Nobody would argue that keeping your clients happy isn’t vital. Clearly, it is the genesis for repeat business, referrals, and getting paid on time. But is keeping your clients happy paramount?
No. Keeping your employees happy is more important.
If you don’t keep your employees happy, you can forget about keeping your clients happy.
By the same logic, keeping yourself happy is more important than keeping clients happy. If you’re not happy, you won’t be much good to anyone else.
In response to yesterday’s post about not negotiating fees, a personal injury lawyer wrote and said he disagreed. “It’s all about keeping your clients happy, so they will return and refer,” he said.
Yes, smother your clients with love and attention. Remind them often about how much you appreciate them and want to help them. But just as a parent doesn’t need to buy his kid a pair of $300 sneakers when he asks for them, lawyers don’t need to buy our clients’ love by agreeing to cut our fees.
I showed my clients I cared about them by taking cases with questionable liability and negligible damages. I showed them that I was on their side and would fight for them when they asked for my help, even when I thought we would probably lose the case, and even if we won, I knew I wouldn’t earn much of a fee.
I also waived my fee on many cases, or cut it voluntarily. When it’s your idea, you are a hero. When the client asks (or insists), you’re just a commodity.
So be generous with your clients. But do it because you choose to do it, not because you might lose them if you don’t.
The writer also said he doesn’t think his other clients know when he cuts his fee for a client who asks him to.
Question: What happens when client A (who got a discount) refers client B? Does he offer the same discount to client B? If he doesn’t, what happens when the new client finds out that you charged his friend less?
And what happens when client A returns with another case? Does he get the discount on that, too?
Cutting fees is a slippery slope. I know. I once had an office in a market where all of the PI lawyers ran dueling ads promising increasingly lower contingency fees. You charge one-third, the next guy says he’ll take the case for 25%, three more lawyers advertise 20%.
When it got down into the 8-10% range, I’d had enough and closed that office.
With low overhead and high volume, I was still making a profit. But I wasn’t happy.
For more, see The Attorney Marketing Formula and Getting the Check
