn rate of 150K per month and wondered why he was stressed, burnt out and couldn’t pay his staff.

At what point do you stop trying to win more clients and start thinking about how you could create significantly more value for the ones you've already got?

Side note: I helped him shift his business model and within 10 days he brought in 170K, zero ad spend. Shifting his entire reality in the process.

3)The more I was paid, the fewer hours I worked.

Back to my 215K client.

During the ongoing consulting relationship, I was working around three hours per week, usually less.

We've been conditioned to believe that the more somebody pays us, the harder we're supposed to work.

But nobody asks why?

If I can help a company solve a problem worth hundreds of thousands of pounds, why should it matter whether that takes me three hours or thirty?

They weren't paying me to be busy.
They were paying me to help them get results.

Most are ‘teaching’ this online, but they miss the subtle nuances of what it actually means, so it gets lost in translation.

4)Within the first week, THREE salespeople were gone.

One of the first things I did was sit down with the sales team and explain the new standards.

These were non-negotiable.

And if anyone had a problem with the changes, they were welcome to blame me. I was the external consultant coming in.

Two salespeople handed in their resignations almost immediately.

I let another one go.

When I asked the head of department why he'd allowed things to continue the way they had, it became clear he'd been too soft to have the difficult conversations.

And that's something I've seen in so many companies.

Managers know when people aren't performing. They know when standards have slipped. But they're too worried about upsetting people to do anything about it.

Sometimes the biggest problem isn't the people who aren't performing. It's the managers who keep allowing it.

5)I never commit to a long term client relationship from day one.

I've always started my major consulting relationships with a 90 day agreement, typically charging £10K–£30K+.

Why 90 days?

Because I want to know whether we actually enjoy working together.

Do I like the people?
Do they listen?
Are they willing to make changes?
Do I genuinely want to spend the next year or two working with them?
And equally, do they want to continue working with me?

I've turned down opportunities to continue after the first three months because I didn't feel the relationship was right.

I don't care how much somebody is willing to pay me. If I don't enjoy working with them, I'm not interested in another 12 months of it.

The client I’m talking about toady started with this 90 day agreement, which worked for both of us.

6)After 12 months, I tried to cancel the contract.

I told the MD I didn't think they needed me anymore.

His response?
"No way. You're insurance."

We agreed to reduce the monthly fee, and I remained available whenever they needed me.

I have entrepreneur clients who operate in exactly the same way.

They pay for the year upfront, and we speak whenever there's something worth discussing.

Not because we've got a two hour coaching call booked in every Thursday that we somehow need to fill (gross).

They're paying for access to my experience, not appointments in my diary.

7)The problem your client THINKS they have is rarely the actual problem.

This company originally approached me for one day of sales training.

But after understanding what was happening in their business, I knew a day's training wasn't going to solve anything.

So I told them straight.

"I don't deliver one-off sales training days. If that's what you're looking for, I'm happy to recommend somebody else."

It would have been easy to take their money and deliver an even easier sales training day, but that goes against my integrity.

I don’t give AF about the money, I care about helping my clients.

It’s weird to deliver on work that doesn’t change anything.

But this takes balls.

Most will sell out for the money and the irony is this is why they’re stuck.

If I even tried to take the easy money, they likely wouldn’t have chosen me, because there’s 1000 other sales trainers who they can interview.

What made me different, was my willingness to challenge them on their diagnoses.

Your clients are coming to you with SYMPTOMS, not necessarily the actual problem.

They've already diagnosed what's wrong, and they're asking you to deliver what they believe is the solution.

But if their diagnosis is wrong (which 99% of the time it is) what exactly are you solving?

It’s why there’s a joke most consultants are ex business owners who fu*ked up their own company and now they charge others to fu*k up theirs.

Remember, the reason somebody will pay you thousands isn't because you're willing to deliver what they've asked for. It's because you can identify and solve the problem they couldn't see themselves.

This is a high value skillset in itself and it’s rare AF.

8)One question completely changes the power dynamic.

"Do you mind if I share what I feel is really going on?"
I've asked this question hundreds of times.

When a client approaches you asking for a particular service, they've already decided what they think they need.

You're just another supplier they're considering (and this is why winning big clients feels impossible for most).

But when you ask “do you mind if I share what I feel is really going on?
Everything shifts.

Instead of you trying to convince them why they should hire you, they're now genuinely interested in hearing your perspective.

I remember asking the MD the same question.

His shoulders relaxed and word for word he replied “absolutely, you are the expert and I value your opinion”.

What are YOU seeing that they've missed?

Suddenly, they're listening to you as the expert, rather than comparing you with everybody else.

You've gone from somebody they're considering buying from to somebody they're looking to for answers.

9)Sales training accounted for about 5% of my work.

The other 95% involved looking at what was actually affecting sales performance.

Recruitment. Leadership. Management. Marketing. Sales processes. Systems. How new employees were trained and supported during their first 90 days.

I wanted to understand the entire operation.

Because what's the point of delivering fantastic sales training if the company keeps recruiting the wrong people?
Or the managers are terrible?
Or the marketing is attracting people who were never going to buy?

You can improve somebody's sales skills, but if the business around them is broken, you're fighting a losing battle.

10)Stop spending your time trying to convince people who can't make decisions.

The head of department was keen to work with me.

But he couldn't approve the agreement.
The managing director could.
So I asked to meet him.

I was told he wasn't available for another month and didn't particularly like meeting suppliers.

My response was simple.
"I'm okay to wait a month. There's no hurry."

The following day, I received an email.
"The MD can meet you at 9:30 am on Monday. Can you be here?"

Funny how that works.

I wasn't going to spend weeks chasing somebody who couldn't make the decision.
And I certainly wasn't going to start begging for a meeting with somebody who could.

11)I spent most of the meeting with the MD listening.

I didn't walk in with a PowerPoint presentation.
I didn't spend 30 minutes explaining how brilliant I was.
I wanted to hear his perspective.

What was working?
What wasn't?
What was frustrating him?
Where did he want to take the business?

Only after I'd understood his position did I ask:

"Can I share what I feel is really going on?"

I think far too many consultants are desperate to demonstrate their expertise.

They spend so much time talking that they miss the information that would actually help them win the business.

12)We created the proposal in the room.

I had the managing director and head of department sitting in front of me.

Why would I go home, spend three days writing a proposal, email it over and then spend another two weeks chasing a response?

We worked through it together.

What needed to change?
What were the priorities?
What would the first 90 days look like?

By the time the meeting finished, we'd agreed on the initial engagement.

I've never understood the obsession with sending proposals to people who haven't even agreed on what they want.

I'd much rather have that conversation while we're sitting together.

13)I made sure the first 90 days were highly profitable for me.

I knew the initial three months would involve a lot of work.
And I wanted to be paid properly for it.

Not because I was trying to squeeze every penny out of the company.

Because I wanted to be able to get deeply involved without worrying about where my next client was coming from.

I've seen consultants massively undercharge just to get a big company on their client list.

Then they spend the next three months exhausted, underpaid and desperately trying to find more work.

If you're going to take responsibility for helping a company make significant improvements, charge accordingly.

SIDE NOTE: Even if the contract ended at 90 days, I still would have given an immense amount of value and commitment, so these first 90 days are key to be paid properly.

14)Within 30 days, we'd recruited an entirely new sales team.

We didn't spend the first month talking about what we might do.

We reviewed the recruitment strategy, the existing team and the sales process.

And within 30 days, we'd recruited an entirely new sales team (we had to with 3 team members exiting).

Remember, they originally wanted a day of sales training.

Imagine if I'd just delivered that training and left.

They'd have spent money training people when one of the biggest problems was who they were recruiting in the first place.

15)Within 60 days, they achieved their best sales results in over FIVE YEARS.

Two months.
That's how long we'd been working together.

And the company was already producing its strongest sales results in more than five years.

My memory isn't specific on this, but I believe the team hit 168% of target, not bad for a team that couldn't close a door before.

This is why I wanted to get involved at a much deeper level.
I wasn't interested in spending six months producing reports and talking about strategy.
I wanted to make changes that showed up in the numbers.

Because you can have the most impressive consulting process in the world.
But if nothing improves, what exactly are you being paid for?

16)By day 70, they'd extended the agreement for another nine months.

We hadn't even completed the original 90 days.

But we'd already achieved enough for them to want to continue.
So we agreed to work together until the end of the year.
And here's where things became interesting.

The first couple of months had involved a lot of hands on work.

But as the business improved, my role started changing.
I was doing less of the implementation and more of the advising.

They were becoming increasingly capable of running the operation without me constantly being involved.

Which was exactly what I wanted.

17)Fu*k your ability, you’re paid for your dependABILITY

I have an easy advantage with consulting.

I’m hyper easy to work with.

I’m on time.
My clients never had to chase me.
If I spotted an opportunity, I raised it.
If something wasn't right, I told them.

In fact, they often had to keep up with my standards.
Not the other way around.

When somebody is paying you serious money, the last thing they want is another person they need to manage.

I’ve met many consultants with egos and low standards, they’re not consultants very long.

18)I never agreed to a set number of hours.

There was nothing in my contract saying I'd work five, ten or twenty hours per week.

I wasn't selling hours.
I was selling my experience, judgement and ability to help them solve problems.

This is where I think so many consultants get trapped.

They charge for their time, then wonder why they have to keep working more hours to earn more money.

This topic goes far deeper than I’m sharing here, but charging for time is amateur land.

19)I worked with everybody, from a 21 year old salesperson to the managing director.

One minute I'd be helping a young salesperson improve their performance.

The next I'd be discussing how to allocate a £10 million annual marketing budget with the MD.
And I love both conversations.

I've met consultants who only want to deal with senior management.

They want the boardroom meetings and the big strategic conversations, but they have ZERO clue what’s actually happening in the business (yawn).

This is still a Grand Canyon opportunity in the consulting world, but I’ll save that for another time.

20)I wasn't interested in being treated like another supplier.

A supplier delivers what you ask for.

I wanted to be somebody the company could trust to tell them what I genuinely thought.

Even when they disagreed.
Even when it meant challenging something the managing director believed.

Because if somebody is paying me for my experience, what value am I providing if I just agree with everything they say?

I wasn't there to tell them what they wanted to hear.
I was there to help them make better decisions.

21)The problem you're being asked to solve often isn't the real problem.

I've lost count of how many companies told me their salespeople needed training.
But when I looked more closely, the problems were ALWAYS somewhere else.

Poor recruitment. Weak management. Terrible onboarding. The wrong strategy.
And sometimes the leadership team itself was the problem.

There’s a good job I enjoy uncomfortable conversations.

Side note: A few years ago I consulted for a billion dollar brand. I had a call with the CEO of the entire company and he asked for my no BS feedback.

I told him the director who hired me was the problem.
Let her go and hire a better leader in that position.

It was up to him if he took this advice, but word for word he said:
“This is exactly what I’ve been feeling but nobody has outright said it, I appreciate and respect you for your honesty.”

22)I wasn't there to become another employee.

I didn't want to run their sales department.
I didn't want to make every decision.
And I certainly didn't want them needing me every morning before they could get anything done.

My job was to improve the way the business operated.

That meant helping the people already there become better at what they did.

If I was doing my job properly, the company should become LESS dependent on me over time.

Not more.

I've seen consultants build entire relationships around making themselves indispensable.

That's never been how I wanted to work.

23)I wanted the results to continue when I wasn't there.

It's easy to walk into a company, create some excitement and get everybody performing for a few weeks.

But what happens when you leave?
Do the managers go back to their old habits?
Does the sales team stop performing?
Does the business end up exactly where it started?

I wanted the improvements to last.

Which meant developing the people, systems and processes that would continue working long after I'd stopped being heavily involved.

I even created a Sales Bible for them, yep.. I literally called it the Sales Bible.

The fact that they eventually needed very little of my time wasn't a failure.

It was evidence that we'd done a lot of things right.

24)I refused to invent work to justify my fee.

Another meeting.
Another report.
Another presentation.
Another workshop.

I've seen consultants create an enormous amount of unnecessary work because they feel they need to look busy and justify their invoice.

But if the company is performing exceptionally well, why would I start interfering just to justify my invoice?

Sometimes the most valuable thing I could do was have a conversation with the managing director, help him think through a decision and then leave them to get on with it.
I wasn't being paid to fill my calendar.

25)Not everybody in the company is going to want you there.

I had a strong relationship with the directors and got on really well with the people on the sales floor.

But middle management nearly cost me the entire contract.

Unfortunately, the company accountant had disclosed how much I was charging, and certain managers weren't happy about it.

And it went beyond a bit of jealousy.

They started putting obstacles in my way, making it difficult for me to do the work I'd been brought in to do, even sabotaging a key strategy we were implementing.

It was toxic AF for a short while.

At one point, I had to pull the operations manager aside and have a very uncomfortable conversation about what was going on.

The whole situation nearly derailed the contract.

One of the biggest challenges of consulting inside a company isn't always solving the business problems. It's navigating the people who don't want you solving them.

26)I'm fiercely protective of how many clients I work with.

I've always wanted fewer clients.
When I work with somebody, I give a lot of myself to that relationship.

Not just the hours we spend together.

I'm thinking about their business when I'm walking, driving, eating dinner or doing something completely unrelated.
I'll suddenly have an idea and want to share it with them.
I genuinely enjoy that level of involvement.

But imagine trying to do it for 100 clients.

I'd much rather have a handful of clients paying me exceptionally well, where I can get properly involved and help them achieve much bigger results.

27)I had to get comfortable with the fact that my value wasn't measured by how much work I was doing.

This was probably one of the more personal lessons.

Because despite everything I understood about value-based pricing, I still found myself feeling guilty when the workload dropped.

I'd look at how little time I was spending with the company and question whether I should still be charging them.

But they weren't questioning it.

They were happy.
The business was performing.
And they wanted me available if they needed advice.

I was the one measuring the relationship in hours.

They weren't.

It's interesting how deeply that conditioning can sit, even when you know better.

28)I'd take five exceptional clients over 100 average ones every single time.

I've worked with over 1,000 clients in the online space.

I know what it's like to have lots of clients.

And I know what it's like to have a handful of clients who pay considerably more.

For me, there's no comparison.

I don't want to spend my life chasing leads, booking sales calls and constantly worrying about where the next client is coming from.

I want to work with people I genuinely enjoy working with.

People who value my experience, trust my judgement and are willing to make changes.

I want to get deeply involved, help them create significant results and be paid exceptionally well for doing it.

And perhaps the biggest lesson from that £215K relationship?
After 12 months, I thought I wasn't doing enough work to justify continuing.
They thought I was too valuable to let go.

I was still thinking about how much work I was doing. They were thinking about what it was worth having me there.