You Had Better Be Practicing Discrimination in Your Law Practice

Copyright (c) 2009 Benjamin Glass

I am a runner.

I'm a 51 year old marathoner. I can run a 4 ½ hour marathon that puts me right in the middle of the pack for my age group. I run half marathons and 10k's as well. I run for fun.

I'm willing to pay list price for good running shoes and I do like all that "high tech" running gear, including "super dry" shirts, expensive rain gear and yes, one of those lights that ties to you head to you don't trip over something on those 5 a.m runs in the dead of winter.

I'm also perfectly happy doing my shopping at local running stores. Yes, I could save 30% or more buying on the Internet, but being a small business owner myself, I kind of like supporting another local small business owner.

My kids are runners. They run for school and they, too, like the high price but great quality shoes and clothes. We were loyal customers at a local running store one mile from my house. We were an "easy sell" of over $1, 200 worth of running equipment each year. Each time we went for shoes (we do wear them out, after all) we'd pick up more shirts, "goo" to eat on long runs or the latest running book. They didn't even need to market to me. I was a fan.

My wife became a runner, too. That meant even more money being spent on her for birthday presents (I can pick out a cool running shirt for her that's easy) and anniversaries (I'm soooo romantic!)

I don't shop there any more and I don't even think they've noticed. Oh, they may notice that revenues are down, but of course they'll blame the recession. That's what most businesses, including lawyers do. Blame the recession. That's easy.

So why did this loyal customer leave to become a loyal customer of a rival store that's six miles from my house? Well, the real reason doesn't matter much but it should not have been enough to lose that revenue. It was rather trivial but I'm stubborn. They should have fought to keep the relationship.

But they couldn't.

They never even knew my name.

They didn't know where I live. They had no way of keeping track of exactly how much money my family was spending there. Since they had no way of knowing me they had no way to keep me interested and involved.

They failed to discriminate in their treatment of me. Yes. "Discriminate." Treat me differently. Recognize that I was valuable. Notice when I didn't show up anymore.

Lawyers need to learn how to discriminate. You had better know who your best clients are so you can treat them better. You need to know who your most profitable clients are so that you can go out and find more of them. You must know who your best referral sources are so that you can treat them better. You can't do this without a great database plus ways to keep track of a ton of data plus a way to get that data back out of the database when you need it.

Here are some things the local running store could have done to discriminate in my favor (your challenge is to say "how could I use something like that in my business."

- Easy to know how often my family members and I bought shoes; what size and what model. How hard would it have been to let me know when they got the latest shipment of that model in, coupled with a deadline driven offer—to get me back into store? - Not that hard to figure out our birthdays and my anniversary. When my wife started running how about a "congratulations on our upcoming anniversary, we've got a special offer to make you a hero to Sandi" marketing piece? - Not that hard to find out what races we were running. How about making me (and the other customers) feel good by making me a "celebrity" in the store? Wouldn't take much. - The seasons change four times a year here. Serious runners have running clothes for all seasons. Make me feel special by letting me in early to have my best selection at a discount

Finally, when I didn't show up and my spending went to zero, how about a call or letter to say "what's up?"

Instead, I now spend more money at a new store that does some of these things. The old place will blame everyone else but themselves for failing to put an iron cage around that relationship so that one very small argument about customer service did not amount to a total loss of my business and those referrals that used to make.

This is a tough economy, especially for lawyers. Especially for estate and family "planning" lawyers. Your client's spending with you is almost totally discretionary. Rather than spending your next dollar to go out and find the next new client, look around and ask yourself, "am I adequately discriminating in favor of my best client and referral sources right now?"

You've already done the hard work to get them into your database. Now, make them raving fans.