658: Converting Clients to New Services
Brought to you by: Pet Sitters Associates. Use ‘Confessional’ at checkout
What do we do when a service isn’t working anymore—but we don’t want to lose the revenue or the client? In this episode, we walk through how converting clients is leadership, not upselling, and why adding or changing a service isn’t a failure. We break down two conversion scenarios: when the service is a poor fit for the pet/client, and when it’s a poor fit for the business. We share practical strategies for leading with friction points, using observational authority, and making the transition feel low-risk through trials and clear replacement paths. We also talk about the reality that some clients will leave—and why staying aligned with your standards matters more than keeping every dollar.
Main topics:
Conversion as business leadership
Fit for pet vs. business
Solve friction, not sell
Trials and switching costs
Ending services with clarity
Main takeaway: “Converting clients isn’t about squeezing more out of them. It’s about staying aligned as their life and your business changes.”
Converting a client to a new service isn’t a sales move—it’s a leadership move. Sometimes the most professional thing we can do is admit: the old way isn’t the best way anymore. Pets change, schedules change, businesses change, and great care has to keep up. If we lead with the problem (the friction), it feels like care—not a pitch. And if a client decides not to come along, that doesn’t mean we failed—it means we stayed aligned with the standard of care we believe in.
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A VERY ROUGH TRANSCRIPT OF THE EPISODE
Provided by otter.ai
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
Client conversion, service change, business health, client retention, service quality, client communication, service trial, client needs, business strategy, service pricing, client satisfaction, business growth, service transition, client feedback, business operations
SPEAKERS
Collin, Meghan
Meghan 00:00
Me, converting clients is not about upselling and adding a service is not a failure. Both are about leadership, clarity and protecting the long term health of your business and your team. Welcome to pet sitter confessional. I'm Megan. I'm Collin. We appreciate you listening today, wherever in the world you are, and we would also like to thank our Patreon supporters and pet sitters associates for sponsoring today's episode. Think about if there's ever been a time that you have tried to convert clients to new services. How did it go? Did you succeed? Were they not interested in it? We do have this unspoken fear of trying new things. Have you ever had this conversation with yourself? Well, we know the service isn't working anymore, but we don't want to lose the revenue, and obviously we really don't want to lose the clients. Well, we certainly have had that conversation. We have cut out over the 14 years that we've been in business. We have cut out overnights, that was many, many years ago, and then we cut out boarding and daycare a few years ago, and that was a very big learning experience, to say the least. But there have been several times where we have tried to get clients over to this new service that we're offering, and this often shows up most with, again, overnights and daycare style services or anything that's high touch and high emotion and low margin, where it's just not working for your business anymore. Here's the thing, though, you're not choosing between keeping clients or protecting your business. You're choosing whether you'll lead your clients through the change or let fear decide for you.
Collin 01:35
Basically, you already have the no before you try. And many times we can think, well, I don't want to make them angry, or I don't want to risk a bad review, or I don't want to upset them, and so we just stop, and we don't do anything, and we just kind of quietly let it die on the vine, or we do things way too abruptly, meaning that we end up actually upsetting them more because we didn't try and have a conversation with them when we really should have
Meghan 02:04
or we do start offering this new service, but we keep the old service around for some very special clients who we don't want to rock the boat and upset them, or we think it's not that much of a pain, so I'll just hang on to them until they move away, or their pets no longer need us.
Collin 02:19
Well, it's important, I think, that we distinguish the two reasons why we need to convert clients, because there are two scenarios where this happens. The first one is that sometimes we need to convert a client to a new service because the one that they're using is a bad fit for them and they just don't see it. Think of this as maybe clients who love the 15 minute potty let out, or the 20 minute quick break that you've providing them, but you really see that it's hard to get everything done in that or maybe their dogs aren't responding well to in and out really fast. Or maybe the cat is really wanting to engage more in that time, but the client isn't seeing it, and you're seeing problems come up from that,
Meghan 03:01
or it can work the other way too. You're providing an hour long walk, and the dog is getting older or not able to walk as much and kind of limping, and so you're needing to pull the service back. But the client is insisting of No, I really need fluffy walk for an hour. She absolutely loves her walks with you, or whatever the case is.
Collin 03:18
So there's that part where it's a bad fit for them. They just don't quite know it yet. And then we need to convert other times. We need to convert those clients to a new service, because it's a bad fit for us.
Meghan 03:30
And I feel like this is most of the time of these two scenarios, this is more common of we are burned out of doing overnight, so we are just cutting them out as of 2026 or our own dog or cat at home is getting geriatric, and we're needing to spend more time with them so we're not able to commit as much to the business anymore.
Collin 03:49
Or maybe you've run the numbers of your business, and you're looking at your profit per service, and if you are not calculating this on a per service basis, I cannot recommend this highly enough, because you will quickly find that there are the services that take up 80% of your time and only make up 20% of your revenue. And when you look at this, all of a sudden, you start thinking of, well, if I didn't spend my time doing those, and if I spent my time doing my high profit services, well, what could I actually do, and how would that change my business operations. So it's all sorts of these things of maybe I'm burned out, maybe I'm trying to make more money in my business, or maybe I'm trying to change the schedule for my employees that I have. And so I've got to stop doing these things that are these big, emotional, heavy investments, but that just don't pay out on the at the end, but clients still love them. And so we have to be able to be able to walk through both of these scenarios. And in that, it's important to point out that clients don't always ask for service changes for many different reasons. It could be that they don't know what you offer, and this is a big one, because many times we bring on clients for pet sitting or for dog walking or for overnights or for. Daycare in our home, and we don't then talk to them about anything else that we do, and so they see no reason to ask, because they only see us as a kind of a one trick pony, of Well, that's the daycare person, or that's the overnight person, so I'm good, and they also don't ask about services change, because they might not see the issue at all. They might not see what's going on, and this is really common as well, because who is experiencing the actual service, the pet, the client gets the report, they see the videos, they see the photos. And if those don't tell the full story, or if we aren't upfront, or if the client isn't asking particular questions, they will see no need to ask for to change anything. Again, people don't have a problem until they have a problem, until they experience that friction. So our job here is to really notice the friction in the service, in what's going on before the client leaves, before they move on before and before we burn out if we don't have our polls on the friction for both them and for us, that's where this all falls apart. And then we have to be bold enough to come forward and actually have that conversation with them about why the change needs to happen. And so we want to walk through several different strategies and different applications here for trying to convert a client, an existing client, to a new service again, whether it's for them being a bad fit for a service or for it being a bad fit for you,
Meghan 06:34
this also comes into play when you have a dog or a cat experiencing fear, anxiety and stress, and that exhibits itself as baring teeth or low growling or lunging at you, and you don't really report this until there's a bite. And that's why it's so important to document everything so you can go back and say, Hey, three weeks ago, I was noticing some changes, and they've been escalating ever since then.
Collin 06:56
Yeah, that escalation is so key. I'm glad you brought that up, Megan, because we were just putting together some information about anxiety in the home and things like that. And one of these key things is, you know, reach out for help if you see something increasing in frequency, in duration or intensity, those three big things there and and if we aren't communicating again, the client's gonna have no idea. And so we can come alongside them and say, Here's how I've charted this out. Here's my documented evidence and conversation that you and I have been having over the past three, four months, or however long it's been, and it's getting more and more difficult to do the walk. It could be that the dog is becoming more anxious and fearful around walks, because it's always trash day when you're there and all of a sudden you are having a really hard time with doing that walk on trash day, and you need to change the service to just backyard play, or you need to change the service to something else or a different day, and that conversation doesn't happen. It can't happen unless we speak up.
Meghan 07:52
So strategy number one here is converting by solving a friction point, not by promoting a service.
Collin 07:58
And this is really because service names are pretty ambiguous. They don't mean the same thing from one person to another, and sometimes people just use a term because they think that's what's standard. So most clients are not just begging and asking for drop ins instead of overnights or overnights instead of drop ins or walks instead of daycare. There's a pain point, there's a friction point that they have in their life that they're trying to solve so that could be less stress, it could be more predictability or fewer complications in their life. And so if you've got overnight clients, it may be time to transition them to drop ins. If the client is experiencing or having guilt about having someone stay in their home overnight. When we used to do overnights, this was actually a talking point for many people. Of Well, I don't want to bother you with this, and I know this is a lot to ask, and I could probably blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. At that point, Megan and I should have looked the person in the eye and said, It sounds like drop ins may actually be better for you, because we don't have to stay here overnight, so you don't even have to worry. Have to worry about that. Maybe there's an issue about inconsistent sleep schedules, and this falls to us as the sitters, where it's hard on us, it's okay if we have that conversation with the client to make that transition and bring in that friction and that pain point, and then also, clients may just openly admit that their pets sleep through the night anyway, so it really isn't that big of a deal. We've certainly had these conversations before. This is a piece of evidence that tells you that the overnight isn't necessary and that instead, we can point them in a different direction that's better for everybody involved. But it takes listening to these in the conversation. It takes kind of reading between the lines and asking good questions.
Meghan 09:43
Specifically for the overnights, maybe you raise your price to a level that makes it worth it for you to get out of your bed and go sleep in somebody else's bed. Or you may even think about implementing a x number night stay. That's what hotels do, minimum two night stay. You know, if it's further away for you, maybe. Be a minimum four night stay where. Okay, now it is worth it for me to disrupt my sleep for four nights, rather than just one night coming and going. Well, I
Collin 10:07
think what this points out here is that regardless of what service you start at and regardless of where you're trying to go, the important piece is that both you and the client have a part of the in the conversation. If it's no longer working for you, bring up those pain points to them and see if you can go back and forth and get to a final point that works for everybody. Otherwise you'll burn out, or they could be unhappy and have this guilt that they're building up over time, and then just stop using you. And this is true for even if you have a daycare clients that you may be wanting to transition to walk. So there's drop off logistics. If you find clients that are complaining about this and it's hard to fit in their schedule and and that they can they're barely on time most days, have a conversation with them. Hey, it looks like this time really isn't working for you. Maybe if we just did midday walks, or maybe if we did two walks for you, that may fit in better with your schedule, so you wouldn't have to rush around so much. There's also the conversation around overstimulation, and this is going to depend on what kind of daycare you're at work running, and what kind of pets and dogs you're allowing into that, and how you manage all of those things. But again, when these come up in conversation and that word over stimulation comes up, or maybe you notice that this is happening in the dog of this dog gets way overstimulated here, and it's uncomfortable for everybody involved, and actually could be a potential safety issue for the other dogs and the people here. I need to take that to the client and say, this is an issue that we're seeing. The way I want to move forward with this is by offering you midday walks, and that's going to do X, Y, Z for you. Same thing with illness and injury concerns. This is a conversation that a lot of pet owners have of, what about all the illnesses? What about the injuries in the large playgroups? Well, client, if that's a big concern for you, and I hear you, and I listening to this, we can offer you walks. We can offer you adventure hikes, where it's just one on one kind of time that you have together that also makes it easier on your logistics, and you don't have to write overstimulation. So all these things come in together.
Meghan 12:07
The key thing here is, if you lead with the service, it's going to feel like a sales pitch of, well, I have this awesome new thing, and you should definitely try it, because I don't really like this. It's really cool, or I'm trying to get rid of this other service. So please buy this new one. I promise it's really great. But if you lead with the problem, it feels like care. I understand that fluffy is getting older and is not able to walk as far anymore, and because I want the best for fluffy, and I know you do too, here is a new care plan that we can go with well,
Collin 12:39
and that leads straight into strategy. Two, you can convert using your observational authority. Your superpower is that you've actually been there. You've been in the client's home. You have hands on the dog or the cat. You've seen them. You have videos. You've had all this personal connection. So when we get to you, we get we get to use language like what I've observed, or based on the visit notes that I have, or what we consistently see in your pet each time that we're over. This gives you the credibility to speak to that client and say, Here is proof positive of the issues that we're seeing. So even things like, Hey, your dog settles down after the last visit and just sleeps through the night. Let's say you're doing overnights and and what you see is, at 8pm that dog curls up in its bed and lays down, and then you're just kind of sitting around going, what do I do now? And that dog, dog doesn't get back up until seven or eight the next morning, and where it needs to go out. What a wonderful point to bring to the client and say, your dog settles down at 8pm and doesn't need to go back out until the next morning. What I'd like to recommend for you is actually just doing a late night visit and an early morning visit, and then we can do some midday playtime for you as well. This gives you credibility and authority and is part of that conversation with the client. You're not trying to force anything. You're saying here is what I am seeing. You may also say something like, we see better regulation with your dog on days where we have structured walks instead of group care, meaning, well, we offer daycare, and your dog really has a hard time regulating itself, and it's uncomfortable and it's kind of dangerous for everybody involved. When we've done the walk, though your talk is fantastic, really well behaved, and it's like gold star plus double good again, you can say, Here's it in this scenario, here's it in this scenario, and here's the difference that we see. These are not opinions. What these are, are professional observations as we partner with the client for the best care outcomes for the pet. This is what that means. Speaking of
Meghan 14:51
outcomes, it is important to redefine the outcome, change what good care means. Clients cling to services because of what they think the service. Guarantees. So your role is to redefine that success, redefine what it looks like to have exceptional care. So if their overnight belief is someone sleeping here equals safety, the new outcome is the pets get consistent routines and they get multiple daily touch points. Isn't that awesome for the daycare belief? Okay, well, you have a tired dog that equals a good dog. That's not necessarily the case. So we reframe that, and we say the new outcome is a regulated, decompressed dog. You're changing the client's mindset here, of of going well, this thing that we have been doing for a while, it was working, and now it's not working, and we need to change it because of whatever reason, but the outcome is actually going to be a better, more regulated pet, or well adjusted pet. When the outcome changes, the service choice becomes obvious. Oh, well, I don't want this negative thing that my pet has been experiencing, and I want something better for them well, and
Collin 15:56
it's really just talking about the care that the pet is getting. And I like how you phrase that Megan of when the outcome changes, the service becomes obvious. That way we're not having to sell and feel like we're stiff arming, or strong arming the client into any one particular thing. We open it up and say, Look, if this is where we want to go, if you really, if you really are after safety, let's talk about multiple daily touch points with your pet and the home. Let's talk about these multiple updates and these hands and eyes and consistency of schedule for safety of the pet. It gives you also talking points to now take that and turn it into and guide really where you're headed with this strategy.
Meghan 16:39
Number Four for for converting clients to a new service, is offering a low risk trial, reduce that switching cost, reduce that friction. Of I understand that this is a change, and change is hard. We may not want to embrace it at times, but here is an offer a trial period of where we can we can go down this road and see how it works out. Clients fear disruption more than price. We've had clients before say I am so glad that I found you, because switching from pet sitter to pet sitter, or even trying to coordinate care between this neighbor and that neighbor and my daughter staying home, it's just too much. So I am so glad that I now have a consistent option. I understand that you're costly, but it is worth it, because I have a one stop shop that is just going to solve all of my problems forever.
Collin 17:27
And what you're going for here is this low risk. So maybe you have a client who's going out of town and they're leaving for 14 days, and they want you to stay for overnights, instead of trying to initially and upfront say, okay, maybe we don't do overnights, but I just convert everything to drop ins right away and do 14 days of drop ins. That's a big chunk to ask for that client to bite into when they've never experienced that. So instead, offer to replace just one of the overnights with an evening visit and a morning visit. Have it be kind of the midpoint, just to test and see how it's going, and then you have plenty of time on the back end to settle in and make sure everything is going well. But this takes you communicating a lot on the front end, documenting, documenting, documenting, and then what's it like when you come back? How are the pets behaving? What's the home like? So the client has that surety and clarity on exactly how it went,
Meghan 18:19
and it'll also give them peace of mind. Of, this was scary. I was nervous to try this thing, but it ended up working out, or, you know, it could go the other way. Of, well, this didn't actually work out like we wanted to, but that's the important part of the documenting of the client will have peace of mind whether it did work out or it didn't work out, and then you can have further conversations from there.
Collin 18:38
Yeah, if you have somebody who's really dedicated to doing daycare with you, and they are five day a week client, and you're really trying to get out of that, or maybe their dog isn't a good fit for daycare anymore, because things that they've developed and things like that. Instead of saying, Hey, I'm going to convert your five day a week daycare to five daily dog walks starting next week, instead say, what if on Thursdays, we try a walk, and I'll do two at first, and we'll see how they do and see how they're regulating. Again, frame this as a test data gathering observation. There's no commitment for this. We just want to see and test and see if this is actually a good fit.
Meghan 19:15
While a moment ago, I said that clients fear disruption more than price. There is a price conversation to be had here, because multiple drop ins are typically more expensive than an overnight and multiple walks are more expensive than daycare. So there is going to have to be a conversation of maybe for that trial, you offer it at a discounted price, just so they can get their feet wet and they can see okay, this thing isn't as scary as I thought it was going to be and most importantly, my pets were okay.
Collin 19:43
Well, because in that point, you always want to be confronting one dissension, one pushback at a time. If you try and get them from something they're nervous about and something that's more costly, well, then they have two reasons to not go with you. So if you can knock one of those down. And trial it. This really helps them see that maybe this can actually work, and this may be worth the price. And again, this is all how it's framed and communicated to them, but in anything that you do as a business, I'm really glad you brought that up, Megan, because anything you do as a business, confront one Goliath at a time, confront one thing so that you can have focused communication, focused problem solving and talking points, instead of trying to feel like you're trying to get your hands around this big, monstrous thing that just is unwieldy. It's too chaotic for you. It's messy and confusing for the client, and nobody comes out good on the other end.
Meghan 20:38
Well, in that way, another metaphor, the client has to climb a hill instead of a mountain in order to use this new service. When you talk about framing and positioning, that is strategy number five. So position yourself as a guide, not as a vendor, not as a service provider, but as an expert. We talk all the time about writing blogs so that you can be the expert at dog walks and pet sitting, but this is where the trust really compounds. When you use language that the client can empathize with, that they understand. When you say you know, things like as pets age, or as schedules change, or long term, this tends to work better. Or in my experience, clients with this problem have seen this result. You're not necessarily reacting. You're more anticipating. You're saying, from my experience as a dog walker and pet sitter, I have seen this outcome over the years,
Collin 21:32
and what you're doing here as a guide, you are as the story brand framework would say you're making the client the hero of that journey, you're pointing out the problem, and then you're pointing out the possible solutions for them to take and how to move forward with this. This means that they are more likely to agree to that when they see themselves as the hero, and all you are are the person standing there going, Hey, I know we've got problems like this, when long term, these 10 these things tend to work out better in situations like this, meaning that person can pick that up and make that decision for themselves, which is going to be way more powerful than you trying to be that vendor, that person hocking your wares, trying to force This on to them when we view ourselves as a guide, it also means it's easier for us to have these conversations, because I'm not sales pitching them. I'm not trying to boost my numbers or anything. I'm genuinely taking my profession, my expertise, and translating it into real world outcomes for the person and their pet.
Meghan 22:39
Now there is a time where we are trying to genuinely get out of a service and we're saying, Okay, well, here I'm going to help you transition, but at the end of the day, I'm not going to be doing this anymore. So there does have to be we're not trying to be deceptive to the client here, but we are trying to reframe it in their mind that there are alternatives to what they're currently doing. Something you should care a lot about is having amazing insurance as a pet sitter. You know how much trust goes into caring for someone's furry family member, but who's got your back for over 25 years, pet sitters Associates has been helping pet care pros like you with affordable, flexible insurance coverage, whether you're walking dogs, pet sitting or just starting out, they make it easy to protect your business. Get a free quote at petsit llc.com as a listener, you get $10 off your membership when you use the code confessional at checkout. That's petsit llc.com because your peace of mind is part of great pet care. I had just briefly mentioned about what to do when you are wanting to end a service. So now let's deep dive into that. We have to say the quiet part out loud here, sometimes you don't want to convert a service, and that is okay. It's your business. You can do what you want. When a conversion is really about ending your service and you want to stop offering it, it's important to communicate that to clients. So the common one, classic one, that we've seen over the past few years, is ending overnights. The mistake here is apologizing for it. I am sorry. I really need to be home with my own pets, and I really don't I love fluffy, and I really don't want to end the service, but I have to. I'm so sorry. Sometimes we start negotiating with clients of if they're traveling for 14 days and they want us to do every other night or every third night at their house, just so their dog has someone. Sometimes we may even start making exceptions of, well, I like these clients or like I like these homes. They make me feel comfortable and safe, so I'll just do the overnights for them and everybody else. I'm going to say no to so the reality is, if this doesn't work for you, then you just need to cut it out whole cloth. Don't make exceptions. I know it can be really difficult when you have some seriously long term clients or in clients that have been really good to you, but if it's really draining to you, if it's mentally taxing of getting out of your own comfortable bed and sleeping in somebody else's then it's just not worth it.
Collin 24:59
Yeah, and there are. Operational things to consider with, especially overnights, but also if you do boarding and daycare and things like that, like you do have to take into account boundaries and consistency and sustainability in all of these things. And too often we hedge our bets, like Megan said, where we apologize? Where we say, I'm really sorry. This is just something that I've been thinking about. We kind of word vomit on people. And then what that means is that we start backing out of this and and that's really where we get into strategy six. Here of you have to decide internally first. You have to decide for yourself first and be firm about this, because if you are unsure, clients will be too they can smell it on you when you're having that conversation with them. And here's the key mind frame that you have to take into this. You must believe that when you are making the shift in services, that whatever you're shifting to, that this is no longer how we deliver our best care, whatever you're shifting away from. That's what you have to believe about it. This is no longer the standard of care that we are going to be offering,
Meghan 26:06
because it's true. Clients have come to know this service. They love this service. They don't want anything else. They're not asking for anything else, and you're ripping it away. So of course, they're going to come and say, Well, can you just make an exception for me? And fluffy, she really loves you, and they're going to play on your emotional heartstrings, and it's it's going to be really hard to have a thick backbone and go, No, this is what is best for me and my company. I appreciate and I love fluffy very much. This is what I need to do.
Collin 26:37
When we stopped offering overnights and when we stopped offering boarding and daycare, it was this strong conviction that just cemented itself in Megan's in my mind, of those are no longer how we deliver our best care. We firmly believe that the best care that we provide are drop ins and daily dog walks managed as his team of employees like we just went hard down that road, because if we had just sat, because it's true that when we got out of the boarding and daycare stuff, we were tired of it, we were burned out. We were so done with it. And if we had just sat in that, that would have come across as not good to our clients, it would not have gone well. So having those strong convictions about this and how you are going to stick to your guns and stick to your boundaries is really what you have to decipher before you even think about changing stand on that firm foundation, so that when those questions come, when they start to argue, when they start to try and bargain with you, and they ask for exceptions, you can stand firm on saying that is no longer the quality and standard that I believe in. This is where my convictions lie,
Meghan 27:48
and it is important to announce that change, and that is something that we could have definitely done a lot better. On your social media posts, your email campaigns, your software, whatever and however you use to communicate with clients. That is where you need to be talking about this. So do not say we are thinking about dot, dot, dot, changing this service to become this, or we're thinking about getting rid of this. Also don't say, for most clients, dot, dot, dot. These are convictionless posts you want to again stand firm in this instead. Say beginning on X date, January 1, 2026 we will no longer offer overnights. We have enjoyed them. We appreciate the clients. Here is now what we are doing instead,
Collin 28:33
and how it helps you and benefits you, and then focus back on the client for how that is going to be helpful to them. And like Megan said, do this early? Do this often, reach out to specific clients that you know may have concerns or may have been your longest term client, so that you can have that personal communication with them to guide them through that this is all about holding high standards for your business and yourself. And the thing about standards is that they build trust when we set where this is going to be, we draw that line in the stand clients can clearly see where our business is and where our business is not. That builds trust because they know we're predictable in how we're going to react and respond. Exceptions invite negotiation. They invite questioning, and they actually breed distrust. When we start to say things like, Well, for most clients, some clients will experience blah, blah. Well, how'd you pick that client versus not me? Am I in the group? Why did that happen? When are you going to make this decision? How do I get in the group? What's that look like? All that just starts circling and swirling. It's clear. It's kind it's defined, and it's forward to the clients when you communicate with them.
Meghan 29:47
This is pretty easily done when you're about to cut out a zip code or a service area, yeah, well, okay, you live there. So no more that that's pretty easily defined. Of well, there's not a whole lot. For them to switch to because they have to move into your current zip code in order to be serviced. But that is at least well defined. When we talk about announcing the change, we often think about pricing and doing that and making sure we don't vomit on people and justify our price. Well, the same thing goes here. Of we don't want to say we're tired of this service because we've stayed in clients' homes that are dirty, and we just don't want to be doing that anymore. Or whatever your reasoning is. You don't have to justify why you're eliminating a service or changing a service to your clients. You just kind of want to stick to the
Collin 30:32
facts well, and in that process, part of this, the eighth strategy here, is to always provide the replacement path. That's what we've been leading to. If we're being clear, we're being forward, we have the delineated path, and we know exactly what is and is not going to happen. You must build a bridge. When we are trying to convert clients from one service to another, it is not enough to just say, Well, I'm not doing X anymore, and leave it. Leave it at that we we did this multiple times when we when we shifted services, when we went from overnights to drop ins. Now you have to start talking about evening routine visits, feeding regimes. You can start talking about how it fits in with the client's daily schedule that late, late night potty break, if needing the early morning visits, optional midday care. Paint the picture for them for what this is actually going to look like and how it fits in with what's going on and what it's going to fit with the clients and their pet's actual schedule. What this does is this reframes that service, and that's what we want to do. We don't want to make it seem like, Well, you had the premium service, and this is the second rate, this is the cut rate service. But that's that communication that we're having to work with. I've got to work with them to kind of redefine some of their terms and and preconceived notions that they may have, because we want to come across as well designed, intentional, professional high end. It's not less care. It's actually individually crafted visits to specifically meet their needs at the needed and desired times.
Meghan 32:13
If you don't show the client what's on the other side of the mountain, they're probably not going to climb it with you. They're going to be more scared, more afraid, more reclusive, not show you how they're feeling and what they're processing and what they're thinking. So that's why it is important to give them more of a roadmap, because we want to guide them on the way well.
Collin 32:31
And this is especially true, I mean, for any kind of service change, but if you are converting, maybe if you're trying to get out of pet sitting and go to dog walking only, and you want to try and preserve those clients. Well, a lot of the pet sitting clients. Well, technically, if you did a midday visit, that's a midday dog walk. So you have a lot of connection point with the client there too, where you can say, I can still service this routine. And actually, here's a recommendation for another company, or other people who can do the morning and evening, and that preserves that connection to you. You're still solving the problem, and you're working collaboratively with others.
Meghan 33:11
At the end of the day, it doesn't matter whether a pet is needing a different service and the client may not agree, or you are trying to convert to a different service and ending a service entirely, some clients are going to leave, and we just have to accept that it's not a fun thing to think about. You know, even with prices, some clients are going to leave, they're not going to be happy with our business. This is especially true if you are taking away an entire segment of your client list. You're getting rid of pet sitting and going only to dog walking, or you're getting rid of all dogs and going strictly to cats, clients are going to leave your business. I mean, that that's going to be no matter what you do. They may even move away, and it's nobody's fault. It's just it happens. Some clients want overnight presence or want a daycare for the hours that it provides, and so they won't convert. Some are no longer aligned with your mission or have differing beliefs that you have spoken up about, and they just don't agree, so they're going to leave. But this does not mean that you have failed or you have made a wrong decision. If you need more peace of mind in your life, and that's by going cat only, then that's what you need to do,
Collin 34:15
because the truth is, is that revenue, that money that requires you to betray your model, your convictions, your operations that you need to do. What if that? If it requires that you betray all of those things, it will eventually cost more than it brings in. It's going to cost your your sanity, probably your personal health. It's going to cost you in burnout. It's going to cost you in everything that you've had to sacrifice to get there. It's also going to limit your potential for what you want to do and what you can take on the the costs of you operating outside of what you want to do that break your model, break your convictions, break whatever your this is like, just for the pursuit of. Money will cost you more in the end, and when we really start to understand that balance and what we're really giving up, that's what gives us a lot of power and surety in our own lives. It's what leads to those strong decisions, it's what leads to those good discussions, and it's what's going to lead you to stand firm when those clients come to you and they have those concerns and they don't follow you. When Megan and I converted away from our services, we had very few clients that went with us to our new drop in services that we were offering. Several people were upset about this. They were they felt let down by us, no longer offering the service that they thought was the absolute best and total premium thing, and they just couldn't get behind where we were moving. They were no longer aligned with us and Megan and I had to just look at that and go, it is for the betterment of us, our business and our family, to go in this direction. And if I have to do it without that client, that's what I have to do.
Meghan 36:03
The common thread here is to have the resolve that the choice that you made is the one that's best. And you know, we were talking about ending a service here, and, yes, resolving that, but also where you are saying, Okay, your dog can no longer handle a 60 minute walk. They are 12 years old, and they really need to go down to a 30 minute or you're making some other personal recommendation that is really, again, aligns with what you believe is best your professional opinion. And the client is not okay with that,
Collin 36:34
and you just have to accept that. It doesn't matter how much education you do, how many emails you send, how many text messages? How many in persons? If that person is really not convinced about what you're trying to do and what you are saying, is best, there's nothing you can do about that, and you have to walk away. And that is not comfortable all of the time, and that's really, really difficult, because then what happens is that we step back in and we go, Well, okay, well, I'll continue to do this because I don't want someone else to do this the wrong way, and then we hook ourselves back in, and at that point, it's going, Well, where were those strong convictions that made you want to bring this up in the first place anyway? If we're willing to compromise for the sake of just so that somebody else doesn't mess it up, that's a very dangerous place to be, especially as a professional business, I feel like
Meghan 37:24
there's a lot of tie ins here with what we talk about, with policies and procedures and implementing those and having a strong backbone and setting your prices and raising prices and being okay when clients leave like it, all ties into the bigger business picture here of you have To do what you feel is best for your business.
Collin 37:43
But again, we can't be surprised when clients don't come along for that ride. If I'm 100% pet sitting and I say, Tomorrow I'm going to be dog walking, it's no surprise that those people aren't that I'm not going to bring over 100% of those clients because it's not a good fit. It's not solving the problem that those clients need, if they only need you for vacation, be care, and they've never asked. They have no interest and they don't want you can try and talk to them about it. You can do the pitch work through some of these strategies for how to still stay involved and connected. But at the end of the day, if you are not solving their problem with your new direction, we can't be surprised if those clients don't come along for the ride.
Meghan 38:22
That doesn't mean it doesn't hurt, though, right, right? Yeah, it's not fun to lose clients. Nobody wants to lose clients. We're all business owners. We're trying to be here for the long term and make some money to put food on our table and our family. But the reality is, you can't please everybody all the time that's in business, that's in our personal lives as well. You know, converting clients isn't about squeezing more out of them. It's about staying aligned as their life and your business changes. Their pets are changing, they're aging, they're getting different conditions and need different specializations. Sometimes the most professional move you can make is saying this isn't how we do care anymore.
Collin 39:01
And that may sound really cold, it does, right? This isn't how we do care anymore, but where it is this. This is the end point of a long road, of a long communication, of a long relationship, culminating in this isn't how we do care anymore, and that's okay. You want the hour long walk for your 16 year old lab. This is not how we do care anymore. I used to offer boarding and overnights. I'm moving to drop ins and daily dog walks. That's not how we do care anymore. Why you always have to answer that and tie it into how it benefits the client, where this is going, where these convictions come from, not word vomiting here, not going down those rows, but sticking to what you see, what you observe, linking together all of these strategies, it's not just showing up one day saying everything I did previously was crap and horrible, and now I'm moving in this direction. No, bring your clients along for that. Educate them, talk to them, reach out to them, and build that bridge to where you are headed all along, we are going to fully understand that not everybody's along for that. That's okay. We're not aligned anymore. They're not always for us. That's okay. We need to change and grow and adapt. Is best for us, our lives and our clients too.
Meghan 40:21
We hope that this episode has been helpful to you, and if it has, feel free to share it with a friend. You can also email us if you would like at Pet Sitter confessional@gmail.com, or look us up on Facebook and Instagram. At Pet Sitter confessional, thank you for taking your time and listening to this. We appreciate you. We would also like to thank pet sitters associates for sponsoring today's episode. We will talk with you next time bye. You.
