If a former client agrees to speak with you, I wouldn’t begin by trying to sell them something.
You may only get one candid conversation.
Use it well.
I’d begin by understanding what happened.
When did the relationship change?
Was there a particular problem?
Did their needs change?
Did someone else serve them better?
Was there something your business made unnecessarily difficult?
And then listen… earnestly.
That last part sounds obvious.
It isn’t always.
When someone tells us why they stopped doing business with us, the natural response is to explain.
We want to correct the misunderstanding.
Defend the employee.
Explain the policy.
Provide context.
There may be a time for that.
But first I’d want to understand the experience from their side of the desk.
The immediate opportunity may be to recover a client.
The longer-term opportunity may be to learn why other clients could be leaving for the same reason.