The Red Velvet Rope
Policy Worksheet
Choose your clients as carefully as you choose your friends. This worksheet walks you through building the single most important piece of the Book Yourself Solid system.
The first thing we teach every service professional
Here's a counterintuitive truth about getting more clients: it starts with turning some away.
Think about the red velvet rope outside an exclusive venue. Not everyone gets in, and that's exactly the point. Your Red Velvet Rope Policy is a set of criteria that defines who you will and won't work with.
When you work with clients who drain you, your work quality drops, your enthusiasm fades, and you attract more of the wrong people. When you work only with clients who energize and inspire you, the opposite happens. You do your best work. Your clients get the best results. They refer people just like them. And you build a business you actually love.
What the worksheet covers
Four sections that build your Red Velvet Rope Policy from the ground up.
The Velvet Rope: Your Deal-Breakers
Start with the negative. What characteristics or behaviours do you refuse to tolerate? Think broadly. Past clients, colleagues, even people you've hired. Who made you want to do them bodily harm, despite your loving nature?
Behind the Rope: VIP Qualities
Now the good stuff. Not demographics (age, income, job title) but psychographics. Who they are as people. What do they like to do? How do they learn? What kind of environment do you want to create, and who belongs in it?
The Energy Audit
Run your current and recent clients through the filter. Who passes? Who doesn't? This is where the rubber meets the road. And where most people have their biggest "aha" moment.
Your Finished Policy
Pull it all together into a clear, written Red Velvet Rope Policy you can refer back to every time a potential client shows up. No more guessing. No more taking on people you'll regret.
RVRP AI Prompt Kit
Prefer to think out loud? Use AI as your thinking partner.
The worksheet gives you the structure. But sometimes you need someone to push back, ask the awkward follow-up question, and challenge your assumptions. That's what the AI Prompt Kit does.
It's a set of guided prompts designed to work with ChatGPT, Claude, or Gemini. Walk through a structured conversation that draws out your deal-breakers, identifies the patterns in your best client relationships, and helps you articulate your Red Velvet Rope Policy in language that's unmistakably yours.
The prompt kit is included free when you sign up for the BYS resource library — along with the worksheet and every other tool we publish.
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