Stop trying to convince people they need a lawyer

May 26, 2015 by
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I started walking again. Three days a week, a couple of miles to start. At least I think it’s a couple of miles. I’m not really sure, so yesterday, I went to the app store to see if they had a pedometer.

Yes they do.

I had no idea how many apps there were for measuring body movement. I had no idea because I had never looked at any “health and fitness” apps.

I figured these were for runners or people who played sports or people with complex workout regimes. I just like to walk.

So now I’m looking at all these choices, comparing features, reading reviews. I even read a couple of articles.
I want a pedometer. I’m trying to decide which one.

Today, I’m “in the market” for an app; before, I wasn’t.

If you were the developer of the best app in the world in this category, before I was in the market your words would have been wasted on me. I paid no attention to your ads, your free trials, or your reviews.

I wasn’t a prospect. Now I am.

So here’s the thing. You may have the best legal services in town–a great track record, the best offer, fabulous “customer service”–but if you’re offering it people who aren’t in the market for what you do, you’re wasting time and money.

Instead of trying to educate the masses about the benefits of hiring a lawyer, target people who are actively looking for a lawyer who does what you do and show them why you are the best choice.

Pretend that there is a app store category for legal services and you’re in it. Instead of trying to convince people who are “not in the market” to come look at the legal services “apps” that are available, focus on making your “app” the top rated, best selling app in that category.

There is a place for educating people about what a lawyer can do to help them solve a problem or achieve an objective. But the sweet spot in marketing is found by targeting people who already know they (probably) need a lawyer and are trying to decide which one.

Marketing is easier when you know The Formula

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Filed Under: Increase your income, Marketing legal services Tagged With: ,

How to select more profitable cases and clients

May 19, 2015 by
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A subscriber asked for my thoughts on how to select, “more meritorious and profitable cases and eliminate smaller cases or “junk” that takes far too much time in proportion to profit potential.”

I thought he was talking about contingency fee cases but when I went to his website I saw that he handles everything but. It’s a general practice, handling everything from divorce to banking to foreclosure, construction law, even appellate work, but no personal injury or anything tort related that I can see.

Unless I’m missing something, as long as they get a retainer fee, they get paid. Even if the case isn’t that good.

So my oh-so-glib answer to the original question is, “Pick a number. Decide, in advance, that you won’t accept anything that won’t provide you with a minimum fee of X dollars.”

That’s easier to do when you charge flat fees instead of hourly, and that might be part of his challenge. If that’s so, and he wants to continue charging hourly, he might consider having a minimum fee, if this is ethically permitted. So, $400 per hour for that divorce case, with a minimum of $5000. Or whatever.

Okay, I realize it’s not always that simple. But I don’t know what else to say. Meet with your partners, pull out the spreadsheets, and see where you’re making money. Draw a line or two to demarcate the kinds of cases or clients you will focus on and the ones you will think twice about accepting or eliminate completely.

Before you make any final decisions, however, there’s something else to think about. It’s something I did in my practice and I recommend that you consider it in yours.

Think clients, not cases.

Essentially, that means you take the small stuff, even if it’s not terribly profitable, because you are serving the client who will have other matters for you, stick with your firm long term, send you referrals, and otherwise help your practice grow.

The lifetime value of those clients, and the collective fees earned from them, is many times what you might (or might not) earn on one particular matter.

If you don’t have those kinds of clients, or enough of them, start weaning the firm away from clients with “one time” cases and focus on clients with lots of repeat work.

Think clients, not cases.

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Filed Under: Client loyalty, Increase your income

Activating your list for fun and profit

May 8, 2015 by
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You have a list of clients, prospects, and professional contacts. What are you doing to activate that list and turn it into repeat business and referrals?

How do you get that list to DO SOMETHING?

Some of the people on that list will do something merely because you stayed in touch with them. When they need something you offer, or know someone who does, they will click or call.

What about everyone else?

What about the people who need you but think the problem will go away by itself? What about the ones who don’t know how bad the problem can get if they don’t do something?

What about the people who don’t realize all of their options? What about the ones who didn’t have the money before, or didn’t want to spend it?

What about the ones who know people who need your services but didn’t think about referring them?

You need to do something to get these people to do something.

But what?

How about creating an event and inviting them to it? A webinar, teleseminar, or video hangout.

Invite your list to see some new information, or new ways of looking at the solutions. Teach them how to stop the problem from getting bigger and keep it from happening again.

You’ve got to get them thinking about the problem again. Comparing solutions. Considering the options. What better way to do that than to invite them to access this free information from the comfort of their tablet or smartphone?

During the event, make them a special offer. A free consultation, perhaps, so they can discuss the specifics of their situation with you. Or a discount, bonus, or inexpensive partial solution. Tell them you now take credit cards or offer a payment plan.

Give them an incentive to do something and tell them what to do to get it (e.g., call, fill out a form, stop by the office).

Record the event so you will have something to offer to new subscribers. Transcribe the recording and turn it into a report or ebook.

You can create an event today and announce it to your list tomorrow. By next week, you can have more people calling, subscribing, and referring.

How to set up an email list for your website or blog

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Filed Under: Email, Increase your income, Marketing legal services, Newsletters, Online Marketing, Seminars and webinars

There is no virtue in working hard

April 27, 2015 by
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There is no virtue in working hard. Not when you can get the same or better results with less effort.

Robert A. Heinlein said, “Progress isn’t made by early risers. It’s made by lazy men trying to find easier ways to do something.”

In fact, that’s a pretty good definition of the word productivity. Getting more results with less effort.

To do that first requires an appreciation of the difference between effectiveness and efficiency.

Effectiveness means “doing the right things”. It means doing things that are consistent with your long term vision and short term goals. It means doing what’s important, primarily, and finding ways to minimize or eliminate everything else.

If growing your practice and advancing your career is important to you, you are effective when you focus on delivering value to your clients, building relationships with key people, and getting better at marketing.

Eighty percent of your results come from twenty percent of your effort. To be more effective, identify those twenty percent activities and do more of them.

Efficiency, on the other hand, means “doing things right”. It means getting things done faster or better.

You become more efficient by using forms, checklists, and templates to streamline your work. You become more efficient by hiring better quality employees who deliver better results. You become more efficient by improving your skills through study and practice and dedication to personal development.

These are some of the things that allowed me to quadruple the income in my law practice while reducing my work week to just three days.

But while there’s no virtue in working hard, there’s nothing wrong with it.

When you are effective and efficient, you might increase your effort-to-results ratio from one-to-one to one-to-ten. If you are effective and efficient and ALSO work hard, you might increase that ratio from one-to-one to one-to-100.

Earn more and work less through leverage

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Filed Under: Increase your income, Leverage, Personal development, Productivity, success

Consider offering your clients a maintenance contract

April 24, 2015 by
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We just got bids on a new heating and air conditioning system for our house. A couple of the vendors pitched us on their maintenance contracts. For $100 to $130 a year, they will come to the house three times per year to inspect everything and do minor servicing. If something needs repairing or replacing, you get that at a discount.

It’s a good deal for the consumer, although probably not necessary the first few years when everything is under warranty. I think one of the vendors was willing to give us the first year free.

It’s a good deal for the vendor because (a) it gives them first crack at getting hired for repairs, (b) it gives them the opportunity to get referrals, (c) it gives their service techs something to do when they’re not doing big jobs, and (d) it brings in revenue.

Could you do something like this? Offer your clients some kind of service or maintenance contract? If you handle small business matters or estate planning, no question this is something to consider. For other practice areas, maybe not.

A maintenance contract allows you to regularly get in front of clients and do issue spotting. You get to see if their documents need updating, and you also find out what other work they need, in their business or personal life.

If it’s something you don’t handle, you can refer it to other lawyers and other professionals (e.g., CPAs, financial planners, consultants, et. al.) who have agreed to offer discounts and other perks to these referred clients.

Clients get work done they might otherwise delay on taking care of, to their detriment. They get a good deal, too.

Also, you get face time with your clients once or twice a year which can only strengthen your relationships with them. They may not need any work themselves but you will undoubtedly get referrals.

Then there is the additional revenue this will bring to your coffers. If you have 200 clients paying you $200 a year, that’s an additional $40,000 a year, not counting any additional work or referrals.

If you don’t like the idea of charging clients for this for some reason, or your practice area doesn’t allow you to provide enough value to your clients to justify a fee, e.g., you handle personal injury only, consider offering this service to your clients at no charge.

You see them once or twice a year, or talk to them on the phone, or send them a form to fill out and then call them. If they need your services, they get to hire you at a discount and/or they get some added benefit.

If they don’t need your services but they need something else, you will refer them to high quality professionals (or businesses) with whom you have already negotiated a “special deal”.

Would a PI or criminal defense client avail themselves of this benefit if it were free? Why not give it a try and find out?

Lawyers are complicated; marketing is simple

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Filed Under: Increase your income, Law office management, Marketing legal services

The lifetime value of a client

April 23, 2015 by
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Most lawyers invest more time and money in acquiring new clients than in retaining existing ones. And yet the cost of retaining clients is a fraction of the cost of acquiring new ones.

If you want your clients to keep coming back to you, the first thing you need to do is to realize that it’s worth making them happy.

And it is.

Your average client is worth so much more to you than what they pay you for their initial engagement. Their value is an average of all of the fees they are likely to pay you in the future, over their lifetime as a client.

Some clients won’t come back because they don’t need you again, but others will hire you frequently. Some will have small cases, others will have big ones.

And every client can send you referrals, which also count towards their average lifetime value.

Once you understand that the client who pays you $5,000 this year might contribute an average of $150,000 to your bottom line over their lifetime, you will appreciate why it is worth investing in them.

If you only look at the $5,000, you might resist the idea of spending $50 per client per month to stay in touch with clients via a newsletter, birthday cards, and small gifts. If you look at their lifetime value, however, you might look for ways to invest even more.

Consider the cost of acquiring a new client. Take everything you spent last year on anything that could be considered marketing (and don’t forget the value of your time) and divide that number by the number of new clients you signed up.

If you spent $2,000 to bring in one new client who pays you $150,000 over their lifetime, you did well. So I’m not saying you shouldn’t try to bring in new clients. Just that it’s more profitable to keep your existing clients coming back.

It’s also much easier to get existing and former clients to hire you. They already know you and trust you. You don’t have to find them or convince them that you can do the job. If they need your services and you kept them happy in the past, you don’t have to do much to get them to hire you again.

The most effective marketing strategy for any professional is to make an ongoing effort to keep their clients happy. Find out what they want and give it to them. Encourage them to tell you how you are doing and what you could improve. Find out what they expect of you and do everything you can to give them more.

Because over their lifetime, they are worth a fortune to you.

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Filed Under: Client loyalty, Client relations, Increase your income, Leverage, Referrals Tagged With: ,

Can you be successful doing work you don’t love?

April 15, 2015 by
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Can you be successful doing work you don’t love? If you define success in material terms, I think you can. But success is not just about money. To be truly successful, you have to be happy.

And here’s the thing. When you are happy, when you love your work, financial success is much easier to achieve.

You don’t have to push yourself to get up early. Mondays are your favorite day of the week. You can’t wait until your next speaking engagement, trial, or networking event.

When you love what you do, the work is almost effortless. Problems seem smaller and easier to resolve. You don’t have to work hard to find clients, you attract them, in droves.

When you love what you do, you are happy, and when you are happy, you love what you do.

What if you don’t love your work? What if it’s just okay?

You eliminate or marginalize the things you don’t like and do more of the things you enjoy.

You can delegate, outsource, and partner. You can change practice areas, client types, and target markets. You can get rid of the marketing techniques that make your stomach churn and replace them with things that come naturally.

You can also give it time. You may learn to love your work eventually. As you hear sad stories about friends who have lost their jobs and can’t find any work, for example, you might start appreciating things you previously took for granted.

Or you might see your current situation as a stepping stone to something else.

Whatever you do, make sure you don’t dwell on the negative aspects of your work. Focus on the things that make you feel good.

Think about the things that are going well and come easily to you. Think about your accomplishments and victories. Think about how good it is that you are paying your bills and that you have the time and space to turn an okay situation into something great.

Focus on the things that make you happy in your work because what you focus on grows.

Success is easier when you have a plan. 

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Filed Under: Career satisfaction, Dealing with stress, Increase your income, Inspiration, Personal development, success Tagged With:

Could you make it on Rodeo Drive?

March 25, 2015 by
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Years ago, when I lived and worked in Beverly Hills, I wore Brioni suits, had a penthouse suite on Wilshire Boulevard, and was busier than a one-legged Irish dancer. So when I needed a haircut, naturally I shot over to Rodeo Drive and visited Vidal Sassoon.

Expensive? Yes. But worth it, at least to me at that time in my life.

They saw me on time and got me out quickly so I could get back to work. Everyone treated me like royalty. And it was peaceful–no chemical smells, bright lights, or incessant chatter.

There were other amenities: easy parking, pretty shampoo girls, soft drinks and snacks of my choosing.

A very pleasant experience, one that I looked forward to as a respite in my tumultuous day.

Oh, they gave a pretty good haircut, too.

I was reminded of those days when I read about a barbershop that charges more by providing better service than most barbershops. The article profiled a customer in New York City who couldn’t imagine paying more than for a haircut but who found, as I had, that it was worth paying more.

But enough about haircuts. The question of the day is, “How much more would your clients pay you for better service?”

Could you charge 20% more? 30% Double?

Doubling your fees is crazy, right? Well, I’m pretty sure I paid Sassoon triple what I would have paid elsewhere. Depending on what you charge now, perhaps double isn’t out of the question.

Next question: “What would you have to do to get that much?”

I can’t answer that for you, but I can tell you it always comes down to the little things. The little extras that make the client feel important, appreciated, and safe. The things that make them say, “Yes, I pay more but it’s worth every penny.”

Now, you may be thinking, “There’s no way my clients would pay a nickel more, no matter what I do.” I’m pretty sure that’s not true, but if it is, you need to get some new clients.

You don’t need to be on Rodeo Drive to be able to charge more. You might want to hire some pretty shampoo girls, however.

Marketing is easier when you know The Formula

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Filed Under: Attorneys fees, Client relations, Increase your income, Law office management, Marketing legal services

If you could only have one client. . .

March 20, 2015 by
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If you could only have one client, who would it be?

Write down their name. Picture them in your mind’s eye.

Now, why would you choose them?

Do they give you lots of work and pay you lots of money? Do they regularly give you referrals? Do you like them and enjoy working with them?

Write down all of the reasons you would choose this client and like to have more like them.

Next, write down everything you know about them. Go through your files, visit their website and social media profiles, think about everything they’ve told you about their job or their business and their personal life.

What are their goals? What are their problems? What do they do best?

Where did they go to school? What does their spouse do for a living? What sports do their kids play?

What do they read? What kind of car do they drive? What’s the favorite restaurant?

Why do this? Because this is your best client and you should learn everything you can about them. You should study them, so you can get closer to them, help them, and find more like them.

We attract what we think about so think about your ideal client. Spend time with them. Appreciate them. Remember their birthdays and anniversaries.

Next, think about your second best client and go through the same exercise. Keep going until you have a short list of five or ten best clients you’d like to clone.

Your ideal clients will lead you to other clients, many of whom will be very much like they are. Birds of a feather, and all that.

Next on the list: do the same thing for your best referral source. If you could only have one. . .

Need help identifying your ideal client? Here you go

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Filed Under: Client relations, Increase your income, Marketing legal services

If Bruce Lee had practiced law

March 19, 2015 by
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If Bruce Lee had practiced law he would have specialized in one practice area. Maybe a subset of one area.

Lee believed in being the best and never settled for good enough. And he knew that being the best requires focus, discipline, and a lot of hard work.

Lee said, “I fear not the man who has practiced 10,000 kicks once, but I fear the man who has practiced one kick 10,000 times.”

I did a consultation with an attorney recently. He doesn’t have a general practice, but he doesn’t specialize either. We talked about the benefits of specializing. I ran down the list:

  • More clients (because clients prefer to hire specialists)
  • Higher fees (because clients are willing to pay specialists higher fees)
  • More referrals (because other lawyers who won’t see you as a competitor)
  • More effective marketing (because your message is more focused)
  • Less work and overhead (because you only have to stay up to date in your practice area)

He said he’d like to specialize but he lives in a small town and there’s not enough work there for any one of the things he does.

“How far is the closest city?” I asked. “Thirty miles,” he said.

“How about opening a satellite office in the city?” I said. He should be able to find more than enough work in the practice area of his choosing.

He’d never thought of that.

Start slowly if you want. Find an attorney with a different practice area with a conference room or extra office you can use one or two days week to see clients. Let him use your office as a satellite for his practice.

If you’re not where you want to be in your career, take a step back and look at your situation with fresh eyes. You may see the answer, right there in front of you. If not, come talk to me.

Marketing is easier when you know The Formula

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Filed Under: Increase your income, Law office management, Marketing legal services, Specializing
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