Quote:
Originally Posted by gnizitigid
Hi,
I am just trying to take idea how much credit period you give to clients for making payments.
1. For big clients, i can give one month credit period, but few are taking more than two months and if i ask, they saying that as soon as clients will pay, they will pay me, otherwise they will look for another digitizer.
2. Does is make sense to charge $10 per design and still give credit of two months.
I do not know how big they are if they can not pay me after two months also. I also can not say them that they can use another digitizer, as they owe me payments and i have to do work for them.
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70% of the work I do is paid upfront. I learnt my lesson from cheats in this industry. If other digitizers want to offer free designs, I let them.
I believe if someone is seriously looking for a good digitizer then they will pay $10.00 to risk that. What is $10.00 these days??? But if they insist to have it for free then I just refuse cos you know they are not legit. I might be wrong in some cases but Im not willing to risk it anymore.
I prefer to get customers from word of mouth who trust us and are ready to risk paying us upfront. If they can do that, I will go out of my way to ensure they get 110% for their money. Thats how you build trust.
30% of my customers are on credit but these customers were once on advance payment but after working for atleast 6 months on advance, we then eventually offer them credit, so the customers we offer credit to are all long term customers who are happily satisfied with the quality, service & price. Sometimes I dont bill them for 2 months but I know they are reputable companies who I have already built a strong relationship with.
Customers who haven't paid you for 2 months, make sure you bill them on time. As soon as they make a payment to you, followup with an email or call after a week and request for a 2nd payment because you need the cash urgently for expansion. As soon as they pay you the 2nd payment, stop servicing them. You might loose out of few orders which you will do during these 2 weeks of chasing but atleast you now have 80% of your money and peace of mind.
If a customer threatened me they would go elsewhere, I wouldnt think twice but tell him / her on her face they are free to choose their digitizer. Remember you are in business and not a charity. I dont let my customers dictate me like that. Customers who threaten you like that are not going to be loyal for the long run so better they go and you look for other loyal customers. You will notice how much nicer it is to work with loyal customers as opposed to customers who are always complaining and wasting your time.
I am yet to list customers who have used us and not paid us despite several reminders.