← LibraryCase No. 11
Low stakesIntegrated marketing studio client (agency retainer) · $30K ARR retainer

"Can You Just Add This Real Quick?"

Friendly request. You've said yes too many times. The retainer is bleeding margin.

Based on real client experiences, but anonymized and dramatized to protect identities and confidential relationships.

The setup

Your day-to-day contact asks: "Hey, can your team just pull this custom AI visibility report for our client's board deck? Should be quick." It's the 7th "quick" ask this quarter. Each one costs your team 4 hours of senior time and never makes it onto an invoice.

The three data points
  1. 01Several out-of-scope custom reports this quarter (zero in the SOW)
  2. 02Cumulative cost to your team: roughly a full work-week of senior time
  3. 03Retainer can't absorb the free-work burn at current margin
How you pitch

3 minutes to say no without saying no. Protect the relationship and the margin. Set the precedent now or you'll never get it back.

What makes it exciting

The hardest agency pitch — pushing back on a friendly client without breaking the warmth. Tone is everything.