http://www.udemy.com/how-to-freelance-for-mobile-developers/ How to Freelance for Mobile Developers lesson 6 Dealing With Challenging Clients. In this episode we cover several different types of challenging clients you may run into and how you can use your Freelance Kung Fu to protect yourself from harm.

1. How to Freelance for Mobile Developers
Lesson 5 of 6
Dealing with Challenging
Clients – Freelance Kung Fu
AppBuilderTV.com

2. The Facts
● Like it or not, if you go down the freelancing
road, you are going to have to constantly be
dealing with clients.
● It can be quite exciting to meet new people and
and companies and work on new things.
● It can also test your resolve and patience at
times because you can't completely control or
predict the clients that may come your way.
● You do however have some influence and
ability to control how you behave and this can
make all the difference.
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3. Your Approach
● How you approach finding clients from the very start can
have a huge impact.
● Are you posting your services into Craigslist? We'll don't be
surprised to find questionable clients who don't want to pay
very much.
● How are you wording your posts and the copy on your
website? Does it look and sound professional? Do you
sound confident when you speak?
● When you meet a client for the first time, what kind of
message are you sending. Clients can smell fear and a
lack of confidence a mile a way.
● Just like Apple has proven, design matters! How you set
up deals, communicate with clients and present yourself
are all part of the design equation.
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4. Freelance Kung Fu
● The freelance world can be a tough place sometimes and there are a
numerous questionable companies and individuals out there who will
try and take advantage of you and your inexperience.
● If you are not careful, you can get “beat up” and without a system or
approach for protecting yourself, you put yourself at risk.
● One of the best things that ever happened to me in my youth was
being exposure to Martial arts. Martial Arts taught me discipline, self
control and enabled me with the confidence and ability to protect
myself in self defence when needed.
● I believe these ideas can be carried over into the realm of freelance
development.
● I believe you can learn to develop your Freelance Kung Fu and once
you have mastered it, learn to avoid taking on problem clients before
they even have a chance to become a problem.
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5. Opponent 1 - The Creeping
Feature
● The creeping feature attack is characterized by an
initial agreement to implement a set of agreed upon
features followed by a series of repeated requests for
new functionality and additions that were never
discussed.
● The feature creep technique can be countered or even
prevented by clearly defining and agreeing on the
scope of the project before it begins.
● Also, making it clear that extra changes or feature
requests that fall outside the scope will cost extra will
help to minimize this attack.
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6. Opponent 2 – The Low Ball of Fury
● This attack is characterized by the single minded focus on
the price of the project right from the beginning.
● Regardless of what your quote is, the low ball of fury will
always try to get an even lower price.
● There are several defensive techniques to this attack
which include quoting an initial inflated price.
● By quoting a higher initial price, you have room to back
off, giving the low ball of fury the feeling of victory, but
arriving at what you wanted to charge anyway.
● Another effective technique is to hold your ground and be
unwilling to compromise on your pricing.
● When the low ball of fury senses your confidence and
willingness to walk away, they will often back down.
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7. Opponent 3 – The Octopus Hands
● The octopus hands attack is characterized by
micromanagement. In this attack, the many hands of
the octopus reach in and try to control every aspect of
the project, effectively overriding your judgements and
experience.
● Once they take hold, the octopus hands can be almost
impossible to remove, so the best counter to this is to
make sure then never get a grip in the first place.
● Your clearly worded service agreement can help keep
the octopus hands at bay, so make sure to put quite a
bit of effort into describing the responsibilities of you
and the client clearly.
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8. Opponent 4 – Attack of Urgency
● The attack of urgency is characterized by a series of blindingly
fast requests that you are expected to deal with at a moments
notice.
● The attacker will make you believe that the fate of the universe
is in your hands unless you can complete your task by the
ridiculous deadline you are given at the last minute.
● For reasons we don't quite now, this attack is quite frequent on
a Friday at 4:00.
● A good counter to this technique is to be very clear about what
your contact hours are in your service agreement and to make it
clear that work done outside those hours will be billable at a
premium rate.
● When forced to pay a premium for urgent work, these attack
diminish greatly.

9. Opponent 5 – Hands on Hands Off
● While the attack of the octopus would be considered
overly hands on, there is an opposite attack we call
hands off.
● The hands off attack consists of the attacker doing or
saying very little if anything at all.
● With no feedback to go by, good or bad, the freelancer
is more less left to make their best guess and hope it
sticks.
● While many of the counters thus far of been defensive,
you must take an offensive stance to neutralize this
attack. You need to take control and guide and move
the client along and ensure you are delivering what
you promised.
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10. Opponent 6 - Golden Peacock
● The golden peacock attack can be effectively
employed on both the novice and fairly experience
freelancer.
● The technique essentially involves dazzling the
freelancer with the “You should be so lucky to work
with client or company xyz on project abc” move,
enticing the freelancer to agree to work for next to
nothing for the glory of working on the project in the
first place.
● The most effective counter to this is to remain steady
in your pricing and be willing to walk away.

11. Opponent 7 – The Extortionist
● The extortionist is an opponent you don't ever want to deal
with as a freelancer.
● Essentially the extortionist client uses money to control
and abuse the freelancer.
● This attack typically happens right before a major or final
payment in a project and involves the client extorting extra
work and services from the developer by withholding
payment until they comply.
● For me, this is the kiss of death. Any client that does this,
will never get a second shot, because I won't ever do
business with them again.
● If you feel you may be dealing with this type of client, an
effective technique is to get them to pay up front for each
phase of the project.

12. Opponent 8 – Crouching Tiger
Hidden Promises
● This is one of the most common attacks used on the
newbie freelancer.
● Essentially the client baits the freelancer with the
promise of future riches and success if they're willing
to take the hit now and give the client the sale of the
century on this project.
● In interesting counter move to this attack is to propose
put these future promises in writing.
● When the client backtracks and says they can't
guarantee what the future will bring, stick to your guns
and your original price!

13. Confucius Say...
● Confucius say ... “He who fail to plan, plan to fail”.
● This is characterized by the client who lacks a solid
understanding of the process, technologies and business
of the project they think they want to start.
● The bottom line is they just really haven't taken the time to
think things through and this makes them among one of
the most dangerous clients of all to take on.
● The best counter to this attack is to steer clear of it in the
first place.
● You may also choose to counter this attack with a series of
paid consulting sessions to help the client clarify and focus
their thoughts and plans.
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14. The Dream Client
● They do exist ... but they are rare.
● They always pay on time.
● They don't haggle on your rate and price.
● The have real integrity.
● They express appreciation for your work.
● They treat you with respect.
● The provide constructive and timely feedback.
● They have realistic timelines and expectations.

15. One Client or Many
● While it can be tempting to latch onto one big client to
bring in the bacon, this can be problematic.
● Basically you are putting all your eggs in one basket
and taking a risk if you adopt this approach.
● If the client becomes a problem, then your major
source of income could quickly dry up or disappear.
● I've found that having multiple clients at the same time
is a healthier approach. By doing things this way, I am
not relying on any one particular client to supply my
income. It's kinda of like diversifying your assets when
investing.

16. The Client is not Always Right!
● There are a lot of armchair quarterbacks out there that
will tell you “The Client is always right”.
● Let's be honest, clients are wrong sometimes and
make mistakes just like you and I.
● One of your jobs as a freelancer is to provide them
with factual information and unbiased advice.
● Sometimes you are going to have to tell clients things
they don't want to hear, but you need to be truthful and
assertive.
● When you argue with reality, reality wins .. and only
100% of the time.
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17. Cutting the Cord
● There may come a day in your freelance career
that a client has become a liability.
● There are certain types of clients that can
become toxic to your mental and financial well
being
● When you identify a client has become toxic,
there is usually one one course of actual, which
is self preservation.
● You need to cut these toxic clients out of your
business and out of your life as soon as you
recognize it's happening and move on.

18. Integrity
● Integrity is the adherence to moral and ethical principles.
● There are far to many companies and people who lack
integrity in this day and age. It needs to stop.
● Just like the warriors of old lived by a code, so should
you.
● As a developer and human being, you should strive to
say what you do and do what you say.
● You should be truthful and honest.
● You should be ethical and moral and fair in all your
business decisions and in your actions.
● In the future, your reputation will be your most important
currency you have, so don't tarnish it.

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