Why Bottom Feed When You Can Feast on Caviar?
I had hardly finished my post Too Sexy For Wasabi when I came across this short post by Dan Hull, titled "Give Me Your Tired, Your Rich Abused Fortune 500 Clients," on the blog What About Clients?
A provocative sound-byte, aimed primarily at smaller firms that are actively using the "Masa Takayama approach to strategy" (in other words, differentiating themselves by delivering ASTOUNDING client service and charging premium fees) :
"Boutique firms with top legal talent in America, Europe and Asia are still bottom feeding. Unless your firm is doing a quality-of-life experiment, or trying to make law practice easy and not stimulating, you should be actively pitching to and stealing BigLaw clients. Get off your knees, get a grip. It's okay, we live in a free markets world. Just keep your rates high and your services superb."
Carpe deum? A strategy such as this is not the easy road. It's difficult. Very difficult. But then, how appealing is the alternative?
At first, I wasn't going to comment because this strategy creates more pain than does bottom feeding. How do I know? I yearn for caviar.
I decided before I moved the business my established from the West Coast to the East that I would not compromise my target markets. So now, with essentially a new business competing for market share, I continue to go after start-ups with cash, a plan and a vision, and companies who are in business to grow, to become the best they can be and who have a vision.
That means my virtual, boutique business goes up against the best and the biggest on the East Coast. Painful? Yes! Profitable? We shall see.