There seem to be two sets of clients: really painful ones and amazing It’s the painful ones that seem to drain an enormous amount of energy and time. They’re the ones that you constantly have to battle with. But how do you know in advance how to avoid these clients? There are red flags in place. In this episode you’ll learn  how at Psychotactics (for the most part) we avoid painful clients. ---------------- In this episode Sean talks about Part 1: Why and how to add  barriers Part 2: How to filter through testimonials Part 3: How to spot ‘Red Flags’ Right click here and ‘save as’ to download this episode to your computer. ---------------- How We Avoid Energy-Sapping Clients at Psychotactics Which ants have more offspring? The ants that forage more and hence have more food supplies? Or the ants that are do less foraging and hence have less food? Incredible as it may seem it’s the ants that restrain their foraging that fare better Biological studies have almost always believed that species that have the greatest food supply tend to do better. A Stanford study by Deborah M. Gordon demonstrates how harvester ants experience greater success when they’re picky. This picky, picky, picky habit applies quite neatly to client acquisition When you first start out in business, it seems like a good idea to go out and forage for new clients all the time. Over time, you’ll learn that there are good clients and energy-sapping clients. And that by appealing to everyone you may get success, but at Psychotactics, we’ve found that seemingly counterintuitive behaviour seems to work a lot better. That instead of trying to increase our reach, we’ve narrowed it down In the ant world, success is measured by a greater number of offspring. In our world at Psychotactics, success is measured by the amount of control we have over our lives. The ability to work with the clients we want, earn a profit that’s sizeable, yet within a pre-defined limit. Most importantly, it has allowed us to take three months off and travel the world on vacation. In a world that’s increasingly driving itself crazy, we live with an island mentality. And a significant part of this success lies in the fact that we have great clients. But no one just has great clients. You have to pick great clients. So how do we pick our clients? Over the past 16 years, we’ve used three core methods. And these methods have worked amazingly well for us. They are: – Adding barriers – Filtering through testimonials. – Red flags Part 1—Barriers: The First Step To Avoid Energy-Sapping Clients at Psychotactics Let’s say you tried to buy the copywriting course off our site. You randomly go to the sales page, plop down a couple of thousand of dollars and then wait for your download. The download might never show up. Instead there’d be a back check on your record Yup, just like an employer does a check on your past before hiring you, a check is done on your history with Psychotactics as well. Have you been a subscriber? For how long? Have you bought The Brain Audit yet? When did you do that? Have you bought other smaller products? If the answer is no, it’s likely that you’ll get your couple of thousand dollars right back in your bank account. So why is the case? It’s a barrier in place. And we have rules. And the rules are simple. You need to have subscribed. You need to have read The Brain Audit. Without jumping over those barriers, you’re not truly qualified to be part of our system. So yes, we may check if you’ve bought and consumed the products with another email address, but if the answer is no, then the money goes bouncing right back to your account. I remember an event in Chicago quite clearly I’d just spoken at the System Seminar. I’d just given a presentation, and a member of the audience approached me to buy our info-products course. Was he a subscriber? Did he have The Brain Audit? Would he buy The Brain Audit? His said he wasn’t planning to buy The Brain Audit. He just wanted the info-products