Client relationships and client work focused

I’ve sat in enough client meetings over the years to know that the first thing a client asks for is not always the thing they need.

“We need a brochure.” Well… do you?

Maybe you do. I still like a good brochure and print is not dead, no matter how many times people say it is.

But sometimes the brochure is really a sign of something else. Maybe the sales message needs tidying up, maybe the website is making people work too hard, or maybe the business has changed over the years, everyone’s busy, and nobody has stopped to ask, “Are we still explaining this properly?”

But that’s the part of client work I’ve always enjoyed most. I like listening properly, asking the obvious questions, and getting close enough to the business to understand what’s actually needed.

I’ve worked with managing directors, marketing teams, manufacturers, engineering businesses and public sector organisations where the job was never to just make things look nice. It was always about trust, sales, reputation, recruitment, or helping a technical business explain itself without sending everyone to sleep.

Good client care, to me, isn’t about nodding along and taking the order. It’s about being useful enough to ask, “Is this definitely the right answer?”

If it’s a brochure then, great. Let’s make a good one.

But sometimes that question opens up a much better conversation.