Grey Areas

I've been learning a lot about marketing this year. The key is to give the customer what they want. Sounds like common sense, doesn't it? What I've been learning and what is finally sinking in is that customers will value more and hence pay more for what they WANT than what they NEED. Even more to the point is that you actually don't have a potential customer if you are selling what you think the customer needs without even knowing if the customer thinks they need it!

The thing with most professional services, doctors, lawyers etc is that we provide a service that our client invariably NEED rather than necessarily WANT. So, as a lawyer we are already behind the eight ball when it comes to providing cost effective services. Customers are more likely to resent having to use legal services in their time of need than chosing the services they want at a time that suits them.

So the struggle I have is working out what preventative legal services you as a business owner will actually want, and appreciate, rather than trying to give you what I think you need.

What makes working out what you as a client might want, is further complicated by the fact that there are not a lot of clear answers in law. The example I used at a recent presentation was this:

Imagine a big red cross one side of the room and a big green tick the other side of the room and a whole lot of hazy grey area in between. There is very little definative right and wrong in law and a whole lot of grey area which is subject to interpretation.

Subject to Interpretation...

What difference would it make to you if your lawyer clearly explained that the advice they are giving you is their best guess as to how it would be interpreted by a court and not the definative right answer in your situation?