As your practice grows and you enable more moving parts, sometimes these parts break down and you have to deal with a quick painful situation or a long painful situation. This week Scott discusses the stress of creating a new website for his practice while Oscar discusses an associate who left and the options for replacing him.
Oscar and Scott discuss Text-a-lawyer. Is it a service that can help those that can’t otherwise afford legal advice or is it an ethical mess that distorts attorney client privilege.
When Oscar and Scott started the podcast they were truly “Rebooting” their law practices. Now over three years later they discuss the next level planning and ideas that they are initiating for their practices. They touch on speaking in front of groups, evaluating if a networking group is right for you and getting involved in thier local bar associations.
As we know, your website is one of the most important tools you have to give prospective clients information about your firm. Scott gives a status update on the revamp of his website. He discusses the steps his design firm is taking to make the new site a success.
In this episode Scott and Oscar talk about making sure you are not getting bogged down by handling small matters that do not properly compensate you for your time. Getting properly paid for your time is the key to a successful law practice. Handling small cases or charging really low fees or agreeing to just “write a letter” for a client for $200.00 may bring some cash flow into your business but your time would be far better spent in working on your practice and on your higher paying clients.
It’s important to have a sterling reputation in the legal community to develop your practice, and that will come if you consistently do good work. But it’s more important to be more concerned about your reputation and “brand” in the client community. Does your website and other marketing material speak to your target clients? Have you planned on how you will reach the type of clients you want? You need to step back and think about who you want as clients and how you will reach them. Then make a plan to put yourself in front of those clients and make sure you are geared towards connecting with them in your marketing and networking.
In this episode, the hosts discuss a variety of issues in their practice that irritate them (adversaries who don’t use email for example) and, building off the last episode, some new ideas they are implementing in 2018 (writing things down on paper) and some things they are not (getting an app for their law office).
Planning and strategic thinking are important certainly. But at some point, you have to just pull the trigger. Scott and Oscar talk about how as 2018 gets going, this should be the year listeners Do Something! Whether its starting a blog, increase or decrease staffing, networking more, whatever it is. Let 2018 be the year that you take at least one concrete step to implement a change in your practice that will increase business. The hosts discuss some of the steps they are taking this year to improve their practices.
As we delve into the New Year, there are things we should be taking off our Practice Management “To Do” lists in 2018. Scott discusses how this year he is completely revamping and re-tooling his website. A high quality, effective website is a main tool in any solo or small firm’s arsenal. Too often, once we put one up, we don’t look at it again for a decade or more. The hosts discuss why it needs to be refreshed every few years to accommodate changes in technology and changes in the way you practice: How does your website look on the new iPhone? How long does it take to go through the main points you want clients to look at? What areas of practice do you want to feature? Old websites look stale and uninviting. Make sure this year you get yours up to date and coordinated to your practice.
Scott and Oscar have talked about the value of networking in many past episodes. This week they discuss why committing to networking should be on your 2018 New Year’s Resolution list. Whether it’s joining a BNI Networking Group in your area or signing up to become more involved in your local Chamber of Commerce, getting actively involved in some form of steady and consistent networking is essential to practice growth. The hosts also provide tips as to how to get the most out of the networking that you do.