How Fewer Clients Replace Many

Imagine a home organizer named Tamsin Royce who charges $60 an hour. She works about 30 paid hours a week, which comes to about $7,200 a month. Those hours are spread across eight households. Most of the jobs are a closet, a pantry, or a garage.

On a Thursday evening, Tamsin sits at her kitchen table with her laptop. She has two quotes to write and three invoices to send. One client wants to move Tuesday’s job to Friday, which means moving two other clients too. Tomorrow she drives across town twice. No one pays her for any of that time, and in a typical week it adds up to about 12 hours.

Suppose instead that Tamsin sells one service. She sets up the whole home for a family who has just moved to the city. She prices each home as a project at $3,600. Two projects a month bring in the same $7,200. Each project takes her about 25 hours on site.

On a Thursday evening in this version, Tamsin has one quote to write and one invoice to send. Both of her families have their days set for the month. She closes the laptop before dinner.

Tamsin earns the same in both versions. What changed first is her week. So work out how many clients would earn your income at a higher fee. Then decide how many clients you will take. Here is the arithmetic, what a consultant found when she raised her prices, and why a gym owner’s coaches wanted fewer members. Then you will see why a higher fee with no limit on clients goes wrong.

Divide your monthly income by your new fee

The arithmetic is one division. Divide what you earn in a typical month by the fee you intend to charge for one whole piece of work. The answer is the number of clients who would earn you the same money.

For Tamsin, $7,200 divided by $3,600 is two. Her paid hours fall from about 120 a month to 50.

Her unpaid hours fall too. Each client comes with a quote, an invoice, a calendar to fit around, and a drive. Eight clients means eight of each, and two clients means two. So Tamsin’s 12 unpaid hours a week shrink to a few.

You may want your income to rise as well. Even so, the first thing the arithmetic gives you is your week back.

Tamsin also changed what she sells before she changed her price. That is what keeps a higher price from bringing silence. A new price on the same closets would have given her clients nothing new to pay for.

A consultant raised her prices, lost two clients, and earned more

Losing the clients you have is a fair worry when you raise your fee. Lilach Bullock, a British marketing consultant, has freelanced since 2008. She wrote that she kept her prices low for a long time because she was afraid. “I thought clients would say no,” she wrote. Before she took her own pricing seriously, she had seven clients and earned about $4,200 a month.

She raised her prices, and two clients would not come with her.

She was left with five clients and $5,800 a month. “I was working fewer hours. I was less stressed,” she wrote. The two she lost, she added, “were the two who paid late and changed the brief constantly.”

A gym owner proposed a cap of 150 members, and his coaches asked for 125

Chris Cooper owns a gym called Catalyst, which once had about 230 members. One January, he sat down with his head coach and his general manager to set the gym’s targets. He told the story on his podcast in June 2023.

At the meeting, Cooper asked, “what if we capped membership at 150 clients?” The gym could hit all of its revenue and profit targets at 150, he said. With 150 members, the gym kept people “just over 17 months” on average.

He expected his staff to push back.

Instead, one coach said, “150 sounds great,” and the other asked, “How about 125?” With fewer members, the coaches told Cooper, “we’ll know every single person in the program” and “We’ll never forget their names.”

Cooper said that conversation was the start of his thinking about a cap. In June 2023, he announced a cap of 1,000 clients on his other business, which mentors gym owners.

Why a higher fee with no limit on clients goes wrong

Imagine Tamsin three months into her new projects. Her two families for March are booked. On a Monday, Joan Kittredge calls. Tamsin organized Joan’s pantry last year, and now Joan wants her garage done.

Tamsin is between two houses, and she does not want to lose a client who has been loyal to her. “I can fit you in next Thursday,” she says. The next week, a neighbor of one of her families asks for help with a closet, and Tamsin says yes again.

By June, Tamsin has two projects and five small jobs. Her Thursday evenings at the laptop are back. One project runs a week late, and the family who paid $3,600 for the whole house waits for its last two rooms.

Here is the course’s view of what went wrong. Tamsin raised her fee but never decided how many clients she would take. With no number written down, one more small job never seems to cost much. So the list grows one yes at a time until the week is as full as before.

The fix is to decide the number before the next call comes, and to give it with its reason. A limit with its reason is a fact a client can plan around. The client learns when you can start and can decide whether to wait.

In the version that works, Joan Kittredge calls, and Tamsin says, “I take two homes a month, so that each family has me until the last box is unpacked. My next opening is in July. If you need the garage done sooner, Lucy Arden does garages, and I can give you her number.”

Joan takes Lucy’s number. Tamsin’s month stays with her two families.

How to work out your own numbers and your limit

1. Write down your income for a typical month and the number of clients it takes to earn it.
2. Write down the fee you intend to charge for one whole piece of work. Divide your monthly income by that fee. The answer is the number of clients who would earn you the same income. Leave your offer as it is for now, because the fee is all you need for this step.
3. Count the hours you spend in a typical month on quotes, invoices, scheduling, and travel. Then estimate those hours with the smaller number of clients. The gap between the two is the time you get back.
4. Choose the number of clients you will take at one time. Write it down with its reason. For example, an event planner might write, “Ten weddings a year, so that I can be at every rehearsal.”
5. Write the sentence you will say when you are full. Give your limit and its reason, the date of your next opening, and the name of someone you trust. For example, an interior designer can say, “I take on four homes a year, so that I can be there for every delivery. My next opening is in September. If you need someone sooner, I can give you the name of a designer I trust.”
6. Say that sentence to every client who asks once you are full, including a client who has hired you before.

Next: You will see that wealth comes in four kinds, and why your trade is hired mostly by one or two of them.