JB_Studio38

That's a good idea...issue is, even ones who contact on the app are full of shit most of the time. If I don't check my messages on there for a week, there will be a backlog of "hi, hello, fuck me, available, etc" and who haven't even bothered to text me. I mainly use the auto reply to display rates, but I'm also using it as pre-screen before they reach my line. As much as I want to remove my number, I'm concerned it could cause booking requests to drag out...and that's what I don't want. At the same time, it's for sure time to cut a lot of the random stuff out. Especially when people get huffy and puffy when I try to get the most basic info beforehand. The stupidity of some people to not recognize I have no idea who they are, and they expect undivided attention and yes to everything before I even get the most basic information out of them. It almost makes me wonder, are these people just really inexperienced, or is that what the industry is allowing? Considering what some have said on the forum, it's no wonder some escorts never respond back to their messages. Many of the flakes had messages that should have been ignored right off the bat.

There is an option for this, in our profile we can allow only registered members to contact us. I do that occasionally, but there's still the chance of "bad" premium members reaching us, and missing out on good guys who may not have registered for a profile. Good points, brother! I'm just at a point where I know I have to do things differently. Even though flakes and lookies are a part of the business, it has gotten persistent to where there's far more flakes than real clients on a day to day basis. Lot of them have reports already from other escorts on blacklist app, and the ones who don't usually get one once I catch onto their game. I don't mind talking thru email, but the area where I find this problematic is on Adam4Adam. I know, cringe. That site is also gone downhill with the reliability of clients. It has become the worst. Even the seemingly serious clients on there flake, some even when they've sent deposits. The ones who refuse to text or provide a number never show up. So, I can't work with them on email either, similiar to RentMen platform which I also don't communicate on. So by having my number up, they have to text me to arrange a session. But some can't seem to follow directions and don't text me as instructed. I been asking clients to send deposit to confirm the session, but now it's gotten to where I have to require it immediately within 1 response. was able to apply that in San Francisco. But all the ones I let "slide thru", ended up falling thru. So now, I'm being 100% adamant about no booking requests without payment upfront, period. Like I said before: clients have all the details they need on our ads to make a decision before they contact me. No need to be having additional conversations about anything. Pay first, talk after. Anything else is just working for free. I even endorse other providers to do the same thing. Normalize it. This could easily be resolved if sites would implement better screening policies. RentMen doesn't allow us to post number is our ads already, all they have to do is add a "pay now to book this provider" like booking an Uber/Lyft, but they don't want to implement my suggestions. So, gotta take a resolve into my own.

Another example of small town action: I stopped over in a rural area east of Utah the other night, and came across an older, tatted daddy/muscle bottom type who reached out to me in one of the small towns I bunked up for the night. He wasn’t much further than a walk across the next hotel parking lot from me, and we were the only 2 on the block. Made for an easy hookup, but the caveat was: We met on the apps but I couldn’t convert him to a paid client. But that’s the downside of the small rural town: it’s nearly impossible to get someone to pay for *** even if they like you. And sometimes it’s a choice between a quiet night of no clients, or making lemonade out of 🍋 lol. That said; I will also advise that sometimes: a smaller market could work out for 1 trip, and then completely fail on the next (especially when scheduled in close range). Had that last week: I was super busy in one medium sized market earlier in March, but then I went back thru this month and couldn’t get any repeats or newbies to pan out. I ended up just staying for 1 night at a hotel that I only got to use for 12 hours, then left the city at 5 p.m. (I’m so fatigued and burnt out with hotels and how they make us pay TWICE just to get a full 24 hours out of it). In fact, I ended up having to travel between San Francisco to Denver having had 0 real clients along the way. Yet on the way to Seattle from Denver, I had a record breaking good streak. But It really hit my resources hard not having bookings on the way back, As I often use small markets to help “boost” my tour. Which is why I dislike flying, because it doesn’t give opportunity to stop at places along the way. But to have that occur, was nothing short of dismaying. Especially when I had potential bookings that flaked. Exactly why I’m changing up the way I do things going forward.

I haven’t personally heard of it before (I was thinking the porn site with a similar name) But from looking at the site, it doesn’t look great. It doesn’t feel like a Craigslist reinvent. There’s other sites like Mintboys and Doublelist, but both are low on the productivity scale, and DB forbids escort listings all together (unless you have time to try and turn lookers into bookers)…which, I wouldn’t bother because I’m moving away from “working” inquiries without being paid for my effort.

That’s all true. In my case, I have decided the only way to end the madness is to require people to make a deposit 💸 just to even discuss a session with me. This doesn’t just weed out flakes, but it also helps me keep track of actual booking requests versus the sea of, “Are you available” brigade that rarely pans out. If someone can’t part with a nominal fee to contact someone who has enough content to prove legible: the person isn’t serious, and they haven’t made up their minds. It shouldn’t be at my expense to help them figure it out when the content is already out there. I’ve given and given and given, and given some more: my time and energy, day after day, answering responses from “clients” that just never go anywhere. I was on the back end of my tour last week, stopped and posted up in 3 different city markets, and got nothing. I was getting booking requests, but nothing that actually turned into one. I wonder if there’s other reasons certain people may not have gotten replied back to. I mean, only the escort would know. But…I just know when I’ve referenced certain numbers, they had bad reports. Some guys might not be willing to take bookings from those who do. So if someone has flaked on a couple escorts before, or is trying to contact from a number that has no call ID attached, that person may not respond to you.

Hello 👋🏽 to both of you as SF locals. Thanks for the input. I must say: I been going to San Francisco since maybe 2013-14ish. Last week was my 4th trip to the area. Each trip is always a little different than the previous. This one was different because I had friends from out of town, and one who was local who knew the area as well. Don’t get me wrong (and I don’t want to get anyone else wrong) but San Francisco (and even Oakland/SJ) does still have a good pool of clients. In fact, ALL of my clients this trip came from outer lying areas. I didn’t meet any San Francisco city clients this time. Which was weird and uncommon. But then again, it was a weekend trip so maybe the locals go away. At the same time there is a lot more providers there, and there is a huge lack of affordable hotels. I recall my first trip: I landed a room by the Marina in Alameda for $36/night on 3rd party app. Even though I have elite membership and points with 3 chains, AND Marriott friends and family rate…it was still not easy finding something reasonable in the city. And they weren’t even all THAT expensive like graduation week in DC or even Palm Springs for that matter. But, it was still enough to staying for 5 days and only getting booking once a day on 3 of those days, interfered with some things I wanted to do. I was expecting at least 2 or 3 more bookings out if it.

I’m likely going to be cutting most of my big city travel going forward and only dealing with limited markets with deposits. I wanted to do one good big tour now that the west coast cities have fully reopened, but I wish I would have done more travel during the pandemic when things were cheaper and more people were off work. The main issue lately is, too many “clients” lying too much. I can’t be bothered traveling places, and being exposed to more and more liars and bullshitters. Who has time for that shit? Lot of this seems to occur in the city markets. I was brainstorming on joining the guys in Palm Springs this year, but to pull that trip off right now, I would need to spend above and beyond what I did even in San Francisco where I just came from (hotels have lost their minds and are trying to regain for their losses)…without a guarantee of securing SERIOUS clients over the course of the week. And considering the ratio of fake/real bookings, I didn’t want to take the chance.

Right! Glad you have understood it. The problem is, America’s “policies” are so simple and basic for such a hedonistic country…they won’t formally accept it to where people won’t be freaked out if a cop car passes by, at the same time the provider is scheduled to show. And it’s sad because there is still disposable income in smaller towns. Those people also don’t have access to gay culture or have retired from it due to health/family/financial reasons. I have relatives who live in small podunk towns. Those guys are driving around in $60,000/$80,000 trucks. They can surely afford $300 (even though I’m aware material possessions don’t necessarily equate to someone having access to disposable cash). The tricky part is finding which small market is really going to play out. Like I say, they aren’t all equal. University and agricultural cities (just ask how horse 🐎 hung, horny goat 🐐, and “stud” all come from 😆 tend to fare better than industrial or military towns.

And then on top of everything else, comes the added work of transportation when visiting those cities. What you don’t spend on parking and $6 a gallon gas, you spend on Uber and transit. I spent $22 to park in a garage for 4 hours in downtown San Fran. That’s a nightly charge at a hotel. And my friends almost paid $100 to get from Castro to Berkeley in a Lyft, but I offered to take them out of my way because that woulda been ridiculous. Then there’s the excess traffic that often surrounds the bigger cities. It’s not unusual to lose 2-4 hours trying to get into/out of the whole metro area if traveling across during the peak of the day. I think that also has an indirect effect on clients being able to coordinate bookings.

To an extent that’s true, but I’ve also come across “the money” outside of the main cities. Of course, I don’t necessarily mean “small market” cities. Those aren’t always great either because they don’t really get the traffic and visibility or can be overly conservative. I refer more to places that have their own economy not in the shadows of bigger cities. Texas is like that: there’s Amarillo and El Paso, but they are quiet because Dallas and Houston is where every escort and their grandmother is posted up. But it’s harder to do biz when there’s 50 million other guys trying to reach the same couple of clients 🤦🏽‍♂️ I find places that stand on their own, far from the crowded bigger cities seem to be more relaxed and productive to me. What I’m also noticing is: the downtowns of big cities seem to be where the “career minded gays” live and play, but they tend to go on Grindr and look for someone to fuck for free type of meets. That’s why I don’t spend extra getting a hotel downtown or gay neighborhood because I end up paying more and not getting any extra bookings. I did that in Seattle, only because I did have 1 client downtown, but it was more of a vacation day for myself and the hotel was a boutique type I wanted to check out. Even in my local market of Kansas City: All the guys advertise in Kansas City, but most of the action comes from a business park suburb outside of town. It’s cheaper than KC proper and more clients either reside there or are in town on business. I was in San Francisco 5 days all weekend, and even though I got enough bookings, I was starting to get a little annoyed. I couldn’t stay at the hotels I wanted to because they were too expensive (my friend spent $1,200 at a residence inn to stay 5 days in an adjacent neighborhood not even in San Francisco proper). Then, I was only getting like 1 booking request a day. I been in smaller cities this year, and my phone was blowing up. And on my last night there, someone called me just after 11 pm. I was available ALL day for a client. I went to my car for 5 minutes to grab something, never seen the missed call until this morning 🤦🏽‍♂️ Guy didn’t bother to text/leave voicemail nothing. I got in touch the following morning and of course, he wasn’t available.

By biggest, I refer to those with oft mentioned names: Chicago, Los Angeles, San Fran, DC, Atlanta, NYC. Having traveled over 10 years and seen most of all the “big player” cities, sometimes I can’t understand why those are the ones always most popular with providers. To me, it often means more choices potential clients (aka competition) and paying more to be there. Often times, when I do the math and add it all up: I can usually do the same amount or more in a less popular town. However, those areas may be more prone to “dry up” intermittently versus the steady traffic of the bigger markets. At the same time, with so many new ads popping up in the bigger areas…there’s not a whole lot of opportunity to stand out. And with standing out, there may be something I want to do that’s different than what the locals are used to. But if lots of clients can just easily reach lots of other providers, that’s a false sense of opportunity to me. Nowadays, I only do big cities when I have family or friends also in that town. Otherwise it turns into a lot of waiting around for calls being bored. And the worst is the hotels. Unless you’re paying $200-250 a night, many of the “affordable” (which right now seems to be like $80-100) hotels in bigger cities tend to be either way out of the city or in a dingy area of town. And to me, few to non hotels are really so nice that I’m going to drop an entire appointment’s worth for a night… Even in my home state of Florida, I’ve long avoided Miami, Fort Lauderdale, and now even Orlando to an extent since I moved, because everybody is there. Meanwhile, the smaller towns have gotten me some of the best clients. But accordingly, it requires a bit of commuting to reach them.

My bad. Initially I did think you were just talking generally, but when you said “you”…it sounded like it referred to me in the context. What exactly was in your reply that you sent? Sometimes people send vague messages that I often filter out. No introduction, or something that doesn’t sound like there was attention paid to my ad. It’s crazy how many messages I get that are just very vague, and I have to “work” them. I’m getting to a point that I don’t want to do that anymore, hence why having a pre-deposit upfront. The average new inquiry takes an hour of my time. Whether they book or not. Considering I don’t sell big “cases” like a lawyer at hundreds and thousands of dollars, I can’t keep offering free consultations… I can’t speak for anyone, but I also think some “advertisers” may not necessarily be escorting to clients like that. It’s possible they may just be only wanting to drive traffic to their brand. Or they probably only see “fans”. Which is actually the route I’ve been steering towards. I would, if I was able to accommodated. However I wouldn’t want it to become regularly expected That’s a good way of going about it. Sometimes though, I’m reluctant to “press” my schedule and availability too much though. I feel if they can’t make room for me when I’m already visiting, they might not come around the 2nd visit or “return route” either. Reason I say is because, clients may sometimes cancel a session and be like, “let’s meet next time you’re in town”. I’ve heard that more than I cared to at times. I have to remind them that, I don’t always get to their area often, and if waiting for “next time I’m in town” that could be 5-10 years from now…because there’s some cities I’ve not been to in that long (Houston, Boston, Minneapolis). My philosophy is sometimes: if I’m in town, and he’s in town…and he can’t meet: it tells me he doesn’t view me much important, or that he’s preoccupied playing the field with other escorts/grinderites (similar to how a client in other thread said he “seen someone else in Portland”. And if it’s who I think it is: that client has been blacklisted for wasting my time, considering I sent my location when he asked, only to be told “a friend just showed up*) I also find myself getting annoyed chasing client’s unavailability…I had that unfortunate situation with a guy in one of my previous travel cities. I wanted to see him because he sent a couple pics and was a sexy potential client. We’d been in contact a few weeks before I even started my tour. But I couldn’t make it the initial days we discussed because a snow storm was blocking travel on my route, and this winter alone: I’ve already had a couple of trips where I was almost stranded in the middle of nowhere when going to my destination due to ice/snow. So I asked to move it. 1st time he’s like, “I’m going to LA”. 2nd time it was like, “my ass has been fucked enough I need a break”. But…we were scheduled mainly for a MASSAGE. Which is what annoyed me. If the client has a pretty plausible reason why he can’t meet and doesn’t on short notice, or I left town before we could connect: I will reach out to connect. But, guys who cancel last minute or can’t seem to come around when I’m there: I don’t like to give extra openings to. Because guess what: when they come to town and I can’t meet, do I ever get 2nd chances? Nope. I never hear from them again. I had a guy do that to me, and it really offended me. He came to Kansas City last minute “with a friend” and was trying to meet me at some odd time of night with short notice. I actually met him before in another city. I couldn’t until the next day, and then he’s like: “I’m flying out tomorrow, just here for the night”. Then when I came to his city later, he couldn’t even be bothered. I had to write off a lot of clients lately and I hate to do that, because I do believe in “next time”. But many clients cancel or flake at the wrong time, and once that happens, it’s hard for me to want to extend another offer to them.

While I’m at it: might as throw this in here. I guess 24 hours is a bit longer than seconds…

I’m just trying to help you out. You came with a question, and now you’re insulting me (unless by “you” you meant “you”) That’s a bad move and if your approach to said provider was the same…I can see why you wouldn’t get an immediate response. All I’m trying to say is, you (you as in, everyone else too) have to use common sense when arranging things. You automatically assume #1, that this person hasn’t already made Memorial Day plans and #2 assume he’s going to even be in Atlanta during Memorial Day (when most people in Atlanta probably go to somewhere with a beach to escape the heat). And I would ask for a deposit because if someone expects to see me 2 months down the line, that means I have to modify and/or close a portion of my schedule to accommodate said request which means not taking other plans. So what if the client doesn’t pan out, then what? I think what happens: some clients take the “normalcy” out of contacting escorts. We are people too. You don’t just call your Uncle and be like, “hey I wanna see you for Memorial Day” and expect a yes without a chance of “I already have plans” unless it’s something that was already previously discussed tentatively. I don’t know what your approach was, but something like, “I’m coming to Atlanta Memorial Day weekend, will you be taking bookings then” may be better than going into it with “I want to book you for Memorial Day weekend”. I’m not saying there’s anything problematic with same day appointments. Or booking out in advance. I’ve been on tour now for a month, and almost all of my bookings were scheduled a day or 2 prior to the meet. Some may have been a few days, but not longer than a week. I can probably count on 2 hands 🙌🏾 the number of same day bookings I’ve taken. I was happy to accommodate them when I could, but it wasn’t my usual routine.

I’m surprised you don’t. Same day appointments tend to require a provider to stop what he/she is doing and see someone who previously: was not expected just hours earlier. Also, same day appointment clients tend to be less flexible (the ones who want to squeeze in a session between the 12 and 3 lunch hour). You end up often times left bending over backwards to accommodate someone, who may end up being a flake or no show in the process. Not cool. I take same day visits when traveling, but when at home base: I stopped doing them awhile ago. It’s like: if you have a narrow window of time to meet, have the courtesy to give a little notice. Like I said before: would a client be available “right away” if I called them for a booking? Usually not. So the easier method is to just schedule stuff ahead of time or not on the same day. And if someone wanted to book me for Memorial Day couple months ahead of time, I’d probably want to secure a deposit…

I like how you said that. It’s what I’ve been considering. Especially since I feel the industry has become so grinderized. Some reach out with an idea that we’re available now, everywhere. And if you’re not, they move on to the next. That’s not what I want. Eventually in life, especially at this point in my life: I just don’t have time to be on a constant hustle and trying to “work” every text that comes thru my phone. Maybe there’s other user-friendly guys out there, but guess what? I’ve been the user friendly guy, and am burnt out. A person can only take so much over a course of time. Right now I’ve left my number up because I don’t want to miss potential bookings when traveling with a limited time window, but once I return to my home base, it’s likely coming down.

Well it’s unfortunate you felt that way. However, I had to do what I needed to do. I was in Seattle before Portland, and let several inquiries slide thru and arrange sessions without a deposit. Some panned out and others didn’t, but the ones that didn’t were an inconvenience and either ghosted or cancelled last minute.

Well, one thing I can say is: I’m starting to see the harsh reality of how hard it actually is to meet men willing to pay another man for **** (no shit after nearing 15 years??). I just was reminded of that because I spent 3 days and 2 nights in Portland, Oregon. I will post in another thread but I officially opinionate that as the #1 worst major City in America to try and escort in. This has been the 2nd time I’ve traveled there and gotten 0 clients. Rather: I hear from them, but they all flake. However, I had at least 3 guys willing to come to my hotel from the “G app”. Only one I actually met because he was an intriguingly hot, Irish looking dude who oddly reminded me of @Benjamin_Nicholas in some ways 😆 (hint, hint 😉 If I wanted to, I coulda had all 3 in the same night. Non of the “oh I’m not available right now/that late at night “ BS clients give me when trying to plan a session. It seems like many clients aren’t very flexible in their schedules, which sometimes creates problems trying to make things happen. When I’m available: they’re not available. When they are available, I have to drop and change what I’m doing to accommodate, else there’s a chance it won’t happen. The Irish looking guy hit me up hours earlier in the day, and we still managed to meet at 3 in the morning. Neither of us really wanted to meet that late, but we compromised. Meanwhile, the 1 seemingly real client (who’s now blacklisted) attempted to schedule a booking “now” but then cancelled moments later citing, “his friend showed up, and he doesn’t think he can get rid of him 🤦🏽‍♂️ But…meeting someone of Grindr was a last resort because it was end of my last night in town, and figured I’d might as well make use of the money I spent on the hotel room. Otherwise it’d of been a frustrating waste of money, sitting in a hotel in a city I really didn’t care to be in, with no bookings, when there’s plenty of other guys willing to hookup with me. Caveat is: they don’t be wanting to pay for it. I even tried to get 1 of the guys who seemed really eager to meet up with me to pay, he then got a nasty attitude, accused me of wasting his time and stopped texting me. Predictable. I wasn’t mad though, I was experimenting the reaction. Hell, clients do it to me all the time…Why can’t I bullshit someone from time to time. So…if the muppet who wanted to “accuse me” of being on Grindr ever reads this one day, maybe he can keep Grindr’s name out of his fucking mouth when it pertains to me unless he knows the specific reason behind it 😆

And I’ll add another thing: I’ve already cut down on a lot of my app use, but lately I’ve been feeling like retiring the app usage all together. I’m getting fatigued of meeting guys on them and things never going anywhere. Not that it has to evolve into relationship, but after month’s of use I have barely even gained a friend or FWB from it. And every time I meet someone from it, they’re on bullshit. Have some sort of complex, or all about sex, or in an open relationship but dabbling in and out. My general optimism for the gay scene lately is just not confident. I still believe location based apps have made things real challenging. It affects things even down to the escort realm.

Exactly. And what made me so irked was: this was a city I was visiting and i only logged on to see if i could find (or he could find me) a guy who talked to me at a bar earlier that night. The whole time I was in the area I didn't meet anyone off the App, as I was busy with bookings the whole time.

Heard this the other day from (will spare the details, but a now banished potential client lol) who thought he could try and make a point, and tell me he seen me on 1 of the apps (Grindr). I was quite annoyed because the way he said it insinuated that because I was on there, that somehow it meant he shouldn’t reimburse for my time. I found that to be a rather assumptive, and dismissive mentality. For one, it’s my personal business to decide what I’m doing on an app, and considering I may simply be using it to connect with others in a way that’s not a hookup. It’s almost giving me another reason to not be a part of the apps. Even though someone’s ignorance and stereotypical, narrow-minded views of what a gay social app can be used for doesn’t affect my purpose for it, it’s almost got me a little paranoid if clients are carrying this idea that seeing a provider on an app is also available for free hooking up. But I just want to clear the misconception: it has nothing to do with that. If I want to meet someone to socialize or connect intimately with and fill the downtime when I’m not having clients while I’m visiting a city, that’s my prerogative. To hell with someone thinking my value goes down just because of it. Just because one idiot can’t see beyond the purpose of hooking up doesn’t mean everyone operates in the same way.

That’s the thing: some of us DON’T stand it. It’s things like this that are the reason why I have to continually be innovative in deterring the nonsense. Hey good morning. I woke up feeling crappy. I’ve been hoping my stomach and head would settle before I reached out because I hate canceling as I know you rely on trust and your time is valuable. I’m still not doing great. Can we meet another time, possibly when you are back? I’m really sorry Really. When I’m back. In Seattle. 1,800 miles from home. And last time I was here was in 2011. Really? It all sounds nice and sappy, but this person asked me a whole bunch of questions the night before, and we agreed to meet that day, which used up my time and effort. All the while, I had a perfect 2 bedroom air bnb HOME to host clients in: nobody showed up, 2 flaked. It’s the reason I get angry with these people and with RentMen as a site. And clients in the bigger cities don’t like to pay deposits because they’re so afraid of being scammed (despite again, me with a full profile and them with nothing but a number). In reality it’s them who are scamming us. The only thing with taking my number down, is the timing right now might not be ideal because I’m actively on a tour. Idk if I can get people to book timely enough when I’m traveling. But the one place I will leave my number is adam4adam, because it’s always the flakes who never make it to the phone.

One thing for certain, dudes play a shit ton of games. I can’t say how many times I’ve met someone and everything was fine, and then afterwards they start acting weird for no reason. However in this case, it’s hard to tell. It does sound like a rude game to play, and if the person comes around again I wouldn’t entertain.

If I stay with this, I know I may miss miss the spontaneity of taking bookings…but I feel unless RentMen does something to mitigate the circumstances, I can’t continue going about things the same way. It’s almost like clients are having all the benefits at our expense, until they actually show up with funds: which out of 10, maybe only 2 will. There comes a point when something has to change. At this rate, there hasn’t been any real improvements when it comes down to how the sites screen to ensure we’re getting genuine inquiries. I feel like I’ve reverted back to my younger days of being in a really shitty sales job. If I’m paying a site every month to be on, plus paying for travel expenses, lodging (spent over $700 in hotels/air bnb this week alone visiting), I shouldn’t have to be constantly subjected to appointments falling thru at random, and getting nothing in return for it. There seems to be this disdain of the idea to get clients to leave any pay before the actual meeting. But that’s what some of us are doing all the time. I’m paying for an ad, paying for expenses related to the biz, all upfront and expecting to be able to make it back on the back end of it all. That’s not fair and it’s unbalanced. Clients have plenty info on us on the site, to make a decision and commit with. Meanwhile many of us have nothing to go off of on them. So on top of my expenses, I have to pay for screening services to ensure the person who contacted me at random is who they say they actually are. I’ve found out at times, they aren’t. And now I’m left with 4 cancelled appointments in the past couple days and multiple “fell thru” bookings on top of it. Just an absolute nightmare end to what has actually been a successful month 🤦🏽‍♂️ And I told RentMen, this is beginning to affect my deeper mental stability. I’m not going to take all the blame for something they aren’t taking the initiative to make better. I shouldn’t have to “figure out ways to handle it better”, they need to do the right thing and find ways to make it better for us.

I know I keep having to bring up similar type of discussions, but there’s still things I’ve suggested can be better, and they haven’t. Even though in some ways it’s better because there’s more inquiries, the overall clientele attitude and behavior right now is trash in most every city in America right now. At this point, I decided I have no choice but to remove my numbers from my ads and require clients to pay to contact me. I’ve tried doing things in different ways to make a difference, but nothing really seems to be fixing the issue of flakes and bullshitters because people are still able to get thru to me. It doesn’t matter if I get several clients in a week who show up, there’s still far too much nonsense and time waste going on each day, often multiple TIMES per day..to where I can almost not even benefit from the gains. In the past 2 days, I’ve dealt with something around 5-7 fake appointments/no shows or cancelled bookings. And that’s even with screening them and asking for deposits. And the problem is, why I need to stop them in their tracks is because some contact me and then give me an attitude as to why they don’t want to send a deposit to confirm. Well, I don’t need to hear that every other time I have a booking request. At this point, the only way clients will be able to arrange a session is to do so directly through my website which will require a deposit. It may result in less overall inquiries, but at this rate it seems the number of clients will remain the same. And everytime I meet a client who has reservations about sending a deposit, they always end up being difficult to work with. So, here’s go nothing: the stakes just got a little bit higher.