An unpaid invoice is a sales conversation

It started as a reminder about an invoice from March.

It ended as a proposal for a new website. Same email thread.

The client is a small shop. They had a website with us, hosting and email only. No maintenance plan.

Before lockdown we'd talked about meeting to discuss their website. Then lockdown came, and the meeting was postponed. Like so many things that spring.

In July their March hosting invoice was still pending, so we sent a reminder. They answered the next morning: they were making the transfer, sorry for the delay, and the meeting was still pending. I proposed a date. Then summer happened, and the thread went quiet.

In November it came back to life. They were adding photos to a local shop directory and, before writing the text, wanted to check it against the website we'd built when they opened. Could we update that too?

The easy answer, and the useful one

I could have answered: sure, here's what the changes cost.

Instead I said yes, let's call. And I told them, plainly, what I saw.

The website hadn't been updated technically in a long time, because only hosting was active, not maintenance. And the design had its years. Web design had moved on a lot since then.

Then the real argument. Today's user doesn't just want to send a question or see what kind of work you do. They want to take a direct action: hire a service, buy a product.

I attached screenshots of recent projects in their sector, and asked when it suited them to talk. A few pictures do more than a paragraph of selling. And a proposal deserves a conversation, not another email.

Forgotten, not unwilling

Here's the confession. For a long time I treated overdue invoices as admin. Something unpleasant to chase, separate from the "real" client work.

We'd send the reminder, wait, send another. And each time I'd feel slightly embarrassed, like asking a friend to pay you back for a coffee.

But in my experience, a late hosting invoice rarely means a client who doesn't want to pay. More often it means a client who has stopped thinking about their website. It's become a cost, not a tool. Like a gym membership you keep paying and never use, except this one you even forget to pay.

That's not a collections problem. I think it's a sign the website isn't doing enough for them.

An invoice someone forgets to pay is a product they've forgotten they have.

So now, before writing the reminder, I look at the website. Is it up to date? Does it still do its job? That's usually where the real conversation is. And if it's outdated, I say so, and say why it matters to their business. Not to ours.

For a studio of two, existing clients are both our income and our best source of new work. A client who only pays for hosting and forgets about it is one step from leaving. A client whose website brings in customers stays for years.

We started Foxnice with 300 €. I think we've grown more by turning small relationships into longer ones than by chasing new ones every month. Slower, yes. But it's growth we don't owe to anyone.

In July it was a reminder about an old invoice.

In November it became a conversation about what their website could do for them.

P.S. I still don't enjoy sending reminders. I've just stopped thinking that's all they are.