Today, Seth and Jay chat with Allison Williams, the Law Firm Mentor, about intake, using VAs properly, and some upcoming free training opportunities for our listeners. Allison Williams is a Business Coach for solo law firm owners at Law Firm Mentor, LLC where she helps solo lawyers develop their law firms. Law Firm Mentor supplies these solo law firm owners with business coaching and consultations for them to separate from competitors and carve a path to success. In this interview, Allison reviews the importance of intake in a company’s success plan and how to overcome challenges with intake in your law firm.
Welcome to the podcast edition of Maximum Growth Live, the number one program for lawyers who want to grow their practices. Each week, our hosts, Seth Price and Jay Ruane, tackle the fundamental questions about how to grow the profit and profitability of your law firm. To watch the program live, submit your questions, and hear the latest episode, tune in every Thursday at 3 PM Eastern on Facebook for our live show. Maximum Growth Live is a production of Maximum Lawyer Media.
Hello, hello, and welcome to another edition of Maximum Growth Live. I’m one of your hosts, Jay Ruane, the CEO of FirmFlex, social media marketing for attorneys, as well as Ruane Attorneys managing partner. We are a criminal offense and civil rights law firm in Connecticut. And with me, as always, somewhere hidden away from the world, no longer in Del Boca Vista but on his way back up north to the cold and chillier, more chillier climes, is my man Seth Price. Seth, how’s your week going this week?
It’s going well, it’s going well. The idea of being on the LAM in non, non-ideal circumstances for, for our show, but excited to be doing this and excited to be heading home.
Just think about it. Imagine being R– Bolger and living like that for 20-plus years, you know, in nondescript hotel rooms with, you know, looking out the window and behind the curtains to see if there’s anybody checking you out. You know, this is, this is definitely not the life for Seth, I can tell you that much, he’s not used to–
It’s also, you know, with my wife and three kids, you know, it adds an extra element to the, to this whole piece. And ironically enough, a hotel with not ideal Wi-Fi to boot. So, you know, when your hotspot is outperforming the hotel Wi-Fi, you’re in trouble.
Definitely, definitely, Seth, but we have a great show today. We’re actually going to be joined by our first repeat guest, I believe. And it’s Allison Williams, and I couldn’t think of somebody better to have on the show again than Allison, given all that she’s done for lawyers and law entrepreneurs. Tell us a little bit about Allison, for those who aren’t familiar with her.
You know, I got to meet her at an elephant event in DC and was really impressed. This is somebody who walks the talk, and she, and she built her own firm, a very successful New Jersey family law firm, and has created a program, a coaching program, and mentoring program to help people with, with their firm development. And what I was excited about to hear is she’s been doing some, some interesting stuff with intake, which is an area that is sorely lacking. You know, we’ve had Gary Fallowitz on and he’s awesome, but there are very few people talking to the world, particularly outside of the PI world, on, on intake and best practices. So I can’t wait to have her on here and hear what she has to say.
Yeah, you know, the thing that’s interesting about intake is that, you know, for the PI World, I mean, they’re not parting with money right then and there. And so it’s very easy to get somebody to sign a piece of paper. I mean, I’m sure the PI people will come back and say it’s not as easy.
It’s keeping quality up and making sure that you’re identifying and not making too many mistakes, there are plenty of mistakes that are gonna happen. But in one sense, there’s a huge other obstacle when you have to convince people to part with their cash versus just sign on the dotted line.
You know, it’s really interesting. And before we get to Allison, I just wanted to cover a couple quick things with you. Number one, I noticed that the PI lawyers have really found those local service ads. I’m still seeing, you know, two or three criminal lawyers, two or three family lawyers, but I, my last count here in Connecticut, a small state, there were 51 law firms registered with local service ads in the PI area, which is just mind blowing, the level of competition there, which is why intake is so important.
Right. And I think that you’re also seeing what’s happened, which is, in the PI space where the puts are so expensive, those local service ads become a value. Whereas we’re seeing, particularly for people with higher, the local service ads can be amazing, and there are people who have crushed it, but certain people with higher price points have had real issues, where it floods phone calls. That’s not the issue. But the question is, does it come with, with monetization? And we’re sit, we’re having some questions, and then still, it’s still, it’s early days, and still, people are tweaking, but for people that do paid consultations, you know, you’re getting a phone call off Google where you’re expecting a consultation, and then all of a sudden somebody’s asking for a paid consultation, whether it be family or immigration or other areas, and that has not been necessarily a great user experience in all areas. So I know that the, the ROI in PI is, you know, really solid and that people are making a go in other areas. But I’ve also heard some people are like, wow, I got the phone ringing like crazy, but it didn’t deliver the results I wanted in the end.
Yeah, it’s really sort of interesting. And the other thing I wanted to follow up with, with you about is, you know, I’ve been on this journey where I’ve been adding VAs, it’s one of the reasons why we’ve been talking to so many people about the VA aspect over the last couple of weeks, and we’ll talk about it with Allison in a short bit. One of the things that we decided to do was to in-house this happiness person, sort of a review wrangler, and Tuesday was her first day in the job. She had come back from sitting for the bar exam, it was a law student that we decided to keep around for a little while, and she delivered three new five-star reviews in her second day of, of work, and as, that being her focus. So, you know, obviously, one day doesn’t make an entire year, but I definitely think that there’s value in having this position. Just creating touchpoints with the clients and, and focusing on reviews is something that’s going to be a thing to move the needle for us.
No, I think, look, especially if you’re starting from flat-footed positioning. The question is, with, like, think of a sales book, we had Rob Lime on the other day, the difference between somebody whose closing warm leads come in versus outbound, cold calling. Somebody can, if you can work with the attorneys in the office, start with the people that are most recent. Basically, the data that you’re giving that person is going to make, make or break them. If you’re giving them great data and great touch points and hopefully did great work for people, it’s going to make their job that much easier. And I feel you’re going to look back and say, “Hey, three is a low number,” and that you’re going to start to get real, real, real volume over time.
Yeah, I mean, that’s great. I mean, we’re already, you know, combined, we’re already at about 500 reviews. You know, I’d love to see 1000 total by the end of the year, and now I’m thinking that that’s doable. But what we’re gonna do right now, folks, we’re gonna take a quick break. When we come back, we’ll be joined by the law firm mentor, Allison Williams. Stay tuned, we’ll be right back with more Maximum Growth Live.
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Allison, the law firm mentor. Great to have you here.
Great to be back guys. I love talking to you guys. We always have such a great conversation.
We’re excited. We have a couple of things we’re going to talk to you about today. We’ve been talking a lot about offshoring different work, VAs, etc. But we wanted to sort of combine that when we talk about intake. You got something coming in intake that we want to hear about. But something that Jay and I were talking about on Tuesday was basically at what point will we be able to use people not in the US to help do tasks that were traditionally thought of as only US? Wanted to get your thoughts on that.
Yeah, so you know, offshoring legal talent is always an interesting topic because there are so many solutions in the marketplace right now and a lot of those solutions can give you your basic nuts and bolts, administrative, secretarial, clerk-type work. But I think where a lot of lawyers are struggling is finding that higher level person, that person who can independently analyze, prepare legal documents, prepare financial affidavits, things like that, that don’t exactly require legal knowledge, but they do require a certain level of understanding of the legal process in order to create something usable for the attorney. And unfortunately, I am not aware of anything that is kind of a one-stop shop for that. So what I see happening is a lot of lawyers are taking the lower cost investment, you can spend a probably anywhere from 15 to 20% of what you would spend for a US employee and you can put that into a virtual assistant. And then ultimately, you’re gonna have to train that person up. But there are some lawyers that are having effectiveness of really dialing in their systems so that when they add that person, that person can come in, learn the systems and structure of legal process fast enough, that it’s economically viable to have them be in training mode for a long enough time that you can actually use them as a paralegal at some point.
You know, Allison, one of the things that Jay and I have talked about, Jay mentioned in a prior episode, is that it’s great that we can find labor around the country, around the world for less, but there are a number of people that are saying, “Hey, my budget is tight, I’m going to swap out somebody that I can get the neighborhood for somebody in the Philippines.” That’s not always a great idea.
Yeah, definitely not. I mean, the issue of swapping out implies that you’re getting somebody from the Philippines that can replace someone here in the US. And the difficulty with that is you’ve got a cultural disconnect, you’ve got a language disconnect, you have an understanding of legal process disconnect. So even as you are training the person up, you have the added layer of being virtual. So a lot of people haven’t learned how to systematize being in a state of persistent communication without being in chronic communication with a virtual person, so you have to, like, work that in there. But then you also have to work in the fact that you’re taking somebody who doesn’t understand what it is that we are doing, and you are expecting them to come in and hit the ground running, and that often creates malpractice risk grievance risk deadline, you know, deadlines being missed. So there’s just a lot of problems with assuming you can start at day one, you are really taking someone as if they are, what I would say is really just a good college kid, kids not even out of college yet. You’re taking them, you’re teaching them the legal process, you’re teaching them the structure of the work in your office, and then you’re teaching them the container of activity that they’re going to do. And if you build out a training process, that can be very effective, especially at the cost that you’re paying for someone in the Philippines, but you’re not going to replace a $50 an hour employee with an $8 an hour VA from the Philippines and think that you’re gonna get comfortable service. You’re just, you’re not.
So how do you, how do you sort of mentor your coaching clients at their law firm? How do you, how do you sort of help people navigate what is appropriate for using people from overseas and what is not? Jay thinks it’s all systems. Is it all systems that allows you to sort of determine, that you can systematize it, what can go offshore? Or what’s the, what’s your litmus test?
Yeah, so what I always suggest is, systems are kind of like my favorite thing in the world. They, they crush chaos in so many different ways. But with, with regard to a VA from another country, you’re not just creating a system, you’re also creating a culture for that person, and you’re trying to embed them into your culture as you do so. So a lot of this is about getting your systems out on paper, right? So one of the little shortcuts I always tell people about is ART: ask, record and transcribe. So every time that you do something, ask a staff person, how did you do this from soup to nuts? And just have them pre-verse that for you, record them speaking that, and then transcribe it so that you have a ready made something that you can give to a person. That’s step one, step two, step three. Then, when you add on the extra layer of dealing with someone from another country, you have to also add in the component of not just relaying the information, but making sure they understand it. Making sure that they have a cultural sensitivity to what they’re doing, having them do the task alongside someone who’s trained in your office, and once you see that they have learned that task, add that to other tasks. So you have kind of an extra layer of training that you don’t have with someone who understands the law here in the US. You have that extra layer of, do you understand what we’re talking about? And do you understand what we’re talking about in the context of what we’re trying to accomplish? And that’s a process. It takes time to learn that whether you’re teaching someone with a law degree or you’re teaching someone who just graduated from high school.
Okay.
Yeah, well, you know, one of the things that I have seen is that a lot of lawyers view this idea of outsourcing their work as sort of, it’s a magic wand and I can just pay at agency to play somebody for me and everything will get fixed, and I don’t have to worry about it. But I want to talk to you a little bit about systems because you love them, I love them, and really talk about how we can develop these systems for people who are not necessarily built into, you know, growing up in the American way of life. I mean, you know, one of the things that we had a challenge of recently, for one of our VAs, was a client had called in saying, “Hey, I’m around the corner from the office, which door do I go in?” And this gentleman who’s a phenomenal intake guy, based in Honduras, froze, because he’s never been to our building, has no idea what it looks at. So immediately, we, we passed it off, somebody else jumped on the phone dealt with that problem. But then we immediately did a Google tour, a Street View tour, and added that to our training program, so people have a better understanding, and a way, and a resource to go to, since they’re not walking through that door every day.
Jay, that’s, it’s funny, because we talked about this offline. And I described how Delta, when they first took their call center overseas and it was like, “Oh, my God, I’m getting somebody overseas, there’s no way.” And what I noticed was the Indian call center got so good that they actually weren’t, they can tell you, hey, what’s inside of security, what’s outside of security? You’re like, it was, it got to the point where it really replaced, you didn’t feel you were being punished by speaking to somebody overseas, you were getting as much or more value because they were following the system created to allow somebody to to do that. Allison, your thoughts?
Well, let me, let me just finish up with, with, with. The question I have for you is, as someone who, who helps to mentor lawyers in this situation, do you think it is a smart idea or a wise idea, I guess, a business-forward idea to say, “You know what, maybe outsourcing isn’t the right thing for me to do at this point. And maybe I need to invest in an American base, and even a locally based assistant, because I don’t have if I’m, if I’m, if I’m in rapid growth mode, and I’m working a ton of files in my marketing squeaked in that type of thing, maybe I don’t have the time to build those systems and do that training that’s necessary.” So there has to be sort of a balancing test. And where do you think that test comes in, as you mentor other lawyers in in growing their firm?
Yeah, Jay. So I just want to harken back to what you just said, which was, I think, brilliant, which is okay, we hit a snag when the person didn’t know how to tell our client where to go, and we came up with a system for that. And that’s what I tell lawyers, and I teach this in Systematize Your Law Business, I’m going to teach it in a Masterclass I have starting next week, it’s really about the idea that we’re not ever going to be able to create perfection and then import people into our perfection. And lawyers want to do that. We want to build out the infrastructure and have the leather bound, embossed, engraved, beautiful handbook that we can hand over with all of the systems and say, “Here, now I don’t have to think about you, I don’t have to communicate with you, I can go do my thing, you’ll be perfect, and everything will work out.” And that is not business. Business is chronically evolving and you have to adapt the mindset that says, “I have to create a system that allows for the system not to work so that I can constantly iterate and evolve the system into something that grows my business and gives the highest quality of service for my clients.” That is always what you are creating when you’re creating a system. It’s never a one-and-done. So to answer Seth’s point, you know, what do you do with that? This idea of like, we’ve got to create something for our processes. Jay, your thought on that is exactly what I say, which is you need to start with somebody who knows what they’re doing. So the first hire that I recommend for anyone in any area, do not hire a starter upper, do not hire a fixer upper, don’t fix a flat, your employee, you have to hire somebody who you can say, here’s the crap of the role, go figure it out, go create the systems, you do your secretarial thing, you do your paralegal thing, you do your associate thing, to a certain degree, right? You don’t want to, like, there’s a, there’s an ethics requirement that we have for supervising attorneys. But you don’t want to hire people that don’t know anything or that have limited scope and then you have to spend your time learning their job to teach them their job so you can get back to your job. Like, that’s part of the reason why lawyers don’t grow, like, it’s so frustrating. And it takes so much time and money to dump into a person who doesn’t know what they’re doing, that we say “You know, it is easier for me to do it myself.” And in that scenario, you’re right. But if you hire someone further up the food chain, you get more bang for your buck initially, because initially, the person brings systems, knowledge, structure, experience. Then, that person can take the $8 an hour VA from the Philippines and, and marry their skill and knowledge with that person’s drive, dedication, hard work, you know, capabilities, etc. And I will say this, I have done this routinely, in my own business, I very much practice what I preach. I have a VA from the Philippines, and she works, and she’s an assistant to my VA that’s here, based in Oklahoma. And the beautiful thing about that is, the person who’s from the Philippines has the work ethic, and the right attitude, and the desire to learn, and the ability to integrate information, and she’ll hop on a phone call and research solutions as much as she can, and then when she hits a snag, she comes over here. Well, if I’m spending $8 an hour for this person, she can spend three hours trying to figure something out, and that’s perfectly fine, because that’s still less expensive than if I were to pay somebody $40 an hour to go from job, here in the US. But I would never hand over my business or integral functions to someone who doesn’t have the wherewithal or knowledge and expect that they’re going to be able to hit the ground running. So number one skill is just start, start with high-skill in the areas that you have for all of your major functions. Make sure that those high-skilled people are not just good at what they do, but able to communicate and train other people. So sometimes you have to train your trainer, right, you have to train people on your team, how you want them to integrate. And then one thing that lawyers are not using enough of, really, is really creating a system around your system. So that means you know, there are lots of of Teachable type courses or platforms like Kajabi and Thinkific and Teachable, where you can actually create little courses. And if you create your own university, then you have not just the ability to train the person, but you have resources for them to go to to try to figure things out on their own. Because part of what you’re training them on is not just the task of today, but it’s the thinking and the way of being that we do things in the US, and they’ll learn that a lot more if they start to absorb your content over the course of time as you have more things to delegate.
Yeah, one of the things that I’ve been really lucky with is a couple of the VAs that I’ve been able to get have done college here in the United States and then returned back home. And that’s really been great for me because they, they’ve seen how we work in the United States, they have a little more fluency with the language. But one of the things that’s important, I think, to understand in sort of the outsourcing and the, maybe the insourcing thing is that you can break down your roles in your office and then plug people in, in a particular area. And I want to talk a little bit about the use of outsourced help in your intakes. Because I think intake is so important for us to get right, right? Because, because if you don’t get your intake right, you’ve wasted money on your marketing, and you’re, you’re going to be in a bind when it comes to actually delivering services and financing the rest of your operations. So that pivot point of intake. Do you have any experience that you can share with our people about the best ways to set up your intake, and then also, to have that outsource part in intake so that we can really get the best utilization of resources out there for people?
Yeah, so intake is its own special topic. We could, we could probably get together and spend a whole day doing nothing other than optimizing intake. And in fact, I do that on day one of Legal Sales for Attorneys and Non-Attorneys, which is one of the retreats that we offer here at Law Firm Mentor. The one thing that I would give to people about intake right now is that you have to not just have the right person in intake but you have to have the right system, that tracks not only how people get to you, but that also tracks what is effective in your communication with people on the phones. And a lot of people just kind of want like the magic stop, you know, the one-stop shop, but it’s very much about AV testing and iterating and seeing what works for you. So a lot of lawyers, you know, they, they get on the phone, and they just kind of tell us that person here, you know, just answer the phones, if somebody wants an appointment, get their name, their email, their, their telephone number, the gist of the case and then schedule them. The problem with that is that is very transactional, and that presupposes that a person is going to buy what you are selling in the intake process, and yes, the intake process is a sales process. You are selling the consultation. Whether you’re selling it for free or you’re selling it for some dollar amount, you are still selling the person on the idea that you are the entity that they should work with, that they should schedule time out of your life to meet with. So you have to approach that conversation as a sales process. You have to structure it in the way of asking more questions than telling information, you have to seed in the qualifications and value of your business as you are communicating about scheduling the consultation. You have to find that urgency point for the person who’s on the phone, like, what is it about this problem that caused you to stop your life, get on the internet, find my business, call my office and schedule an appointment? What is it that you’re looking to achieve by coming in, and how, ultimately, is your life going to be better by that? And then once you find that urgency point, you’re going to offer the solution that meets them at that urgency point. All of that sounds very complex. It is not complex if you have a process for doing it. But most people don’t have a process for doing it, they just tell their person, “Here, get the data on the person, tell them about our system, charge the fee and get them booked.” And it’s a low enough fee for a lot of people that that works, but it is still a sales process, so you have to approach it that way, and then you have to train your people on intake. And I actually, I walked through when I, you know, ironically, we’re gonna be doing this on a webinar next week, so I got a lot of things going on next week. But one of the things that we’re gonna be talking about is how to train your intake person on not just what to say, but pacing and communication in the process. So how do you listen actively for changes in tone, changes in pitch, changes in verbal stance? Is the person all of a sudden becoming more quiet or more energized around a topic? What are you listening for? And once you learn how to listen actively, how do you work into your discussion with the person on the phone, the different things that you need to about your firm so that they’re sold on you, before you say anything about scheduling an appointment. All of that is a process. And then once you’ve had that process created and documented, you then have to train your person on that process, which means in states where you’re allowed to, recording the communication so you can hear how they relate to people, being able to walk them through that process, ie having heard your recording, where did you go right? Where did you go wrong? Where do we need to improve? What’s working? Well, what should we change universally in our system? What do we need to AB test here? And then once you have that, checking in with the person periodically, because people learning a new skill will often deviate to what’s most comfortable for them. So if you don’t ensure that your person is really on your system, your results may seem to wane, and the first thing that we think is, well, we’re not getting enough leads or the leads aren’t good, so let me go harass my marketing people because they’re not delivering enough leads. Or, let me change out my intake person, because they’re not doing it effectively on the phone without really giving them an opportunity to improve their process, because you’re not checking in with them on how they’re executing it.
You know, it’s interesting, and I’m going to confess something to the audience now. I used to not really pay attention to the people that were answering my phone, I mean, we’re gonna look back 18 years ago now. And I remember, you know, as a DUI defense lawyer, we had gotten a call and I was in the other room. And the call came in, and my intake person, who was just out of high school, not well trained, I was one of those losers that just answer the phone book, the appointment will be good. And, you know, I heard them say, “Aha, okay, and what’s your address?” And so I’m thinking, that’s not a big deal. And then the caller doesn’t book the appointment, says they’re gonna call back. And I said, you know, tell me a little bit about the case. And like, “Well, they told me they were in an accident and killed somebody. And then I asked them for their address.” And I was like, whoa, whoa, you can’t take that information in and gloss over it, you have to say, “Oh, my god, are you okay? Do you need mental health treatment?” That type of thing, because it was a failure on our part to train the intake person the right way. They were so focused on getting the six pieces of data that they need, they weren’t building rapport with the caller at all. And, you know, we wound up not representing that person, probably rightfully so, because we weren’t in a position at that point to give them the type of service that they needed. But that’s, you know, those are the types of things that you need to have active listeners talk on, on your phone, and picking up those clues from the callers so that you can build that rapport, establish those bona fides, establish that relationship so that you can do it. Seth, are you back with us to be able to pipe in here?
Sure, just Murphy’s Law, that as we start going, there’s massive background noise. But what I was saying when my current, you know, I’ve been very passionate and it, saying we have, we have our 12 person team. I’m currently trying to basically have a shadow team that I am working with, mirroring what Allison was talking about earlier, that you can’t just like plug and play, and just see like, also as an experiment, can I get people, not just for tasks, that’s easy, but can I get people trained over time so they can answer the Jay Ruane question of where is the office, and that they can become part of the culture or part of the vernacular, and sort of take a three month period to let them just, without worrying about ROI, just allowing some you know, finely-screened people train and continue to immerse themselves to the point where they could actually be part of that, you know, A-Plus team.
Yeah. So Jay, you mentioned the idea of, of having you know that, that right empathy for a person. And empathy, of course, is one of the major touch points of, of, you know, of dialed-in communication regardless, but it’s your, your story is funny. I tell the same story, it’s not the exact same story, a very similar story, when I talk about intake. And what happened in my office, which is, I actually did have a training process, and I went through training my intake person, and I got his conversion rate, anywhere from you know, it was averaging in the low 20s, when he first started with us, and we got it over 45%. Now, granted, one of our practice areas is one that is indigency base, so child abuse and neglect. So there is a statistical likelihood that a great portion of the people that would call our office are not going to be eligible to work with us just based on minimum economic compliance, right. So 45% is really an exceptional rate in our office historically. And I got him to that point, and at some point, he was really disappointed that he didn’t get this one person booked, and we went through the process of going over his calls. And, you know, I kind of coached him on what to do if that happened again. Well, Zuma had, that same person that we had gone through a coaching session with called the office like a month and a half later, and he remembered her voice, she had a very raspy, very distinctive voice. And she called and said, “Oh, my God, oh, my God, oh, my God, I’ve got to come in right away.” And he said, “Well, you know, hi, I remember you, you know, it’s, I’m sorry that you’re, you’re needing to call us what’s going on?” She said, “I came home and my husband was on my sister.” She just literally blurted that out. And his answer was “Alright, well, how about Monday at nine o’clock?” No reaction at all, it was just kind of like, alright, well, I guess we got the urgency, now let’s get her in. Well, I’m glad she actually did book and I’m glad she didn’t look out for that response.
Allison, it so reminds me of the chat world. We use a very inexpensive chat company. You could say, “Hey, first of all, my whole family got in a car accident,” and it’s like, “That’s terrible. Sounds like you need to speak to a lawyer immediately.” It’s like, there’s no nuance.
And you know, here’s the thing, what’s crazy about it is that a lot of that happens because people are so fixated on the script or the talking points. I think we all have had that experience where you call a bank and you get, you know, someone that clearly is not a US who says to you, “Hi, how can I help you?” And you say, “I want the checking division because I’ve got a problem with my checking account.” And they say, “Would you like the checking division or the savings division?” And you’re like, did you listen to me, you know, because they’re clearly reading off the teleprompter. And that’s what that feeling is for people that call our law offices. When we have a person who is married to getting all the words right without understanding the general conception of, there are processes, right? The first part is you want to get the basic information so that you can continue to communicate with that person if they don’t schedule now. Then you want to get the story, and that story is not “tell me what happened,” that story is a guided process. You are the leader of that process and you’re taking a person through, connecting with you, identifying the nature of the problem, identifying why it matters to them, which is that urgency point, and then getting them sold on solving the problem, which is coming in to see the lawyer or the non-attorney who’s going to ultimately help them. Then you’re going to close out that call with processing a payment, confirming details, giving them what they need to get in, and giving them a sense of relief that their problem is about to be solved. If you don’t approach it that way, and just kind of get on the phone and have a chat with the person. Sure, sometimes you book people, sometimes you don’t, but you miss the opportunity to frame them to one, be, be inclined to buy when they come to your office. So you can increase your actual intake conversion rate, your consultation conversion rate when you have good intake, but you’re also framing the relationship, right? If you have a client or prospect who calls your office and just kind of runs roughshod over your intake person, what do you think they’re going to do when they come into the office and meet with you and you’re trying to set the frame for them? Or when they start working with your lawyers and the lawyer is trying to tell them legal advice, “this is what you need to do,” and the answer ultimately stops at that point. So you know, you have to, you have to think about intake as a critical part of the process, early in the process. It does more than just get people scheduled. It gets you people more inclined to buy, it gets you better rate of payment when they come in, it gets you better attitude during the working relationship, it gets you more referrals in the future to people that are also comparable to them. All of that is what you were structuring when you create intake, which is part of the reason why I created this intake webinar that really derived from the conversation and the discussion we had at the Law Firm Growth Summit. So I know that Seth also spoke at the Law Firm Growth Summit. And, you know, there we had an opportunity to kind of go one to one with people. And what I spoke about was intake. And I thought of it as just I’m going to help people deal with the objections to money being paid for lawyers at the at the point of intake. But so many people had so many questions, we didn’t get to the second side of it, which was what leads to the objection in the first place, the structuring. So I said, alright, let me put together a webinar on that. We’re actually hosting it next week. It’s on Monday, pardon me, it’s on Wednesday, March 10, at 9am, Eastern Standard Time. And for anyone that’s interested in it, we will drop the link to register in the comments. But it’s out of Bitly, it’s all caps LFM, for Law Firm Intake, dash intake, very simple, LFM-intake. You can register for the webinar, it’s gonna be one hour, it is going to come with a free guide on dealing with intake objections, so you’ll be able to get that guide so that you have that handy to give to your teams when they are on the phones. And my goal is really to help people to start to reconceptualize the way that they look at intake. It is a sales process, you need to get people trained in sales in order to be effective at sales process. And when you do this, you can start to see dramatic shifts in how many people come in, how much they pay when they come, and how likely they are to, to refer other people in the process.
You know, it’s really interesting. And one of the things that pops to mind, for all the trial lawyers that are in the audience, when you can make some, you could make some correlations between intake and picking a jury, right? Because how often have you been picking a jury? And you’ll get, establish this bond with the, with the veneer person, you’re asking the questions, they’re answering. And then the other lawyer will stand up and ask them the exact same questions. They didn’t bother to listen to those answers that were given. And so it puts, places you in a much better position, because you were parrying back and forth and talking about oh, I love that restaurant and or, you know, I’m also a bulldog, you know, that type of thing. And so those are the types of things that I think we need to really impress upon our, our intake people to sort of talk to them about engaging people rather than mining data. Because that’s really, I think, an important part of the whole process. Seth, are you ready for another question?
Yeah, no, no, look, I love it. And the art of intake is it’s so difficult to get right. Because I feel like, every time I think about it, I’m pushing off in the right direction, particularly at scale. It’s one thing, it was, for me it was my baby, it was via cell phone, that phone, that you know, had passed off to somebody else, and then the story. And that’s how you know, that our process began. One of my, a life moment with one of our past guests, Gary Falkowitz, who’s, you know, he’s awesome on intake. He was like, you know, one of the people that always professed, “You got to listen to recordings of calls,” something we do on a weekly basis now. And early on, I’d do it, it was me doing it, I trusted a guy who’s doing it. But what I found was at scale, it was pretty shocking what I’ve heard, once I was listening to my own calls. And, you know, there was, again, a woman who did a Jay Ruane-type situation with somebody who had an office situation, they’re going “U-huh,” so listening to her from the firm’s side, walking around the office as if you were just doing a lap, sounded great. And then you heard this, and we had to fire somebody. So I feel that like, it is, it is a combination of, you know, putting your team in place, training them, but it’s not, it is a continual process, not a set-it-and-forget-it by any means.
It sounds to me like it’s just something that you have to be paying attention to. And, and so many, so many lawyers, I think, you know, especially entrepreneurial lawyers, we are, we are drawn to, I wouldn’t call it the shiny things, but we’re constantly in growth mode. So we’re ready to tackle the next problem, maybe even before we’ve solved the problem we’re dealing with now. We get to like 50% of a resolution and are like, “Okay, that’s good. Let me get to the next thing.” You know, maybe there’s some ADD in all of us, or just, you know, a desire to keep moving forward. It’s interesting, I was having a conversation with, with a colleague of ours, and the conversation basically led to so many lawyers don’t focus on their business because, since they’ve never focused on their business, cases come to them sort of magically. They don’t really have a marketing plan and so they show up at the office have no idea if the phone is going to ring that day and when it does, it’s magic, and let’s, let’s jump on this magical opportunity. And so at five o’clock, they turn off their mind they say okay, now I’m gonna go binge Netflix or go play golf or tennis, maybe do some cooking, because they’re not constantly thinking about their business because they, they have no business thoughts. But for us, who are such entrepreneurial minded, we know the more work we put in, the better results we’re going to get. But I think one of the hardest things to learn, Allison, and I’d love your input on this is, making sure you actually finish a project before you get to the next one.
I mean, so there’s a lot to be said there. And you’re right, I think lawyers do have, and it’s not just entrepreneurial lawyers, by the way, I see this tendency in what I would refer to as high-D people, right? So if you’re familiar with the disc, people that have a dominant personality, it’s kind of like yep, go, next, next, next, next, next, and they’re moving on before they complete the project. And so part of the, part of knowing yourself, and the beauty of building a business, is when you add other people, you can add people who have strengths in the areas where you don’t. So if you’re not a systems person, you don’t get to eliminate that from your role as the CEO and owner of a business, but you, you certainly can outsource parts of it, right. So someone has to be invested in getting to the right solution, whether it’s you or someone else, and while you are working on yourself to improve in that area, your business can still grow. So all of those lawyers out there that are like, “Oh, I just sit back and the phone rings and whatever,” I don’t really believe that. What I believe is happening is that they’re just unconscious, right? They’re, they’re an unconscious competent, they don’t recognize what they’re doing. They are doing something to have that happen, they just don’t realize what it is. So it could be that they are very personable and outgoing and connecting with people and naturally networking when they were at the courthouse, or it could be that they are instinctually speaking in different locations, people will ask them to teach a CLE, they say great, I’m serving the bar, and what they’re really doing is marketing themselves in the process. And they don’t know it, right. So what ends up happening is, yeah, that’s fine when it’s a team of one, it’s you and maybe a VA or even a full time secretary. But when you want to get to a place where you don’t have the stress of will the phone ring and you want to have the consistency that comes from working with someone like Jay’s company to generate leads or even you Seth, you know, to get you know, to get your SEO coming so that you’re constantly filling the funnel. And you have your choice of who you want to work with and you can charge them what you want to charge them, when you know that there’s a consistency and a reliability to what’s coming in because you haven’t systematized, then you don’t have that stress of oh my god, something has happened and I don’t know what to do. And I harken back to last year a lot because last year was kind of the, I’m trying to use my my words judiciously, I have kind of a potty mouth, I grew up in the South in a navy town. So it’s the stuff factor, okay, you know what stuff is really supposed to be here, right? When, when stuff happens, we think okay, I don’t have any choice but to react to the circumstance. Well a lot people were, you know, you know, up Stuff’s Creek during, during Coronavirus. And not because the, there was an economic calamity, there were some places where the economics of their, of their economy really were not anywhere near as bad as in other places where there were hotspots, right? But that lawyer was feeling a sense of retraction because he or she had not systematized where are my leads coming from? How am I getting people booked? How do I pivot what I’m saying in order to respond to the people that are coming in? And a lot of those little strategies can be employed to make a big difference. And that’s part of the reason why frankly, my law firm grew during the during the pandemic. It wasn’t because a whole bunch more people got divorced, we actually didn’t serve more people, but we grew because we were able to get more people through the door with a mindset and a psychology that worked for where they were, based on the fact that we were responding to small things rather than, it’s kind of a question mark, where’s the next call coming from? Whether they’re going to book or not? It’s their choice, whether to book. If we look at it as we are ultimately at cause, we can influence the way that people choose to interact with us, then we can always control ourselves, right? You can’t control other people, but you can always control yourself and what you’re saying. And that then gets people in the door and gets them there faster at a higher price point. So yes, there was an economic consequence, we all had to deal with what actually happened and to some degree, we’re still dealing with it. I think I watched a Amex webinar or an Inc 5000 webinar, I can’t remember which, where they were projecting that the recovery from Coronavirus for the US is going to be somewhere in the middle of 2022. So, you know, we’re going to be in this state for a moment now. And those of us that dialed in our systems, especially our system of intake, and really looked at how we can start to respond and react differently to people and knowing our numbers that comes from having a really well-defined intake process. We are better able to shift and pivot so that we can deal with the economics before they actually land on us rather than having to be in crisis mode and being in constant stress as a result of that.
Yeah.
I got a final question for today. Two people who love systems, and while I love to have a system, I’m not big on building them. That’s just not me. I love it, I’ll build, I’ll build things, and I’ll take it with marketing and I love, but like, I want. I know I need them, and they’re essential, but it’s not my jam. I have put teams in place, you can find people who open the store, we have found people around who do these things to build out our training for intake. What is your advice for people where they know they need the systems but it’s not their thing? Like, I don’t get, Jay gets pleasure, he’d rather build a system than watch Netflix, you know, and I have a few, you know, I have a number of shows to go back to rewatch. What’s the recommendation for people who know that they need stuff? But you know, to this, I always say, do what you like to do. If you don’t like to write, you’re not going to blog. You hate video, you’re not going to make videos. So, like, how, what tools, tricks, techniques have you found for people who are not systems creators to get systems and put them in place so that the firm does run on systems?
Yeah. So that, I mean, we kind of touched upon it in a couple of different areas, Seth. It really is about getting yourself to the top of the heap as fast as you can, which means if you are a solopreneur, from the very first moment that you are in business, you have to get enough revenue in your business, and you have to hire exceptional at the start. And that hiring exceptional means hiring people that have the skills for necessary activity that you don’t have. So if you know, I’m not that, I’m not the systems thinker, I’m not the person who’s gonna geek out on this stuff, I know I need it, I know what needs to be built, it’s not going to be me, then hire somebody who’s going to do that, right? Hire somebody who’s going to do that. And what you’re always looking for is you’re always looking to expand value so you can expand revenue. That does not mean charging the most in the market, that does not mean being able to like constantly sell people, it means being able to expand so that the person with the most qualifications and the least cost to the business is doing the work. And that principle applies whether you are looking to optimize a system, whether you’re looking to add better people to your business, whether you’re looking to sell more, you are always looking to have the most done by the least activity. The most value by the least cost. And that is how you expand profit. And the more profit you have, the more you can put into adding more people who can build more systems who can do more work that you don’t want to do.
Well, Allison, this has been awesome. Tremendous value. I can’t wait to hear your webinar. Allison Williams of Law Firm Mentor, friend, and just an inspiration. You’ve done a great job building your firm and now a coaching program. Thank you so much for your time today.
Yeah, Allison, why don’t you before you go give us give everybody just a brief overview of what you’ve got coming up with your, with your Masterclass and everything just so that they can have that information at the end of the show if they need to come back to it.
Yeah, so thank you for asking about that. So the Masterclass I created is completely free and the whole idea of it is for people to learn systems thinking. So we’re actually going to take you through a step-by-step process on how to build a system in a law firm, how to do it fast and easy, and how to do it in a way that creates more money and time, contemporaneously. So that’s the real key, like a lot of people think, “Okay, I’m either putting in my money, so I can buy back my time, or I’m putting in my time so I can generate more money.” And there’s always an element of that in business to a certain degree, but as a as a sole owner of a business and even small law firms, where you really should be focusing is how do I get the most time and money at the same time out of what I’m doing. And the way to do that is to build out systems in a way that you are able to expand the pie without adding more time, you’re able to take things off of your plate without having them be either neglectful, in which case you’re gonna put risk in your business, or they’re going to land on somebody who’s not qualified, in which case you’re gonna you’re gonna end up taking it back in frustration. So this is the goal, is to really create a systems culture in your business. It’s a step by step day by day process. We’re going to be live for a period of nine days, nine days, 12 o’clock pm eastern standard time, every day, and we will be having replays at 6pm, and it’s going to come with a nifty little workbook that walks you through the process, so you’re gonna get something in writing that you can take back and start using in your law firm right away. If you want to sign up for the, for the masterclass, again, it’s completely free. Masterclass is at lawfirmmentor.net/masterclass.
Awesome, awesome. Thank you so much for being with us. I know what I’m going to be doing in the next couple of days. I’m signing up for that Masterclass so I can geek out over systems with you. I’m really looking forward to that, that’s going to be a lot of fun. But, I want to thank you so much for being us, being here with us on Maximum Growth Live. It’s always great to have you with us. If you want to find out more about Allison and her programs, we’re gonna have links down below in our comment section. And with that, we’re going to take a quick break, you’ll hear from our sponsors, and we’ll be back more with more Maximum Growth Live.
Hey, it’s Becca here. I’m sure you’ve heard Jim and Tyson mention The Guild on the podcast and in the Facebook group. The Guild is this perfect mix of a community, group coaching, and Mastermind. Guild members get so many benefits, including weekly live events and discounts to all Maximum Lawyer events. Head over to maximumlawyer.com/the guild to check out all the benefits and watch a few testimonials from current members. So head to maximumlawyer.com and click on The Guild page to join us. Now let’s get back to the episode.
Hey Seth, another great interview. I gotta tell you, you know, having Allison on as our, as our first time we’re having a having somebody back. She, she doesn’t fail to deliver, man, she gives you great stuff, and I’m really looking forward to some of the stuff that she’s got going on over the next couple of weeks. What are your thoughts?
No, no, I, look, intake is everything. There are so few people that do it well, or at least at scale and that can actually deliver on it. So this is something that is so sorely needed. And I gotta tell you, myself; it’s Whack a Mole. And you know, there are moments where I know I have an issue that I’m fixing, then once it’s there, you’re like, “Okay, well, I can leave that alone and I can go on to everything else.” And the truth is, it is a constant work in progress. I don’t know anybody, you go to the largest firm, you know, guys with the hardest person on intake, they’re kidding themselves with the set and forget it. It’s a constant evolution of tweaking and pushing and turning. And so again, for those people with a much smaller operation, it’s no different. If you set it and forget it, you will, you’ll be disappointed in the end. And present company included, you know. So, what a great opportunity to sort of sit and think and get some systems and best practices to put in place.
Absolutely, absolutely. Okay, folks, that’s gonna do it for us this week on Maximum Growth Live. Of course, you can always catch the show live here on our Facebook page every Thursday at 3pm Eastern 12pm Pacific, but you can catch all of our back shows here on our page. We are also syndicated through Maximum Lawyer and the Maximum Lawyer podcast as well as our own standalone podcast where you, wherever you get your podcasts, via Google Apple, Spotify, Pandora, wherever you get your podcasts, you will find us there. But with that folks, we are going to sign off now. Thank you so much for being with us. He is Seth price. I’m not sure where you’re going to be on the recording, Seth, so I’m going every single, I look like a person who was doing the flossy or some, one of those kids dances. But for now, we’re gonna sign off. He is Seth Price, CEO of BluShark Digital, your SEO for law firms, as well as Price Benowitz, your DC, Maryland, Virginia, and South Carolina law firm. And I am Jay Ruane, CEO of FirmFlex, your social media marketing agency for lawyers. We are combined to be Maximum Growth Live. Bye for now. Thank you so much for being with us. Have a great week. We’ll see you next week on another edition of Maximum Growth Live.
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