success Archives - Page 3 of 33 - The Attorney Marketing Center

Going on a research diet

June 16, 2023 by David M. Ward

If you’re like me, you never know if you’ve done enough research. There’s always more to look at and, God bless us, we can’t help ourselves—we keep looking.

In school, in business, and in a law practice, due dates and deadlines come to our rescue. We “call a lid” because we have to get the work out the door—or else.

When there is no deadline imposed by a teacher, a client or court, however, it’s a different story.

How long have you been planning and researching that book or business project?. Exactly.

You never know when you’ve done enough research so you keep doing more, just in case.

Perfectionism? Self-doubt? Imposter syndrome? Call it by any name, but it boils down to our fear of making a mistake.

But we can’t spend our life in perpetual research. At some point we have to say, “enough”.

But how?

One way is to redefine the project or goal. Instead of doing enough research to write the book, for example, the task is to do enough research to START writing the book.

But that’s only a partial solution because you will inevitably see something that calls for you to do more research.

What then? How do you know when you’ve done enough?

You don’t. Not by any logical metric, anyway. You’re better off trusting your gut. When you feel pulled towards the finish line more than you feel pulled to doing more research, you go with that.

It’s your only option. Unless you’re prepared to hold yourself accountable to someone else. A partner, spouse, or friend—someone who won’t let you get away with endless research.

Someone who will kick your butt for you. Like your teacher, your client, or the court.

Filed Under: Personal development, Publicity, success, Writing

“You’ve got to explode out of the mud!”

June 14, 2023 by David M. Ward

When you can’t seem to get started on a big project, or make progress on one, or you’re struggling with a difficult situation and don’t know what to do, typically, you change your approach. You do more research, try different tools and different strategies, and little by little, step by step, you climb out of the mud.

And that usually works.

But sometimes, the mud turns into quicksand, and you’re stuck. And the harder you try, the harder it is to get out.

You need a different approach. Instead of tinkering and looking for incremental solutions, you have to do something radical.

“You’ve got to explode out of the mud,” says CEO and author John Addison.

To do that, you’ need to change how you think about things. And use your imagination.

Look at what others have done when faced with similar challenges and ask yourself, “What would (this person) do if they were in my position?” You couldn’t find the answer. Maybe they can.

If your goal seems impossibly difficult, ask yourself, “What would I do if this was easy?” If things are going too slowly, ask, “What would have to happen for me to finish this project in the next 30 days?” Or, “What would I do if I had one year to live and failure was not an option?”

If you’re stuck, pretend you’re not. Pretend you know what to do to explode out of the mud.

Filed Under: Productivity, success

Expensive? Damn right!

June 9, 2023 by David M. Ward

When you look through the app store, you see more than a few complaints about certain apps being too expensive. They’ll tell you why and compare the app to others that are available for less.

Guess which apps sell the most? Which apps are the most profitable?

Yep. The “expensive” apps.

People may complain but they want high quality and they’re willing to pay more to get it. The’ll tell you why, right there in their review. They say,“It’s expensive, but worth every penny.”

Which just happens to be what you want your clients to say about you.

Of course, you have to get the “worth it” part right first. You can’t raise your fees and expect clients to pay top dollar for services that aren’t “worth it”. But if you are worth more, you should charge more.

You will lose some clients who can’t afford you, it’s true. But more than make up for that loss by higher revenue from the ones who stick and the new ones to ome along.

What could you do to increase your value so you can justify higher fees?

That’s what you have to figure out.The good news is it doesn’t take as much as you think.

In marketing, perception is everything. You don’t have to get the highest verdicts and settlements or have the most prestigious clients to qualify. Other factors come in to play. The things your clients say about you, the people you associate with, the causes with which you are identified, are also important. So are the articles you write, the interviews you give, your videos and podcast and presentations..

They are all part of how people perceive you and thus part of the value you offer.

And guess what? Your fees are part of that, too. Charge more and people assume there is a reason. They assume that if other people pay those higher fees, you must be worth it, because people associate price with quality.

Bottom line, increase your fees and do what you can to get everyone to say you’re worth it. If enough people say it, it must be true.

The Attorney Marketing Formula

Filed Under: Attorneys fees, success

Why we don’t do things we know we should

May 25, 2023 by David M. Ward

My dad always told his business clients not to sign any contracts without showing them to him first. More often than not, they didn’t listen, usually because they didn’t want to spend the money.

No doubt you’ve seen the same thing in your practice.

Why don’t clients listen?

For the same reasons you don’t do things you know you should.

You’ve repeatedly heard from me and others about the value of staying in touch with your clients and prospects. You’ve heard that you should delegate more of your work and not try to do everything yourself. You’ve heard about the value of improving your writing, speaking, and interpersonal skills.

You know these things, but don’t always do them.

Maybe you don’t want to spend the money, or the time. Maybe you’re busy. Maybe you intend to do them but forget.

But the biggest reason you don’t do these things, and others, is that you don’t believe they are important. Or important enough. Because if you did, you would.

Think about it, if you truly believed that staying in touch with your clients and contacts via a weekly email (for example) could help you double your practice in less than a year, you would do it, wouldn’t you?

If your clients truly believed that calling you before they sign a contract would save them a lot of money and a lot of grief, they would do it.

Reminders help. Accountability helps. But if you want to change your clients’ behavior, or your own, work on their (and your) belief.

Show clients and prospects what happened to other clients who didn’t follow your advice. Show them testimonials and positive reviews and success stories of people who did.

Because if you say it, they can doubt it. If your other clients say it, it must be true.

Build your practice with a weekly email newsletter

Filed Under: Email, Newsletters, success

Think bigger, run faster, work harder

May 24, 2023 by David M. Ward

We’re often told that hard work is the answer. I say hard work can be a path to success, but it’s not the only path. Just look at how many people bust their butt every day but make little (or no) progress.

Some people are successful by showing up consistently over a long period of time. Objectively speaking, they don’t work hard or run fast. They do a little every day, do it well, and keep doing it. They improve their skills, deepen their relationships, and allow their efforts to compound.

Slow and steady wins their race, while others burn brightly and burn out.

Some people have good business connections and leverage them effectively. Some have money to burn. Some people are smarter than average, some have more charisma, and some happen to be in the right place at the right time.

There’s also the “passion” factor. Some people love what they do and their enthusiasm and joy for doing it attracts people and opportunities that allow them to leapfrog others who are just doing a job.

Here’s the good news. We get to choose our path. Some choose to work hard, some choose something else.

We need to give ourselves permission to choose the path that’s right for us, and remind ourself to focus on our strengths instead of trying to run fast enough to overcome our weaknesses.

When we do, we can not only get where we want to go, we can enjoy getting there.

Filed Under: success

You’re not going to want to do this (but you should)

April 17, 2023 by David M. Ward

Have you ever stopped to think about how much more you could accomplish if you just had the time? The projects you could finish (or start and then finish), the skills you could learn or improve?

You want to take a course, learn a new language, build a second brain, or finish that book that’s gathering dust on your hard drive. You want to learn how to get more referrals, better clients, more leads, more subscribers, or more people registering for your seminars. You want to expand into a new practice area or open another office.

But you’re busy with work and don’t have the time.

That’s the problem. The solution is to do it anyway. Take some of the time (you don’t have), and dedicate it to doing things that allow you to “level up” your practice and, eventually, allow you to buy back that time.

It’s an investment in your future.

Specifically, block out one hour on your calendar every weekday. Call it your “power hour”. Or your financial freedom hour. Or don’t call it anything, just do it.

I know, it’s too much time. You’re not sure how you’ll use it. You think I’m crazy for even suggesting this nonsense.

Block out the time even if you don’t know if you should or how you’ll use it. You will use it. And be glad you did.

You’ve heard me talk about calendaring 15 minutes a day for marketing. 15 minutes is a great place to start and create a daily habit, but imagine what you could accomplish if you used an entire hour for marketing.

It’s your power hour. Use all or part of it for marketing if you want to. I did that when I was struggling in my early days and it changed my life.

If you’re still having trouble wrapping your head around using that much time for non-billable work, start with 30 minutes. Use your lunch hour. Or do this early morning before you start your regular day.

But do it. Because it can change your life.

Filed Under: Law office management, success, Time Management

3 things you need for success in private practice

April 13, 2023 by David M. Ward

What does it take to make it? A lot of things can help. Cash, for one. Because if you can put it to work wisely, you can get things off to a good start or more easily move to the next level. But cash isn’t one of the 3 things you need.

How about mental toughness? Also good. But also not essential. Even for litigators.

Knowing a lot of influential people? Excellent. But not on the list of must-haves.

Charm? Good looks? Being smarter than the average bear?

No.

So, what then? What are the 3 things you need for success?

At the top of the list, far above the other two, is desire. You’ve got to want it. So let’s call it, “burning desire”.

But not necessarily the desire to be a successful lawyer. The desire to be, do, or have something that being a successful lawyer makes possible.

Something that’s important enough to you to get you out of bed in the morning and do things you might not feel like doing.

For some, that might mean being able to move their family to a safer neighborhood or helping their older parents (finally) retire. For others, it might mean helping to save humanity.

Something you are passionate about. Something you might be brought to tears when you think about not getting it.

That kind of desire. Not ego-driven desire.

Desire is at the top of the list because that’s what will see you through the tough times, disappointment, and sacrifice that often go hand-in-hand with building a successful practice. Desire is the key to everything else.

What’s number 2? Willingness to learn. But not just legal knowledge or your core legal skills.

There’s a lot to learn about marketing, hiring and keeping good people, budgeting, productive work habits, and all the paperwork.

Most of all, there’s a lot to learn about yourself. Your personal and interpersonal skills. Because success means becoming the kind of person who is successful.

As Jim Rohn put it, you need to work on yourself more than your business.

Which leads to number 3. Willingness to do the work.

You may have the desire and be willing to learn, but if you’re not willing to show up every day and do the work, and keep doing it, you’re not going to get to the promised land.

I’m not saying you have to continually burn the midnight oil, never take breaks, or do things you hate doing. You needn’t work till you drop. You can (and should) look for shortcuts, and create systems and habits that make things easier and better.

You can have a life while you’re building your business.

You can also go quickly or slowly and take the path that’s right for you. But you have to do the work and that means you have to keep moving.

Because there’s a lot to learn and even more to do.

The Quantum Leap Marketing System (if you’re ready)

Filed Under: Law office management, success

Revenue generating activity

April 5, 2023 by David M. Ward

Business advisors of all stripes talk about the primacy of revenue generating activity for sustaining and growing a business. They tell you to should spend most of your time doing this because it is the only thing that brings in income.

“Everything else is an expense.”

Literally, that’s true. If you spend most of your time and resources on creating value for your clients, your business will be profitable and grow.

So, how do we define revenue generating activities?

For lawyers in private practice, anything you do that allows you to bill a client clearly qualifies. Admin tasks might be necessary for managing the people and processes for creating and collecting that revenue, but don’t qualify as revenue generating by themselves.

Okay, so you want to spend most of your time doing billable work. But how much?

If you spend 80% of your time doing billable work, is that enough? Is spending 20% of your gross income (and time) on admin too much?

Ultimately, this is the debate we have with ourselves, our partners and advisors.

But it doesn’t only come down to doing the work vs. the cost of getting it done. There are other activities that come into play.

Continuing education, personal development, and business development, for example.

These aren’t revenue generating in the classical sense, but they can create significant revenue, arguably with significantly less effort than it takes to do the billable work.

It’s true.

When you improve your marketing skills, you can get more leads and prospective clients, attract bigger cases and better clients, expand into additional markets, and increase profits by being able to hire more help and/or open more offices.

When you improve your personal skills, e.g., sales, networking, speaking, writing, productivity, etc., you can attract even more prospects and close a higher percentage of them, get more repeat business, streamline your workflows, and build deeper relationships with other professionals who can lead you to additional opportunities to develop your practice and career.

And when you improve your core legal skills and knowledge, you can increase your value to your clients, allowing you to bill higher rates.

Revenue generating activities, to be sure.

I can’t tell you how much time to spend on these activities, only that if you want to grow, you should consider spending more.

When you’re ready to take a quantum leap in your practice, here’s what to do

Filed Under: Law office management, Marketing legal services, success

It’s not supposed to be easy

March 27, 2023 by David M. Ward

Practicing law. Marketing. Building your career. None of it is supposed to be easy.

Sometimes it is easy. But not always. Don’t expect it to be.

If it was always easy, if everyone you talk to wants to sign up, if everything you write goes viral, if everything you sell is purchased and clients keep coming back for more, you’re playing it too safe and limiting your growth.

Don’t do that.

Don’t make it your top priority to please everyone or avoid offending anyone. Don’t avoid all risks or wait until you’re 100% sure before you begin.

Don’t sell cheap. Don’t give it all away.

Be nice, but don’t be a pushover.

When you lose, accept the loss and keep going. Loss, rejection, struggle, pain—are part of the process. And you should welcome this because the more you lose, the more opportunities there are to learn and grow and do bigger things.

On the other hand, it’s not supposed to be unbearably hard. Don’t believe it, or accept it.

There is always light at the end of the tunnel. Success is truly just around the corner. Things do get better.

Assume that everything is always working out for you. Because it is.

Filed Under: Inspiration, success

I quit!

March 21, 2023 by David M. Ward

I start a lot of books, articles, and videos, I never finish. I start a lot of projects and abandon them. I download a lot of apps and delete them in seconds.

I guess you could call me a serial quitter.

If you do, I’ll say ‘thank you’ because quitting is smart. A productive use of our time.

When you try things, you get ideas for other projects that are quicker or easier or a better fit. I get a lot of ideas for content that way.

Trying lots of things helps you confirm that what you’re already doing is “good enough” and you don’t need to spend more time on something new. I do that with apps all the time.

You learn things you can use with the things you currently do. You may find a better way to organize your notes or tasks, for example, by watching videos about other apps or what others do with them.

When you start a project, you learn whether you enjoy working on it, or whether it will succeed. If you don’t try, you may continue thinking about it when you would be better off moving on.

You may start something, like it, but realize that now isn’t the time to do it and put that project on hold for the future, giving you time to plan and collect more information you can use when you’re ready to dive in.

Trying new things can also be a pleasant distraction from your regular work. It may or may not lead to something, but it is a productive use of your time because it might.

In fact, I just read about a productivity expert who makes “quitting” his default. He starts a lot of things with the express intention of not finishing them.

By quitting a lot of things, he has time for the best ideas. Sometimes, he finds them right away. Sometimes, they stick with him after he’s quit, and he goes back to them.

If you’re still not convinced of the value of quitting, think about what would happen if you never quit. You’d be overwhelmed with projects and ideas that eventually go nowhere.

Quit fast and avoid the mess.