Easiest customers to get are not the ones you want

Marketing guru and author, Seth Godin, shares some wise counsel this morning.

The easiest customers to get are almost never the best ones.

If you’re considering word of mouth, stability and lifetime value, it’s almost always true that the easier it is to get someone’s attention, the less it’s worth.

Whether a law firm attempting to get more clients or a business owner looking to grow a customer base, Seth’s right.

You don’t want the customers and clients who are easy to get. At least if you are building a law firm or company the right way – by your word of mouth reputation.

LexBlog gets a lot of drive by lawyers looking to become a member of our network. A $3,000 annual subscription seems like a steal to lawyers and law firms paying more for less.

Heck, we’ll get lawyers who want to be a member for the SEO benefits to their website, blog, and other Internet identities they have.

But we don’t want all lawyers and law firms to be a LexBlog client and a member of our LXBN network.

• We’re looking for lawyers who understand the power of networking to build relationships and a strong word of mouth reputation.
• We want lawyers who understand that the Internet through blogging and other networking saves them time by accelerating relationships and a strong reputation
• We’re looking for lawyers willing to participate in their business development efforts, not throw a few bucks at a vendor or two or ask law firm marketing professionals to carry the lawyer’s business development water for them.

Sure, we could take the money of the easy to get clients, but it wouldn’t work for them or us. They’d also ruin our reputation.

They’d be a pain in the rear for my LexBlog teammates. The lawyers wouldn’t put forth an effort, they wouldn’t understand our philosophy, and they’d complain when they didn’t get what they wanted.

Worst of all they’d take the time we love spending with good clients, who may have been harder to get to join our network, but who are willing to put forth the effort needed to reap the rewards.

Not unlike when I practiced law. The clients who came from the yellow pages to represent them or their family members on serious injury claims were always the worst clients.

I’d look down the counsel table at trial and ask myself where we got this SOB client. It was always the yellow pages. And their cases didn’t settle because the opposing side would make us take the problem cases to trial.

What do you guys think? Make sense to not take on as customers and clients the easiest ones to land?