You’re What Is Holding Your Firm Back

Great, y’all fucking hate me…terrible way to begin this, right?

But here’s the thing, have you been wrong about something and changed your mind?

I HATED cauliflower as a kid.  Thought it was gross and smelled bad.  Guess what...now it's pizza crust, tater tots, rice...I don't know that I LOVE it...but I eat it multiple times per week in stuff I enjoy.  You have to have some examples like this, right?

Okay, now…has someone else been wrong about something and you changed their mind?

Anyone? Anyone? Buehler?

So what does that teach us? That it’s easier to change ourselves than someone else.

And, you’re with your employees for at most 40 hours a week (I hope it's not more than that). You’re with yourself for 24 hours a day, so 3-4 times that amount of time.

So in theory you have THAT much more time to change yourself.

So congrats, we are what holds our firm back. We have more control over ourselves. And we have an easier time changing ourselves. So am I still an asshole?

There are three buckets I want to talk about (feel free to skip any that don't apply to you):

1. True solos

2. Beginning growth stage

3. Tweaking and trying phase

Tips For Everyone

Personal growth is exponential growth as you grow your team - think about that...the more you SCALE a team, the more you can SCALE your growth!

I am also a big fan of mapping out your days. So you have long term plans, you break those into segments, you calendar those segments and then you plan your day(s) ahead.  Pro-tip as you build a team, they can take some of the major projects off of your shoulders.

Not sure what you're long term plans should be?  Then think about:

• How much money do I NEED to make?
• How much time do I WANT to work?
• What work do I WANT to be doing?

This should be the framework you run every decision by on a person level.  Does it fit with those questions?  If no, skip it.  If yes, schedule it.

And on a business level add - does this attract more IDEAL clients?  If yes, great, let's get it going.  If no, again...skip it.

As you come up with more and more ideas that fit those questions, prioritize them.  I suggest always prioritizing the stuff that saves you TIME.  Then you have more time to put into getting more things done and accomplished.

And look...if cauliflower can become pizza, you can run a success freaking law firm!  I know you can do it.

True Solos

This is the easy one. At least hire a VA for small tasks. Even if you don’t want to “grow” this prevents you from being EVERYTHING.

If you're flat fee you can make more by charging more or getting things done faster.

If you're contingency fee, you can make more by getting things done faster so you can handle more cases.

If you're hourly, you can only make more by charging more per hour.

So as long as you're not hourly, the other thing you need to do is MAXIMIZE your time.  So any automations, systems, workflow that help you do things faster are ESSENTIAL to you.

Because other firms can grow by adding more people. but if you don't want to do that (which is FINE...don't let anyone tell you differently).  But you need to focus on YOU.

Other tips for solos:

Build a network of experts and stay in your lane.  Turning down that $3500 case is tough, but if it requires 40 hours of research to understand how to do a good job...it might not be worth it.

Hopefully who you send it to, sends you stuff back or helps you out in other ways...but saying no to a case is saying yes to something else (maybe your sanity...)

Beginning Growth Stage

Here is where you've started to expand from just you.

What is the key to this stage?

How well do you know me?

No, not habits...SYSTEMS.

You need to know how everything is done, to then assign it to other people, in a way where it can be tracked.

Allison Williams the Law Firm Mentor has an AMAZING free course she runs to help with this.

Remember, a system is not just what is done, and not just who is doing it, but in what order.  And then tracked properly it helps you see the bottlenecks (YOU MIGHT BE THE BOTTLENECK)

I really like Kanban boards like this:

Pro-tip: to design a system, you do it, and screen record you doing it

• Then send that to the person you're delegating it to
• Have them ask you any questions they don't understand about it
• Then do it a few times
• Then provide any feedback on a better way
• Have them screen record doing it
• Then have them upload that, transcribe it, and save it somewhere (Tettra, google doc, etc)

Now you have the system in video, audio and written out.  Without much extra work!  Boom.

So where do you hold your firm back in this role?  You're not delegating enough, and not delegating the right things.

How do you know what to delegate?  What saves you the most time?  And what do you HATE doing?  (seems a lot like the questions above with how much you want to work and what work you want to do...)

The other way you hold your firm back is by not being a great boss/leader.  And look...totally new role for you, you're no longer a true solo.  Now you can't just be an asshole (at least man I hope I'm not still one...)

So, and I am giving you permission... Sometimes you need some help - a course, a consultant, a therapist...it's different for everyone, but the better you lead people, the more people you lead, the more exponential the growth is!

Tweaking And Trying Phase

This is my favorite phase.  You get to (in a targeted manner that makes sense) screw around and try stuff.

Now you have the people, the systems, the clients, etc and you just want MORE (in a targeted way that makes sense)

So guess what - you get to try new shit and see how it works.

Try new marketing campaigns, A/B test customer service options, hire someone to try a new area of law, etc.

All of it should be thought out, and fit with your brand and your plan...but seriously, eventually you just have to try new things and see what works and what doesn't.

Earmark a certain amount of time/money/effort and see what happens.

If it gets your more clients, gets your more referral sources, get your more reviews, or otherwise achieves the goals you wanted from this attempt - GREAT you've got a new thing for your firm.

If it doesn't - decide if you want to tweak it, give it longer to run, or cut.  This is the HARDEST call to make.  And I cannot help you other than on a case by case basis...I will tell you most failures are I see are because the foundation wasn't in place.  The firm couldn't support the new caseload.  The firm couldn't intake the leads fast enough.  The firm wasn't charging a competitive rate, etc.

But...sometimes you need to try it to find out.

How you hold your firm back in this role is either cheaping out on a true leadership team so everything doesn't fall back on you or not having the right team in place to set the right expectations and execute well.  This could be an internal leadership team, or you friendly neighborhood fractional CMO a la us.

But, the other best part of this role.  You have MONEY!  Or at least you should, so like a good celebrity going on an apology PR tour for slapping Chris Rock...throw some fucking money at your problems and make them someone's problem (that's what you're clients do to you, right?)

So what stage are you in?  What did I miss?  Is there another way you think you hold your firm back that I didn't cover?  As always, reply to this newsletter and I will see your response and get back to you.

I LOVE how much feedback I get from these newsletters, I hope you find value out of them, and I hope my private replies are that much more helpful.

Until next week!  Have a wonderful week (if your kids are on Spring Break next week or were this last week you're welcome or I'm sorry, you be the judge of which is which).

There are times you don't want to stand out Like wearing a neon suit/dress to a funeral

For the longest time, the biggest fight between businesses (and even people) was just resources.

• You needed land to farm
• You need fresh water to survive
• You needed metal to make better tools and weapons

Now, our biggest need is that we need internet to binge watch season 2 of Bridgerton.

The reality of this saturation of the market and expanding number of great lawyers and law firms means that positioning and differentiation become more and more important every day.

And while we talk a bunch about being different and finding your unique selling proposition (USPs)…I realized I don’t think we’ve done the reverse, so let’s do that.

Here are some bad differentiations, the ones that make you Elle Woods at the “costume” party, just without the moxie to make it work.

Being a Great Lawyer

I don’t even think you need me to flush this one out. If you’re here you know…

But just in case, with all due respect - no shit, Sherlock

Being a great lawyer is table stakes.  It’s what keeps you in the game. And honestly, how the hell does the client know if you’re great or not?

Board certification - awesome, but do clients really know the strenuous process you went through to earn that?

Hell, a shit ton of online reviews probably impacts them more.

So, please, BE a great lawyer. Be the fucking best.  But don’t bet on that as what will set you apart.

Being Client Focused

A close second. Literally the most common one I hear from lawyers as their unique thing.

But again, no firm is going to admit they don’t “put the client first,” “treat you with respect” or otherwise “care about your case.”

Sadly/awesomely except when it comes to our cell phone company, local utilities, or computer tech support…we expect great service as consumers.  

And your clients expect the same.

To be clear, there are SPECIFIC things you can do to provide a DIFFERENT service for clients that stands out.

You can have a client concierge who is there to help them on non-legal needs.

You can create an amazing online portal so they know about their case in real time and don’t have to call.

You can respond to phone calls and emails in a maximum time of 24 hours or whatever it is.

BUT, “providing better client service” - that’s not a great differentiator.

Creativity AKA Bullshit Marketing Speak

You can’t “optimize the estate planning process,” “recreate the personal injury case flow,” or “synergize the intersection of the tried and true approach with a tech forward new age eye for the digital ones landscape of the future needs of your case.”

Yeah, the last one sounds great, but what the fuck did I even say?

It needs to be a clear and actionable (probably trackable) differentiator.  So that you can back it up and truly honor what you promised. 

Threshold Law or Door Law

Doing EVERYTHING they need sounds like a good one.  But uh…it’s not. There’s no way to be a great lawyer who does every type of law.

I don’t read case law, but if I did, I wouldn’t be able to read ALL the case law all the time.  

Nor attend every legal area conference to stay up on best practices.

Nor buy all the softwares to keep my forms updated, etc.

It’s a lot easier to commit the dreaded it which shall not be named M word (spoken in harsh tones like Voldemort…mal-prac-tice) when you do this.

Price

Look, on the one hand, price is SUPER easy for your competitors to match.

On the other hand, they might be dumb enough to go out of business faster than you.

And on the other hand, did you really go to law school to do $3000 worth of work for $8?  (Criminal lawyers - I mean charging $8, not only having the client pay you $8 after signing a contract for $3000, that’s a different conversation).

Now that we’ve used too many hands and not touched a positive…I think we can throw lowering your prices into the trash.

but

But

BUT

I do think there’s a way to play being the MOST expensive in town to your advantage.

“Come see why we are the most expensive in town.”

“We charge more than everyone else because we are (faster, have the best results, handle everything you didn’t even think you needed, etc)

So really it’s competing on LOW price that I hate. It’s the race to the bottom that even when you win you lose.

Somethings to Consider

It has to make sense in context - my dad always jokes about the Harvard grad doing PI work in town.  To him, it makes no sense when all of us non-Harvard grads chase ambulances too.  I think he meant this as a compliment…too soon to tell.

You have to have the credentials - spoken about above a bit, but if you say you have the most 5 star reviews, you need to prove it. If you’re #1, where are you ranked that high?  If you’re client focused…uhhhh…can’t prove that…

And you need to communicate your different - it’s got to be on the website, in the welcome emails, part of the pnc drip campaigns, etc 

You might need to run some ads to tell people about how awesome you are.

Some Examples

Be the first firm to specialize in this area - this ship has sailed for a LOT of options, but maybe legal cannabis use in your state? Nfts? Decentraland business disputes? There are still blue oceans out there with no blood in the water.

And don’t be too angry if you can’t be first.  

Facebook > MySpace > Friendster

Nintendo > Atari

Every phone that still exists > Palm Pilot and BlackBerry

Maintain ownership of your THING - Morgan and Morgan told us size matters, they’re the biggest PI firm, they own that.  

Thankfully my wife tells me it’s what you do with your (law firm) size that really matters.

Own your THING, whatever that thing is. Maybe trademark it or at least build moats that stop other  people from just stealing it.

Be the leader - this one is tough in an ivory tower service industry like law.  Maybe you lead by being your bar president, or teaching a mandatory CLE or something.  Other times you lead by having the most billboards and doing the most work. There are many more different paths here than with “normal” businesses.

Have firm history - established in 2021 after I got fired from my last job because I was an eviction lawyer during COVID isn’t going to sell people on your firm

This is where older firms (even if they're slow to adapt, can really stand out) - I'm writing this newsletter from a Carnival Cruise ship. The entire YEAR is dedicated to this being their 50th anniversary. So when I hit 50, I hope I get a whole year to celebrate!
 
But imagine you're a maritime lawyer, and your founding partners were there for the carnival on day 1. Or maybe it’s just one of them at the dedication of the local clock tower that is now 25 years old.  Heck, maybe it’s just you graduating middle school from the local middle school. Things like these show TRUST. Why? Because you’re much less likely to uproot and move (because you, like Questlove have got roots)

Specialize in your market - the opposite of door law, we should ALL be doing this. Whether your niche is a practice area, the local area, or a type of person, specialize and hammer that specialization.

Be the preferred provider - again, tough in our area to prove. We can’t do a large study and find 9000/10000 dentist recommend us like Crest.  Heck, at some of our scales and marketing budget, we might be stretched to make it truly 9/10.  But maybe you focus on helping nurses get and keep their licenses.  If you got endorsed by their union or a local nurse related organization, that would probably go a long way!

What else?  What’s your differentiating factor?  What does your firm tout to make you unique?  To convince your IDEAL clients that you’re the best fit?

Let me know and we’ll feature you in a future newsletter (if you’re cool with that).

Want to get to know us better and hang out?  Come join us in St. Louis at the beginning of June for Max Law Con.

I’ll be there, Greg will be there, and most importantly Thayne will be there.  We’ll have a booth and some fun swag (very on brand), and maybe some other surprises and giveaways.

For more info click here. If you book through us, we get a % of that and I will happily pass that $ on to you as credit with us for future services.

I’ve been going to this conference since 2019 and it’s truly been one of my favorite and most helpful to my practice.  Would love to see you there and hope you get a similar benefit.

Until next week, have a great weekend and enjoy!

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