Banks won’t pay for the long term. Neither will your clients.

Update, September 17, 2026: This piece was written in July 2026, when the Fed had held its target range at 3.50–3.75%. The FOMC raised rates to 3.75–4.00% on September 16, 2026. The argument about term premiums still holds; the rate figures below are as of publication. See The Fed raised rates. The SBA raised the bar.

I was talking with a client this week who builds their whole business on long-term contracts. Multi-year service agreements are the model — it’s how they forecast, how they staff, how they invest ahead of demand. And right now, they told me, those deals just aren’t closing the way they used to.

Prospects like the service. They believe in the value. They just won’t sign up for two or three years in an economy nobody can see twelve months into. That same afternoon, our conversation drifted to something that looks unrelated: CD rates. And the more I sat with it, the more I realized it was the same conversation.

01Look at what the banks are doing

Here is the certificate-of-deposit ladder posted at a regional bank right now — the actual rates a saver can walk in and get today.

Fig. 01 — A ladder that doesn’t climb

Advertised APY by CD term at one regional bank, July 2026.

Chart by Pulse Business Finance · Rates posted at a regional bank, Jul 2026

Look at that ladder. It doesn’t climb — it lurches. Six months pays 2.96%. Then a twelve-month commitment pays you a quarter of one percent — less than a tenth of the six-month rate. Eighteen months snaps back to 2.47%, then it drifts down again: 2.23% at two years, under 1% at three, barely over 1% at four.

That’s not a rate curve. That’s a shrug. When a bank’s own pricing is that incoherent across the term, it’s telling you something plainly: it has no confidence in what the rate environment looks like a year, two years, three years out — so it flatly refuses to pay you to lock in for that long. The only place it’s willing to pay a real rate is the short end, where it can reprice quickly as the fog clears.

And this isn’t one quirky bank. Nationally it’s the same story in milder form — the average six-month and one-year CD pay almost exactly the same, right around 1.7%. There’s simply no reward for going long, and sometimes there’s a penalty.

02Your clients are running the same math

Now go back to my client’s stalled deals. What that jagged ladder reflects isn’t just a banking-desk decision — it’s a validation of exactly what’s happening in the product and purchasing decisions of small businesses across the country. Their prospects aren’t being difficult. They’re pricing the exact same uncertainty the banks are pricing.

Committing to a three-year agreement in this climate feels expensive — not in dollars, but in optionality. You’re asking a business owner to give up the right to change course, right when the ability to change course feels more valuable than it has in years.

The old sales instinct is to push harder on the long term — lock them in, protect the revenue, secure the backlog. In this environment, that instinct is exactly what’s killing the deal. You’re demanding the client pay a premium for certainty at the precise moment the market has decided certainty isn’t worth paying for.

You’re asking a business owner to give up the right to change course — right when the ability to change course has never felt more valuable.

03Sell the flexibility instead

So flip it. If you’re genuinely convinced you deliver a superior product or service — and that you have the capacity to serve that client well — then it’s worth taking the risk to shorten the terms and make the decision more palatable. Offer a month-to-month option. Offer a hybrid: a short initial term to prove the value, then flexible after that. Lower the barrier to yes.

Because here’s what you get in return. You take the revenue and the relationship today, in a market where every new logo is hard-won. You get the client in the door, you service them at a level they can’t easily replace, and you turn flexibility — the thing they value most right now — into your advantage instead of your obstacle. In a tough climate, flexibility trades at a premium in the buyer’s mind. Price accordingly, and let them pay you in commitment later, once you’ve earned it.

04Optionality cuts both ways

Here’s the part most people miss. A shorter contract hands the client an option to walk. Fair enough. But it hands you an option too — the option to reprice. As the economic climate improves, as your value gets proven, as demand firms up, a month-to-month or short-term structure lets you adjust terms upward at the next renewal instead of being frozen into a rate you set during the hardest part of the cycle.

If your service is as good as you believe it is, you hold the stronger side of that trade. They stay because leaving would cost them quality they can’t easily find — not because a signature traps them. And every renewal becomes a chance to move the price to where the market, and your track record, say it should be. The only condition attached to all of this: you have to keep delivering top-quality service. Flexibility is a weapon only for the provider who’s genuinely earning the seat.

05Do it like a CFO, not like a salesperson

Shortening terms isn’t free, and it isn’t a blanket giveaway. A few guardrails keep it from wrecking your economics:

1. Charge for the optionThe client is buying the right to leave — that right has value, so make month-to-month cost more per month and let the longer commitment earn the discount. Make duration the deal you offer, not the demand you make.
2. Protect cash and forecastingShorter commitments shrink your contracted backlog — the thing your own lenders and forecasts lean on. Tighten the pipeline, watch net revenue retention and churn like a hawk, and carry more of a cash buffer to absorb the lumpiness.
3. Structure the on-rampA short proof period — say 60 to 90 days — before month-to-month kicks in, sensible notice requirements, and auto-renew language give you flexibility and protection at the same time.
4. Earn the conversionFlexibility gets you in the door. Performance is what earns the longer term — and the higher price — down the road.

Stop asking your clients to pay a premium the market has already decided isn’t worth it.

In an uncertain economy, the certainty premium is shrinking everywhere you look — including in what the smartest banks will pay for it. Win the business on flexibility, prove your value in the work, and convert that trust into duration and pricing power on your terms. If your service is as good as you think it is, flexibility isn’t a concession. It’s the fastest path to yes — and the option that pays you back.