You’re speaking with a prospective client. You ask questions to discover what brought them to you so you can tell them what you can do to help them.

Slow down. Too much, too soon.

Yes, ask questions. You need to know what they want or need, but before you go down that road, there’s something you should do first.

Make them feel good about their decision to contact you.

They’re probably nervous. They don’t know you or trust you. They’re worried about their problem and how much it’s going to cost to do something about it.

So you want them to relax. See you as someone they can talk to. Someone who wants to help them, and not just because they’re going to pay you.

We’re talking about building rapport.

This isn’t terribly difficult to do, if you’re willing to take a few minutes to talk to them before you put on your lawyer costume and demonstrate your super powers.

Make them feel comfortable and respected. Make them feel good about their decision to contact you.

Start by seeing them “on time”. Ask if they want something to drink. Treat them like a welcome house guest, not a walking checkbook. Ask if they had any trouble finding the office or parking or how their day is going.

Yes, small talk.

When you are both seated, ask them to tell you about their situation. Give them your undivided attention. No phone calls or texts. Make eye contact, listen to them, take notes, and don’t do anything else.

Ask follow-up questions to fill in the blanks. Take more notes. Taking notes shows them that what they’re saying has value and you want to hear it.

Let them do most of the talking. If they’re angry, let them get it out. Make appropriate noises or comments to validate how they feel.

When they’ve told you their story, repeat the salient points back to them. (Refer to your notes). Give them an opportunity to hear what they told you and how it sounds, and clarify and add things they might have forgotten.

Then you can shift into problem-solving mode. Tell them the options and ask what they’d like to do.

During the conversation, listen for “commonalities”—things you or your other clients have in common with them. Kids, school, pets, industry or market, or what they do for fun.

If you have something in common, mention it. It might be as simple as saying, “Me too” or “I love that show”.

People like to do business with people who are like them, or who represent people like them. Don’t underestimate the value of shared experience.

Finally, thank them for coming to see you and confirm the next step, even if that’s “I’ll email you a proposal” or “Let me know what you’d like to do”.

You probably do most of the above, maybe all of it, most of the time. But when you’re busy or distracted, it’s easy to forget something or let the client see you’ve got other things on your mind.

But this is their time, not yours. So make sure you get yourself out of the way and let them have center stage.

You probably talk to your clients and prospects, to find out what they like about your services (and customer service) and what they think needs to be improved.

If you don’t, you should.

But you might not get helpful or honest answers, either because the client is uncomfortable talking to you about the subject or they don’t know how to articulate it.

You can encourage your clients to post a review, or, as I suggest, wait for a client to say something positive or thank you or provide a referral and ask those clients to leave a review (and let you quote them in a testimonial), because you know they’re happy and their review is more likely to be positive.

But you also want to know when clients are unhappy so you can do something about it before things get worse.

You can keep your eyes and ears open for clues and then talk to them, but by the time you notice there’s a problem, it might be too late.

That’s why you should regularly send clients a survey, and allow them to describe their experience with your office. But if you want them to respond more often, and respond candidly, you should give them the option to do it anonymously.

Yes, you would like to know who is or isn’t happy, and the issue, but isn’t it better to know what clients like or don’t like even if you don’t know who they are?

One more thing.

Clients are funny, and by funny, I don’t mean amusing. I mean strange. Weird, unpredictable, with seemingly random likes and dislikes and preferences. You certainly can’t please everyone, and you shouldn’t try.

But you should look for patterns.

If a significant percentage of clients (and prospects) don’t like something, such as being kept waiting for their appointment for more than 10 minutes, or being kept on hold for more than 30 seconds when they call, you need to know that.

You might not know there is an issue or realize that you’re doing it.

Unfortunately, you may not get enough survey responses to show you a pattern.

What you can you do?

You can go online and look at reviews of other lawyers, to see what their clients complain about, and also what they like, because the odds are your clients do (or would) feel the same way about you.

Study the competition. Learn their “best practices”. Avoid their mistakes.