I'm no longer running a business. My customers are running me.

[PJ Pahygiannis]

Hey everyone! I'm 22 years old and have built a business helping other businesses with email marketing/prospecting. I find the email addresses, write the copy, and send the emails. I started it almost three years ago. In 2017 it grew 20X from $2,000 in 2016 to $35,000 in 2017. I'm a one man show and run it solely off Facebook messenger. I'm friends with almost 5,000 entrepreneurs and all of my customers come from my friends list and referrals as well as networking.

I'm no longer running the business. Customers are running me and putting me through the wringer with demands and pressure 24/7. I'm not complaining, but its getting tough to manage and please everyone. Some mornings I wake up to over 10 messages. If I don't respond immediately people get pissed off.

Revenue wise, this is the biggest business I've ever built. Not to be dramatic, but this has all made me question whether I'm meant to be an entrepreneur or if I can even handle it.

To be completely honest, I'm a sensitive/emotional guy. I just feel like customers are toying with my emotions in a way that is hard to explain. I've realized that customer service is 100% not my strong suit. I just don't know what to do.

The last few weeks of December I took on 15 clients. All are in different industries. Some of the jobs and requirements have been way more strict/stringent than others. I just had to refund a guy $500 and he tore me apart over messenger on how bad it was I didn't meet his deadline he gave me and got chewed out.

 

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[Strive]

Congrats on your biz! Most people would be very happy to wake up to 10 messages from clients.

Don't worry about getting chewed out, it happens. I've been cursed out, threatened to be sued, etc. Some people are just mean, and sometimes we as entrepreneur drop the ball. You just do what you can to mitigate the situation and do your best for them.

It sounds to me like you need to up your prices significantly and streamline your processes to reduce your stress.

Take a look at what you're doing and see where you can outsource it/standardize it so you're doing less work. And increasing your rate will, if not reduce the amount of headache clients you have, make going through those headaches a lot more worthwhile.

Hope this helps, good luck!

 

[hungryhippocampi]

Of utmost importance is do you see yourself doing this business long term? And if so, can you figure out a way to scale it so that you do not have to be responsible for the execution of every detail? Customer Service is extremely important. It doesn't mean you have to put up with rude clients but it does mean you need to set expectations early and aim to exceed them.

I agree with Strive. First thing is to up your fees. Second thing is to have some sort of contract/document that clearly establishes your service levels. Let them know if they email you will get back to them within X hours, etc. Third thing is to figure out how to automate the email sending and look at hiring a virtual assistant that can find you the email addresses. That way you can focus on sales, writing copy, and customer service.