The Pitch

I've always been wary of 'the pitch', the line your clients try to feed you when you open the door to them. There's always the tension of putting your trust in complete strangers. Yeah, I took the classes and I got my PI license so I'm not an outright criminal, but who's to say I'm not going to screw my clients over in other more subtle ways. I wound never intentionally hose a client (unless they deserved it), but regardless, the same thoughts flow through my clients heads you can see it in their eyes and you can even read it in the new ones' faces; the raised eyebrows when they first walk into my office, the skeptical looks that carry on even after they look at the photos. The photos are a slight misdirection; pictures of myself standing beside celebrities, political officials, even a few world leaders. I should of course be more honest about the origins of these photos but I consider it to be part of my pitch, it helps to convince the customer that they're in the right place.
Of course the tacky props I use only work some of the time. They work on the 'missing cat people' or the 'stolen rims clients' however, they typically don't work on the potential clients with actual interesting problems. They often require other offerings. For example, body language and basic use of psychology have always proved to be helpful when trying to snag important clients. I like to say that if people actually paid more attention to 'Posture Pals' then we'd be sunk as a business. Sitting up straight and listening to the client's story is often the key to just getting them to open up to you. Sometimes I wonder if should have actually pursued a degree in Psychology, but I've got a doctor pal who seems convinced I'd make a shitty therapist.
In the end for the sake of the firm it doesn't matter how interesting the case is (trust me I've survived whole weeks on ramen and 'missing dog' jobs), but i promise only to write about the interesting ones I come across. And I guess on that note I should get around to actually explaining what I'm writing this for. Claire my partner/secretary/boss/mother has been nagging me to do this for quite some time. She's convinced that it'll help business pick up, I'm skeptical, but I guess it can't hurt to get the word out by new technological means. I'm also bored, we haven't had any new cases yet this week. No lost lover or missing valentines, no lost rings, hell, not even a damn pet. So boredom and the fact I kind of want to flex my writing muscles have me semi-sold on this idea. I guess if we don't get anything interesting this week I'll go back through my files and pick out a good story for you.