Setting expectations for agency clients

One of the biggest sources of friction between agencies and clients comes from mismatched expectations.

Too often agency leaders don’t do enough to set realistic expectations during the business development phase of the relationship. It’s exciting to get a deal done so we often allow prospective clients to entertain inflated expectations without correcting them — or to avoid discussion of expectations altogether.

Chip and Gini explain that for healthy, sustainable relationships with clients, agencies must get agreement on shared expectations every step of the way. The agency’s process and timeline should be clearly explained so that everyone knows what will happen and when results can be expected.

Avoiding the expectations conversation may lead to short-term business wins, but they often produce bad-fit clients and high churn rates.

Key takeaways

* Gini Dietrich: “When you’re in new business meetings, the questions you have to ask are what are your expectations of us? What does success look like?”

* Chip Griffin: “We all know that agencies cannot be successful without a lot of help from our clients.”

* Gini Dietrich: “We tend to think, Well, gosh, prospects are going to freak out that it’s going to take us six months to get results. So let’s just not mention it.”

* Chip Griffin: “If the prospect doesn’t like your process, it’s better to find that out before they sign than after.”

View Transcript

The following is a computer-generated transcript. Please listen to the audio to confirm accuracy.

Chip Griffin: Hello and welcome to another episode of the Agency Leadership Podcast. I’m Chip Griffin.

Gini Dietrich: And I’m Gini Dietrich.

Chip Griffin: Gini, I’ve, I’ve got some expectations that I need to clue you in on. Great. Right after this.

Gini Dietrich: I answered that very happily, but now I’m scared of your expectations.

Chip Griffin: Well, no, I’m, I’m addressing your expectations, really, because, you know, I know that you had expected that we would have a million listeners by the time we hit the five year mark, and I guess I might’ve forgotten to tell you back then that I didn’t think that was a reasonable expectation.

And so we’re not quite, not quite there.

Gini Dietrich: We’re not quite there. That’s all right. I understand. I don’t think I’m as understanding as some clients might be, but I understand.

Chip Griffin: Well, you know, I mean, you had, you had mentioned that you were, you wanted those numbers, but, and I just wanted you to be my co host so badly that I just couldn’t, I couldn’t, I couldn’t tell you the truth that that was not a realistic expectation.

We deal with it when we got to that time.

Gini Dietrich: And here we are, and we don’t have a million. Shoot. Well, bummer. I guess you’ll have to find a new co host. Make sure you tell them the next five years, not going to get to a million.

Chip Griffin: Well, then why would I do that? I mean,

Gini Dietrich: I feel like you’ve learned your lesson. It’s a lesson you should learn.

Chip Griffin: I mean, maybe, but you know, then I wouldn’t be like a lot of agencies, which is,