Starting a Law Firm | Goals for 2010

I know I know, another goals for 2010 post. If you read any other blogs then you are probably seeing these pop up all over the place. Everyone is telling you how to set goals you can achieve and set goals that will help make starting a law firm a reality for you. Well, I'm selfish. I care about your success, but I like to do a little less talk and a little more show. To do that, I'm going to tell you what my goals are for 2010 for starting my law firm (there won't be any personal goals in here, so wifey, don't get mad).

Before I get there, I want to talk about the questions I've asked myself to get to my answers. And, as is usual with much of my direction, I haven't obtained this information from any lawyer sites. I picked it up from somewhere else. And to get to my goals for the year I asked myself 4 primary questions. First, how much money do I want to make this year? Second, what kinds of specific things do I want to do with the money I will make? Third, what am I going to do to reach that moneymaking goal? And finally, what am I going to do to measure day to day success?

First, the money. People start law firms all the time for different reasons. One of my reasons is to make money. I want to be able to provide for my family. But I'm realistic. I know it grows over time. But I also know to reach goals you have to set goals. My gross income goal for this year is $100,000. That boils down to about $8,333 a month, though I may not make that much every month (the goal is to increase my revenues every month).

Second, what kinds of things do I want to do with the money I'll make? The first thing I want to do is pay down debt. I won't tell you what I owe, but it's a lot. The main thing I want to do with this money is pay down the debts I owe (these are primarily personal debts). I'd like to pay down at least half of the debt that I owe that isn't associated with student loans (the interest rate is too good to pay off early). The second thing I want to do is travel with my wife. The third thing is play some golf. And the fourth thing is begin saving money to buy a house.

Third, what am I going to do to reach that moneymaking goal? First, I am going to continue to strictly adhere to my online marketing plan (you can read more about that here). Second, I am going to set up a system where I give one online or in-person talk a month about dealing with cops. Third, I am going to continue to track and tweak my marketing efforts to get the return on investment I need. And finally, I'm going to continue working every day to become the best Seattle DUI attorney there is (this includes doing at least 5 trials this year).

Fourth, and finally, what am I going to do to measure day to day success? This is easy, but won't be readily explained here. I'm going to create a strategic plan in the next couple of days that will produce a day to day list of action items to carry out. It will be set up so the next 6 months or so are planned out for me. The day to day satisfaction I'm going to take out of meeting my goals is crossing everything off the to-do list I've got scheduled for that day.

2010 is on the horizon, and I'm really excited about it. I'm looking forward to getting new business, helping new people, and making more money.

By the way, I'm working out my finances for this year right now. When I get those numbers I'll let you know what they are so you can have an idea of what I've been doing.

Happy New Year and thanks for reading How to Start a Law Firm!

Related Posts:

How to Start a Law Firm | To-Do List

Starting a Law Firm | Practice Update

Turning Down Clients the Key to Starting a Law Firm Successfully

You may have just read the title of this post and immediately thought of clicking away. After all, how can you make any money if you turn down clients? Isn't the goal to make as much as possible, and isn't that goal only attained by getting the maximum number of clients? I mean, if you are just starting a law firm, isn't any client better than no client?

The short answers are: you can make more money if you turn down certain clients; the goal is to make as much money as possible, but that doesn't necessarily mean getting as many clients as possible; and no, any client is not better than no client at all.

If you've already started the journey, you know starting a law firm is a scary experience. And for me, it was probably about as scary as it could get. I was in a new city, didn't know any people, and was scared the phone might never ring. But, keeping my law firm goals in mind and thinking big picture instead of immediate gratification helped my law firm generate money from day one.

Turning Down Bad Clients is Okay When Starting a Law Firm

Turning down clients to make more money with your new law firm, while appearing to be a little counter intuitive, definitively holds true. Let me give you an example from my practice to show you what I mean. I had someone come into the office who had a problem. They were facing some pretty serious criminal charges. No problem, I told them, I can help you, it will only cost you x dollars. I need to be paid up front and once I get that payment I'll help you.

The client's court date came and they told me they'd have a check waiting. I showed up, entered my appearance, got the check, and deposited it. And it bounced. Not only did it bounce, but I found out it was a check on a bank account that had been closed. So I called the client and told her I needed to be paid, in cash. She said okay, but she couldn't get it all, she could only come up with about a third. I said okay, bring the third and then pay me x dollars a month after that.

The last time I got paid was in September. I've been doing some work for her ever since, and every time I ask for payment I get excuses that I buy and give her more time. Tomorrow I'm entering my motion to withdraw and get out of the case. And if I would have demanded payment earlier I could have used the time I wasted helping this person to help a paying client or do something else that would help my business.

And it isn't just nonpaying clients. You ever have someone come in that you knew was going to be difficult? That was going to be pulling teeth to work with? Why take them on as a client? I know it's a scary proposition to turn business away, but you will be happier, your employees will be happier, and other people will still want your help if you turn bad potential clients away.

Making the Most Money Possible Doesn't Mean Having the Most Clients Possible

You can have two kinds of practice as an attorney - a volume practice or a value practice. The volume practice relies on discount prices and a high volume of clients. Think bankruptcy, think criminal defense (for some people), think traffic defense. You need a lot of people to survive because the profit each client gives you is small.

The value practice works in a different way. Your clients are paying you not for your time or because you are the cheapest, but because you provide something to them that they consider valuable enough to pay a premium (or at least market or above market value for). It is your job to create and demonstrate that value to potential clients, but it is there, and it is possible. A value practice makes more money with less clients by making more money off of each case, by providing more value to each case.

If you are a volume practice, turning down clients is difficult. If you are a value practice, it is easy.

Any Client is Not Better Than No Client at All

I think you already know where this is going. The bad client doesn't pay according to your agreement. The bad client calls you for no reason. The bad client doesn't adhere to your policies and procedures they agreed to at the beginning. The bad client has had previous attorneys and moved on to you. The bad client is just not a nice person. And you don't need the bad clients.

And turning them down will not only not have a bad effect on your business, it could actually help it thrive. First, you won't have the stress of dealing with that bad client. Second, you won't have the stress of trying to track them down for payment. And third, you can use that time to work on your firm (marketing, marketing, marketing) and work for your good clients, your paying clients.

I'm a Seattle DUI attorney. This means I have the choice of slugging it out in the gutter, racing to be the cheapest attorney out there or provide a great service to the clients I have, at a good price. I think you know which way I'm going.

Any thoughts, questions, comments? Please leave them below.

Related Posts:

Starting a Law Firm? Get Your Money Up Front

Challenges of Starting a New Law Firm

Starting a Law Firm and Time Management

When you are starting a law firm one of the first things you are going to have to think about is how to manage your time, particularly if you're starting a solo law firm. Every once in a while I make a short list of all the hats I might wear in any given day, and it ends up looking a little something like this (in no particular order): attorney; receptionist; paralegal; office manager; marketing manager; and customer service representative. As you might expect, my days can go by in a flurry feeling like I get nothing done.

To get the most out of my day I've found it is best to do two things: first, every day I devote a third of my day to marketing your law firm, a third of my day to administrative tasks, and and a third of my day to lawyering. That way all of the things that need to get done get done. And second, I make a to-do list every day so I know exactly what I have to get done. These two things help me maximize my time, keep everything moving forward, and prevent me from going crazy thinking about all of the things that have to get done.

Of course, some days things will pop up and the time allowance will get skewed, or you won't get all the way through your list. But that's okay. Just keep working down the list. And cross things off when you get done with them - it will make you feel good knowing you are getting stuff done and at the end of the day you can see what you have gotten done.

Remember that you can't get everything done in one day. Break a task up into manageable pieces and get something done every day. And follow the one third rule. It will ensure that you are getting stuff done in all the aspects of your practice that are important, not just the one.

Why Bad Decisions Make Good Stories--A Cure for Writer's Block

Still life--it doesn't make for good stories. Bad decisions? They do.

A friend from Florida just emailed me a list of random thoughts, truisms to laugh at or shake your head over. Here's the one that grabbed me for this week's writing exercise: "Bad decisions make good stories." Funny, but really accurate. A good motto for writers.

Bad decisions are one of the only ways plot is furthered in memoir and fiction. If you're stuck in a rut, chances are your writing is staying too safe.

This week's discussion and exercise looks at a simple question. Why are you keeping bad decisions out of your book?

Staying Safe
A student in my classes complained about her writer's block. She wrote several chapters that just flowed out. Then, about chapter 5, she got stuck. Nothing happened--either on the page or with the pen. I suggested she look at the bad decisions in her chapters. Try to find something that made everyone uneasy or got them into trouble.

What you're after here are the qualities of risk. What does the edge feel like? What does it feel like to "up the stakes" in your writing?

This writer was working on her storyboard (see post two weeks ago) so she went back to it. As she reviewed the plot points, she realized nothing big had happened. She was saving the big stuff for later. No bad decisions yet, so very little momentum. Very little energy to propel the plot.

I asked her why not. As she explained, I saw that this writer is a very nice person. She believes in a world where most people are good at heart. She just couldn't see getting her characters in trouble, painting them as anything but good people too.

I like her, who wouldn't? And I also believe in that kind of world. But not on paper. Not in fiction or memoir, especially if you want to publish today.

I'm not suggesting you have to make murder and mayhem. Bad decisions can just be telling a white lie, and watching the consequences unfold. I asked this writer if she'd ever told a white lie, and she said, "Of course, who hasn't?"

"Find your bad decisions," I suggested. "List them, then transport one into your story."

Finding Bad Decisions--This Week's Writing Exercise
We've all made bad decisions. We've been on the receiving end of other people's, too. They are hard to forget, no matter how hard we try. Think of what your "story" was after the decision. It probably had drama, movement, energy, and consequences. That's what you're after in your writing.

This week write about one really bad decision you made in your life. Write about it in all its glory. I like to set a kitchen timer for 15 minutes, to limit the agony. Maybe you're far enough away to not feel the pain of it again, but if you do feel some embarrassment or unease as you write, good thing--because it'll make the writing that much more emotionally grabbing for a reader.

Now look at your book draft. Where are the bad decisions? If you don't have many, make a list of 10 things your character would never do. (Use this equally for memoir or fiction.) Now write one scene, one moment, using one item on the list--imagining it happening.

See if this provides momentum. Gets you unstuck. Out of that "still life."

PS We'll carry this one step further next week, with an update on storyboards. I've been learning a lot as I work on my novel's sequel, and I'm feeling far from stuck now--hooray!

Working with Unsavory Characters

A reader recently posted this excellent question: "I have many stories in which the characters are not easily appreciated. I am sure many of my stories will be filled with hints of resentment, bitterness and disdain. Many players acted badly, and hurt the lives of many people. I guess forgiveness is due, but the facts are the facts. How do I deal with that?"

Another reader wrote me the same week, very disappointed in the ending of a popular thriller which let the bad guys triumph. Why'd the author do that? he wondered. Such a let down, after a great story.

So here we have the same dilemma, from both sides.

What do you do, as a writer, when one or more of your characters is not very likeable (at best) or downright horrible (at worst)? You'll be spending time with this person. A negative character isn't like a downward turn of plot. Plot changes. People often do, but they don't always, especially if their nastiness is part of who they are.

And how does a negative character affect a reader? Will they stop following your story, or will they read to the end and be so disgusted, they won't want to recommend your book to anyone?

An Example from Tobias Wolff
Tobias Wolff wrote a fabulous short story called "Bullet in the Brain." I teach this story in one of my one-day workshops because it's complex, amazing, and gives writers so much information on working with unsavory characters.

Wolff presents a character, Anders, who is thoroughly despicable. So much so that he gets himself killed halfway through the story. But the way Wolff continues the story, revealing Anders beneath the anger, boredom, and frustration that makes him a really bad guy, is brilliant.

We end the story actually feeling the depths of humanness, even in this miserable person. How is this possible? How does the process work, for the writer, while he or she is putting the story together?

My Challenge with Melvin
Melvin Fisher is the main male character in my novel Qualities of Light. He's the first character that "came" to me, nine years ago, and was the subject for a short story published many years before the novel. Melvin was a pest; he didn't let me stop writing about him, even though I grew to really dislike him.

He's everything you don't want in a friend or relative: self-absorbed, terrifically talented but pretty mean-spirited about it, short with loved ones, a betrayer at his worst. A painter, who hasn't actually had affairs, Melvin falls in love with his models and does everything but sleep with them. Somehow he believes this is OK, justified by his need to "absorb beauty."

Bleech. My writing groups, three of them over the years Melvin has haunted me, agree. The first one actually told me they really didn't want to hear more Melvin scenes until he got nicer.

So what's a writer to do?

I would've dumped Melvin like a bad lunch date if he hadn't presented some interesting writerly problems for me. I needed to learn how to make him less evil. In other words, if my basic belief in life and in writing is that human beings have many sides, not just bad or good, where was Melvin's compassion, beauty, shades of gray? Could I show him as vulnerable, learning and growing? Who in my story would help me do this?

It turned out to be Molly, his teenage daughter. She saves the entire family in Qualities of Light, but mostly she saves her dad. From himself.

One reader told me, "I loved your book, and by the end I even got to like Melvin." That was my biggest complement.

This Week's Exercise: Write a "Good" Bad Character
Find someone bad in your story, be it a real person or a fictional one, and interview them on paper. Pretend you are a very skilled interviewer who knows how to get to the truth about someone. First ask them what bad stuff they've done. Get them to be specific--who have they cheated, lied to, stolen from, or worse? Then begin asking them about good stuff they've done--even small.

Finally ask your character about their missed chances, their longings, what they wanted from life but never got. Go beneath their bitterness if you can, into the innocence they once had.

If you can, get ahold of "Bullet in the Brain" (search for it online, or better, get ahold of the short-story collection--you'll love Wolff's other stories too). Read it as a writer, asking yourself how Tobias Wolff allows us to see a bad character in a good light.

The ending lines are particularly important, so pay attention, but don't read ahead. It's a great surprise.

What Makes Strong Writing? Something to Think about as You Work on Your Book

How does a book writer create writing that pulls a reader in, that engages us so well, we can't stop reading? A favorite nonfiction writer, Malcolm Gladwell, spoke about this in the preface to his book What the Dog Saw and Other Adventures.

Gladwell's topics are potentially dry. I love his ability to present his material in an amazingly engaging way.

"Good writing does not succeed or fail on the strength of its ability to persuade," he said. "It succeeds or fails on the strength of its ability to engage you, to make you think, to give you a glimpse into someone else's head--even if in the end you conclude that someone else's head is not a place you'd really like to be."

Each book writer has their topic, the thing they must write about. Some write about flowers, some write about addictions. No matter your topic, the trick is to make it engaging. It's harder than it sounds. The key is something called "container."

On Sunday I taught a one-day workshop at the Loft Literary Center in Minneapolis called "Self-Editing for Book Writers." We spent all day on this question: How does a book writer move from the writer's view to the reader's? How do we get the reader engaged in our work? It usually happens in the crafting stage, or editing stage. In the class, I guide writers through a series of exercises that let them move to the reader's chair, instead of the writer's.

This is the first step to producing the engaging writing that Gladwell is talking about.

Tough Material, Great Container
In the class, we read an essay by Susan J. Miller, excerpted from her book Never Let Me Down. Miller's father was a well-respected jazz musician who hung out with the likes of George Handy and Stan Getz. But he was also a heroin addict, and her life was terribly affected by this. Her memoir is heart-breaking.

Some of the class members were really repulsed by the essay. Some couldn't even finish it. Others loved it. No one was nuetral. We had a lively debate, trying to understand why the essay affected us so much.

In the end, we concluded it was because of her extraordinary "container," the living environment of her story.

Container Equals Emotion
This is the key to engaging writing. Container, the enviroment of your book's story, delivers more emotion than plot, characters, topic, structure, or all of these combined.

"It's counter-intuitive," said one class member. You would think that good plot, exciting action, would create emotional response.

Good plot creates momentum. It drives the story forward. Container creates emotional response. It's what makes us feel hit in the gut by a story's tender moment or feel our hearts racing with anticipation by a twist. Without container, plot is just a series of events, like a newspaper report.

Why else would I, as a reader, become so engaged in the healing of a crime-ridden neighborhood, the comeback of Hush Puppy Shoes, and other examples from Gladwell's book, The Tipping Point? I don't care about Hush Puppies. Really. But I did when he talked about them. Same with Susan Miller's work. Heroin addiction is not on my list of fun things to read about. But I was totally engrossed by her tale.

Because both Gladwell and Miller are masters of writing container.

How Is Container Presented?
Container is presented in writing in several ways. Here are a few from just one paragraph of Miller's essay:

1. physical setting (being on a speeding subway train, watching the night flash by outside the grimy windows)
2. use of the five senses (screech of train wheels, whisper of her father's voice against her ear)
3. physical sensations (the rocking of a train causing nausea, felt in the body)
4. word choice ("screech" and "whisper" echo the sounds of jazz being played--Miller's overall container for the essay)
5. paragraph length and flow (a series of clauses, separated by commas, giving the impression of movement and jerkiness while on the subway train)

The effect of this paragraph--one where her father takes her on a train ride then gleefully whispers that he just dropped acid--is one of terror. A young girl is aware that her father might at any moment decide the train car is a tomb and try to jump off. What can she do? Not much. She just has to ride out the ride.

It's an astonishing container.

This Week's Exercise
Choose a dead spot in your writing--a paragraph or a page. Insert one of the above tools to increase container. See if you can let go of your preferences as a writer and be willing to see your work from the reader's view. Does more emotion come through?

When Starting a Law Firm, Be Careful What You Outsource

One of the difficult tasks you will face soon after starting your own law firm is what to delegate and what to do yourself. And more importantly, what you delegate in house and what you delegate out of house. I was reminded of this lesson today when a colleague of mine (in the sense that all criminal attorneys are colleagues of mine) was called out for outsourcing his marketing and having the marketing company use some less than professional methods of marketing.

If you know anything about internet marketing (and if you don't and are starting your own law firm you better learn) and marketing your law firm, you quickly discover that one thing can send you to the top of the Google ranks faster than anything else - links from other sites to your sites with your keywords in them. But, as you might expect, getting those links is harder than you might expect (and, by the way, if anyone wants to link to this site, feel free - I love links). Some people try to get them in less than honest ways (and there are different degrees of this).

One of the dishonest ways is called comment spamming. Comment spamming is when you troll other blogs and websites and leave comments for the sole purpose of getting a link back to your site. Usually these comments contribute nothing to the article or the conversation in the comments. They are made solely to get a link. The funny thing about these links is that Google doesn't even count them (I could explain this in more detail but it would take to long) so they are doing this for nothing.

My criminal defense attorney friend found himself in the cross hairs of some angry bloggers because he was comment spamming on their site. And after he promised to stop he kept on doing it. His name is Bradley Johnson and you can read those posts at the following links - W-T-F?; Bradley Johnson, Seattle Spam Lawyer; I'm Going to Make a Bet with You Bradley Johnson, Seattle Personal Injury Lawyer, And Spammer; and Don't Be Bradley Johnson.

The real problem I have with something like this is that you have to be in charge of the content you are putting out there and have to know what your name is being put on. If you don't, there is the chance that you could end up with something like above happening, which is extremely hard to get rid of. Your reputation is everything. For me, I require the approval of all marketing materials that go out with my name on the, particularly on the internet (they will stay around forever).

Bottom line, being a criminal attorney or DUI attorney is tough. The market is tough. There is a lot of competition. And it is all moving toward the internet. But that doesn't mean you should cut corners. Take the extra time to figure out what you need to do to be successful, and then create your own content. You'll sleep much better at night knowing the above won't happen to you.