How to deal with difficult clients: 8 strategies and best practices

When it comes to running a successful business, client relationships are everything. 

Whether you’re looking at how to start a business online, finding creative ways to make money with your own agency, or focusing on brick-and-mortar business opportunities in the retail, hospitality, or beauty sector, you need to be able to build and maintain a good rapport with your clients.

And, whether we like it or not, an important part of customer relationship management is knowing how to deal with difficult clients. 

When customer relations turn sour, it’s not just your bottom line that suffers. Difficult clients can impact your reputation, hamper your customer acquisition efforts, bring down your workplace culture, and even impact employee retention.

So, while it’s not always easy, it’s essential to master the art of smoothing things over, de-escalating heated situations, and remaining calm and professional in the face of conflict.

In this guide, we’ll show you how to deal with difficult clients in all their various forms — leaving you well-equipped to navigate the ups and downs of customer relationships and run a thriving business.

Recognising the different types of difficult clients

If you want to know how to deal with difficult clients, you first need to understand exactly what type of client you’re dealing with. Here are some of the most common ‘difficult client’ persona types and how to recognise them.

The indecisive client 

Indecisive clients don’t know what they want — which makes it very difficult for you to deliver. They often lack a clear vision, struggle to make a decision, and change their mind constantly. 

The indecisive client can be incredibly time-consuming. They require lots of guidance, and you might find yourself spending more time than usual going back and forth to establish next steps or making changes to accommodate their ever-evolving requirements.

The entitled client

The entitled client expects special treatment — and they’re not afraid to demand it. 

Whether you’re a salon owner, a creative freelancer or consultant, or in the hospitality industry; you’ll be able to spot entitled clients almost immediately. 

They expect to be served right away, and often want you to bend the rules or make special allowances for them. If you run an appointment-only business, for example, an entitled client might expect you to squeeze them in last-minute even if you’re fully booked. 

There’s nothing wrong with going above and beyond to keep your clients happy, and there’s a lot to be said for being flexible. However, entitled clients will constantly push the boundaries — and may become rude and disrespectful if you push back. 

The overly demanding client 

The overly demanding client always wants more and better — even if it exceeds the scope or budget allocated to your collaboration. They expect exceptional, often unrealistic, results, and may push for a faster-than-average turnaround. 

The issue with overly demanding clients is that, similar to entitled clients, they don’t respect your time or processes. They have no qualms about asking for more, and faster, even if it means disrupting your workflow, draining your resources, and requiring you to work overtime. 

The micromanager 

The micromanaging client struggles with trust. They want to oversee every detail, and they check in frequently for updates. This often goes hand-in-hand with lots of unsolicited feedback, and the micromanager may come across as overly critical. 

Dealing with a micromanager client can be stressful, not to mention highly disruptive. You may find that, distracted by their many check-ins (often unprompted), it’s difficult to focus on the job at hand and get the work done.

Not only that: feeling like your client doesn’t trust you is incredibly demoralising. It’s hard to enjoy a project if you feel like they’re constantly checking up on you and questioning your expertise.

The impossible-to-please client

As the name suggests, you can’t do anything right with this type of client. They are quick to complain, slow to express happiness or gratitude, and can find fault with even the most stellar work. 

Their constant nitpicking and negative attitude will quickly bring you down — as will the realisation that, no matter how hard you try, you’ll never meet their impossible expectations. 

There’s also the danger that impossible-to-please clients will speak poorly of you to others and leave a negative review. 

The penny-pinching client

This type of difficult client is always looking for a freebie or a bargain. They don’t respect your pricing strategies, and they may question the value of your products or services — believing there’s a better deal to be had.

Not only is it frustrating when you’ve thought carefully about how to price a product or how to price a service, only to have clients try to haggle for a discount. If you don’t hold firm, penny-pinching clients can also impact your cash flow.

The slow-paying client

If you run a service-based business that involves sending invoices, beware the slow-paying client.

eadlines mean nothing to this type of difficult client. They’re typically late with payments or, even worse, will dispute your invoice and go back on what you previously agreed. 

While the slow-paying client may not be deliberately withholding payment — they might simply be disorganised or at the mercy of painfully slow processes within their own organisation — they will put your small business finances under immense strain.

How to deal with difficult clients: 8 strategies and best practices

No matter what kind of business you run, these strategies for working with difficult clients will help you remain professional, productive, and resilient. 

1. Don’t take it personally

When dealing with difficult clients at work, bear in mind that it’s rarely ever personal. 

Even if a client is finding fault with your business, it likely has more to do with their own issues and circumstances than anything you’re doing or not doing. 

This piece of advice is easier said than done. You’ve put your heart and soul into your company — from poring over small business ideas and jumping through all the legal requirements for starting a small business, to nurturing customer loyalty and doing your best to turn a profit. Naturally, it hurts to have a client question your expertise or disregard your terms and processes.

But facing a difficult client requires a certain degree of emotional detachment. Rather than viewing their behaviour as a reflection of you and your business, try to consider the root cause. What factors, circumstances, or emotions might be driving the client’s behaviour? 

By shifting the focus onto the client and their situation, it will be easier to remain professional and concentrate on finding a resolution.

2. Pause and reflect

This is one of the most important (yet oft forgotten) strategies for working with difficult clients: take a breather before you react.

Difficult clients can really push your buttons — whether they’re hounding you with emails, making unreasonable demands, or complaining about the wait time during your busiest period. 

However, the last thing you want to do is react in the heat of the moment or say something out of frustration that you might later regret. 

The key is to respond promptly but react slowly. In other words, be quick to acknowledge the client’s concerns, but take time to pause and reflect before you take action. 

Perhaps, after many years of exploring how to start a side hustle, you’re finally living out your dream of running your own creative agency. Unfortunately, you’ve got an overly demanding, micromanaging client on your books who’s taken to emailing you every day to check in, complain, or provide feedback.

After one email too many, you might be tempted to fire off a heated response and vent your frustrations — but that could do irreparable damage to your relationship with that client, and will undoubtedly make the situation worse.

Instead, send a neutrally-worded email confirming that you’ve received their message and will get back to them shortly. This pacifies the client while giving you time to put your frustrations aside and think carefully — and more pragmatically — about how to proceed. 

3. Communicate professionally and respectfully no matter what

Effective communication is key when interacting with clients. And, when it comes to dealing with difficult clients, it’s especially important to remain professional and respectful. 

No matter what kind of difficult client you’re facing, the goal is always to de-escalate tense situations, ensure a productive working relationship, and maintain a positive rapport. 

But, once you let professionalism and respect slip, all of those things become increasingly more challenging. 

Whether you’re dealing with a difficult client face-to-face, over the phone, or via email, make sure your tone remains professional. Avoid emotive language, be constructive rather than defensive, and, where necessary, use “I” statements instead of “you”. 

Let’s imagine you’ve turned one of your hobbies that make money into a full-time business — say, working as a freelance marketing consultant. While helping with the marketing strategy for a small business, you receive an email from your impossible-to-please client. They’re very unhappy with the results of a recent campaign you worked on, complaining that it didn’t generate as many leads as they were expecting.

Let’s consider an emotionally-charged, defensive response versus a more constructive and professional one:

The first response could be construed as defensive and dismissive — and the irritation is palpable. The second response, however, is much more likely to appease the client and keep them on side. 

4. Listen and empathise 

If you want to resolve conflict with a difficult client, make a conscious effort to listen and empathise. 

This ensures that the client feels heard and understood, and enables you to truly understand where they’re coming from — and find an effective solution. 

Start with active listening. Give the client your undivided attention and let them speak without interruption. Once they’ve finished airing their frustrations, repeat back what you’ve heard (in your own words) to make sure you’re correctly understanding their perspective. 

For example, you might say something like “I’m hearing that you’re frustrated about how slowly the project is moving” or “So your main concern is that we haven’t generated enough leads, is that right?” 

If necessary, ask follow-up questions to clarify the client’s issues and get more details. 

Then, even if you don’t agree with their perspective, show that you’re empathetic to their position. For example, you could say “I can understand why that would be concerning for you” or “I appreciate that you need this done quickly.” 

When you listen and empathise, you signal to the client that you care about meeting their needs and that you’re actively focusing on how to improve the customer experience.

5. Manage expectations 

Managing client expectations is crucial not only for dealing with difficult clients, but also for helping to avoid them in the first place.

If you’re already working with a difficult client, start taking steps to manage their expectations as soon as possible. 

Be firm and clear about what’s possible and what’s simply unachievable — and explain why. This should help to prevent misunderstandings and keep unrealistic demands in check. 

It can also be useful to set goals and expectations collaboratively. If you feel that the client is asking for too much or veering off-piste from your original agreement, try to check in with them and get realigned. Go through their objectives once again, identify the main priorities together, and agree on concrete next steps. 

But what if a client is so difficult that your attempts to manage their expectations fall flat? 

If that’s the case, focus on your own boundaries. Emphasise what’s possible from a practical perspective, and communicate, in no uncertain terms, what you’re planning to deliver and the timeline you’ll be working towards. Then it’s up to the client to decide if they want to continue.

6. Be solution-focused

When dealing with difficult clients, you ideally want to find a way to move forward and get to a point where everybody’s happy — so focus primarily on solutions and fixes.

However frustrating it may be, try not to get caught up in defending yourself (or your team) and arguing against the client’s point. If they seem intent on airing their grievances or dwelling on a problem, it’s your job to shift the narrative. 

Steer the conversation towards practical solutions and concrete next steps. After you’ve acknowledged the client’s frustrations, move swiftly on to “What can we do to improve the situation?” or “What would be a reasonable next step to resolve the issue and keep everybody happy?”

Of course, there are clients who will never be happy — no matter how many different solutions you propose. However, that shouldn’t stop you from trying. Even if the situation is unsalvageable, you want to be able to look back and feel confident that you did your best.

7. Establish a conflict resolution plan (and provide adequate training)

A conflict resolution plan provides you and your team with a clear set of guidelines for how to deal with difficult clients. 

This ensures everybody’s working from the same framework — which is crucial for maintaining consistency and professionalism throughout client-facing interactions. And, with a clear protocol in place, team members are less likely to act impulsively or emotionally when dealing with difficult clients.

From a practical perspective, a conflict resolution plan will also speed up the process of finding effective solutions and moving forward productively. 

So what should you include in your conflict resolution plan?

Here’s how your framework might look:

• Acknowledge the client’s concerns and show empathy

• Assess the situation fully, gathering more information and asking follow-up questions if necessary

• Seek a resolution — propose possible solutions and outline concrete steps for how to move forward 

• Foster alignment to ensure that the client is in agreement with how to proceed, and, if necessary, spend time with the client to re-establish goals and expectations

• Implement the proposed solution(s) and monitor progress; keep in regular contact with the client

• Follow up with the client to hear their feedback and make sure they’re happy with how their concerns have been dealt with

Once you’ve created a conflict resolution plan, make sure you train your team members in how to implement it across different scenarios. If you’re running a café, for example, you might role-play with your team so they learn effective communication techniques when dealing with difficult clients. 

There are several benefits of training employees to deal with difficult clients. Not only will your clients and customers receive a more professional service; your team members will feel much more confident knowing they’re well-equipped to take action and de-escalate tricky situations.

Difficult clients can bring down team morale, so it’s important that you know how to motivate employees even in uncomfortable situations — and that starts with empowering them to take action.

8. Know when to cut ties 

Customer retention is a crucial part of running a successful business. But, when it comes to dealing with difficult clients, you need to know when to draw the line.

No matter how hard you try to get difficult client conversations back on track and find a productive way to move forward, some clients just aren’t a good fit for your business. 

And, if you continue to hold on to those difficult clients, they’ll do more harm than good. They’ll drain your time, your resources, and your small business budget. So, as counterintuitive as it might feel, think of it as a necessary part of small business risk management.

Learn to recognise when a client relationship just cannot be salvaged, and when a client is taking more away from your business than they’re putting in. 

Once you decide to cut ties with a difficult client, be sure to communicate clearly and professionally. Depending on the nature of your business, you might choose to have an in-person conversation with the client and follow up with a written summary. 

If possible and necessary, try to agree on a transition plan so the client isn’t left completely in the lurch. You might offer to complete any ongoing work and tie up loose ends, for example, or provide a two-week notice period.

Lessons to be learned from difficult clients

Your interactions with difficult clients can teach you a lot about your business. Here are some valuable lessons to take with you when you encounter difficult clients.

Not every paying client is a good fit for your business

When you’re just starting out, every paying customer feels like a win for your business. But, when you work with difficult clients, you realise that some people just aren’t a good match for the products or services you’re offering.

Knowing how to identify your target market is essential. Be clear on who you want to do business with and what kinds of clients you want to attract. This will help you position yourself accordingly, guide you in how to advertise your business, and enable you to filter out potentially problematic clients early on.

Difficult clients can shed light on your strengths and weaknesses

It might be tempting to simply write certain clients off as difficult — and, in many instances, that may well be the case. However, difficult clients can also steer you towards important improvements.

After dealing with a micromanager client, for example, you might decide to schedule more regular check-ins with future clients to ensure greater transparency and better communication.

If you’ve had one too many slow-paying clients on your books, you might explore different payment options for small businesses to see if there’s a way to make it easier for clients to pay — such as taking card payments over the phone or implementing online payment methods.

Difficult clients help to build resilience 

Dealing with difficult clients can be stressful, frustrating, and emotionally draining (and probably not what you had in mind when you were dreaming of how to become your own boss).

But, with every difficult client you encounter, you’re developing resilience — and that’s an essential factor for business success. 

By dealing with difficult clients, you and your team are constantly learning how to problem-solve on the fly, how to navigate and overcome setbacks, and how to provide exceptional customer service no matter what.

Next time a difficult client is getting you down, try to view it as a valuable learning curve; an experience that will only make your business stronger. 

Key takeaways and next steps

Building positive client relations is essential — and that requires knowing how to manage difficult clients. With the right strategies in place, you can:

• De-escalate conflict and try to turn a negative client relationship into a positive one

• Maintain professionalism and protect your reputation

• Empower your team with the skills and confidence they need when having difficult conversations with clients (also crucial if you’re thinking about how to create a positive working environment)

• Protect your time, resources, and finances

Next steps

If you’re reading this article with a particular client in mind, you’ve hopefully already found some tips and strategies that resonate. If that’s the case, we encourage you to go ahead and implement them. 

Even if you’re not actively dealing with a difficult client right now, it can be useful to think about how you’ll deal with difficult clients in the future. Here are some next steps you can take to prepare:

1. Reflect on past experiences. Can you think of any difficult clients you dealt with in the past? What difficult client persona types do you tend to come across most frequently in your business? This may help you identify any common patterns or recurring challenges that you can address to help you avoid (or better manage) similar clients in the future.

2. Establish watertight guidelines and processes. Make sure that every aspect of your business is set up for maximum transparency so that any new or prospective clients know what to expect. Be clear and upfront on things like pricing, scope, and timeline before you start collaborating — and be sure to have everything documented for future reference.