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Vent: Stopped offering free initial meetups and it backfired big time
I spent the last 6 months refusing to do free 30 minute coffee meetups with potential clients, following that popular advice to value my time. Instead of weeding out tire kickers, I lost two solid contracts that went to competitors who bought them a sandwich at a deli in Cleveland. One of those contracts was worth $4,200 a month for property management consulting. Has anyone else found that the hardline no free time stance actually hurt their business more than helped?
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kevin_williams6d ago
...and that's the thing, that LinkedIn advice is coming from people who already have a full pipeline and can afford to be picky. For the rest of us, buying a guy a sandwich is just part of building trust, not some giant loss of self respect. I've had the same thing happen where I stuck to my guns on a phone screening policy and lost a bid to someone who just sat down and listened for an hour. You gotta read the room and the market. In a place like Cleveland, relationship building still matters more than a strict time value calculator. Those lost contracts hurt way worse than the half hour you might have wasted on a tire kicker.
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fionanguyen6d ago
You said "you gotta read the room and the market" and I get that, but I think the real problem is people confuse buying a sandwich with actual business development. I've been running my roofing company for 12 years and I stopped doing free estimates for the same reason. But I didn't just cut the free meetups and hope for the best. I started charging a small fee that gets rolled into the job if they hire me. That way the tire kickers bounce but someone serious doesn't mind because it's basically a deposit. Two of my biggest residential jobs last year came from people who paid $75 for a roof inspection and walkthrough. They got a detailed report and a quote right there. No sandwich needed.
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Honestly, that's the kind of advice that sounds great on LinkedIn but falls apart in the real world. Cleveland deli sandwiches beat self-respect every time, apparently. You probably could have charged them for the coffee and still come out ahead if they'd paid for half the sandwich. Next time just bring a jar of pickles and call it a "consulting appetizer." Ngl, sounds like you got out-hustled by a couple of Reubens.
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