The remedy is an additional P3P code, "DSA". Any web administrator using DSA in her P3P privacy policy indicates she disavows legal liability for her P3P policy and renders it meaningless.

Using DSA code, organizations can publish fictitious P3P codes to enable cookies, while nullifying their legal affect. "The P3P language is simply inadequate for writing legal privacy policies, and corporations are foolish to use it for that purpose," said Mr. Wright. "The DSA code allows them to exploit P3P coding for technical purpose of deploying cookies, while disclaiming that codes have any substantive or legal effect."

To provide background and detail, Mr. Wright has written a monograph titled "Disavowing P3P Liability" and made it available for sale at http://www.disavowp3p.com. On request, he will e-mail it free to any journalist.

"P3P is a very complex subject that will catch corporations by surprise," said Doug Peckover, CEO of Demand Engine, Inc., a strategic privacy consulting firm. "Few are even aware of P3P's full implications. They need to read analysis of a world-class e-commerce lawyer like Ben Wright."

P3P is Platform for Privacy Preferences, developed under sponsorship of a non-profit organization named World Wide Web Consortium (also called W3C) http://www.w3.org/p3p, a coalition of industry and non-profit groups.

One of toughest sales tools to master, either while selling or investigating, is proper and effective handling of objections. We recently conducted a marketing program offering a free book to potential clients of investigators. When a book was requested we gave local ION members opportunity to deliver book. Delivering book was meant to be a door opener for investigators to meet and hopefully sell themselves to possible clients. As with getting order for a referred investigation, some of our members succeeded in meeting with and establishing rapport with most of leads provided. Others complained that none, or very few of clients contacted about book were willing to meet with them. A good salesman knows sale begins when prospect says no. To sell something, even yourself, to someone who accepts what you offer with no hesitation does not require a salesperson. Easy sales only require order takers and clerks. You won't find many millionaire or CEO former order takers or clerks but there are countless millionaire and CEO former salespeople.

Have you ever had someone call about possibly doing an investigation and they talk a lot but never turn into a client ? Whatever their reason was for not going ahead with working case is known is sales as an objection. Maybe it was your price or what you said or failed to say but, usually it is their inability to make a decision. In many such cases, offering them a choice instead of leaving decision up to them would have been a service to them. It would have eased their stress by helping them decisively deal with one more thing in their life and for you, it would have made difference between an almost case and money in bank for you. Most people, even attorneys and SIU directors sometimes need help making decisions to do things they know they should do. Making decisions involves risk whereas doing nothing seems more safe. Inertia on part of potential clients costs private investigators who refuse to accept need to sell themselves, more than 25% of what their incomes could otherwise be. Our "cancellation rate" statistics from 20,000 referrals demonstrate difference between PI's who know how to close a sale and those who don't. Here is a sample choice question to try after discussing potential case. "Shall we start on that this week or next?"

No one should sell people things or services they don't need. The main difference between a professional salesperson and a high pressure salesman is their sensitivity to interests of others. The high pressure salesman I described at beginning of this article didn't care about farmers situation. Con artists who call themselves private investigators don't care about problems of their mark. The goal is not to turn private investigators into high pressure salespeople or con artists. Professional private investigators care about people and enjoy helping solve their problems. Learning professional sales skills however, will make you a better investigator and a more successful and affluent businessperson. If you would like ideas on how to get sales training and/or skills, send me a note online to lc@ioninc.com..

Published in PI Magazine - Fall 1998

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