Some lawyers still are hesitant to give a lot of information away. Whether when asked a legal question or during seminars.  What brought this on was an experience I had with my computer.  Stay with me here.

My computer died last weekend.  Problems began with a blank screen and when I tried to reboot, nothing happened.  The “experts” at a computer supply store couldn’t figure it out, but did refer me to a local one-man shop.  He told me in about 15 minutes after some Internet research, and taking the back off the laptop, that it was the motherboard in combination with the graphics card.  With this particular computer model, he said he gave up trying to fix the problem, because he had learned from previous experience (and unhappy customers), the problem was likely to return in six to eight months.  He referred me to someone else. I decided to buy a new computer.

In all he spent about 40-45 minutes with me, and didn’t charge me!!  I said “aw, come on, certainly I owe you for your time,” but he refused.  He suggested I purchase a Gateway (didn’t know they still made them), Toshiba or Dell, since I was insisting on sticking with Windows 7.  Now, do you think I will refer others to him, if I get a chance? Of course!!

Bottom line:  received my new Dell Wednesday, and even though I had a recent backup of my hard drive, who do you think I went to transfer my old hard drive to the Dell? Duh! And I didn’t even ask him what he charges to do that. It’s call trust.

Which brings me to today’s meditation from my old standby 365 Marketing Meditations: Daily Lessons for Marketing & Communications Professionals  by Larry Smith and Richard Levick of Levick Strategic Communications.  It is: “The best client giveaway is information. They’ll value it enough to pay for more.”  Amen.