When starting any kind of marketing project, it is often tempting to dive right in to the minute details. I’ve been guilty of this myself, and I think it is a sign of being excited and eager.

I remember one client that wanted a blog. They went through all the possible benefits their firm could reap from having a good blog. But they thought of one problem: if the blog took off and became very successful, who would have to answer the phones when reporters called to interview their attorneys? And if droves of perspective clients contacted the firm because of the blog, who would take on the new clients?

I thought of it as trying to find space to fit all their unicorns.

To be clear, I don’t want to make it sound like the client was overreacting and wasting time. In fact hearing questions like this is nearly always a good sign. It’s a sign that they truly believe in the project, and that they want to make sure the right processes are in place to allow it to succeed. All good things.

But there are other times when dwelling on what could possibly, remotely, maybe, potentially happen can hold you back from the project at hand. It’s good to know where you’re going to put the unicorns, but it is more important to figure out how you’re going to find them in the first place.

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Many years ago in a far off land, there was a small village called Nocontextia. It was a fairly happy place, much like our own world today.

Nocontextia had a complex set of laws to govern the behavior of its citizens. And although life was usually peaceful and serene, there were times when people sought the advice of someone that knew the ins and outs of the laws.

In Nocontextia there were two people who citizens visited when looking for legal advice. One was the Guru, the other was The Servant.

The Guru lived on the top of a hill overlooking the village. He was well known as the expert on all things legal in Nocontextia. If somone had a very complicated, difficult legal problem, they would seek the Guru.

Since the Guru never left his hillside mansion, people had to climb the hill, a two-day walk, to get there. And once they arrived, some villagers had to wait for hours just to speak with the Guru’s assistant. If the Guru decided to take the case, he would often demand a very high price for his advice and representation.

Because the Guru only took on a very limited number of cases, villagers felt honored when the Guru decided theirs was a worthy case. The high price the Guru commanded was hardly a concern; the client was just elated to be deemed sufficient.

Back in town, the Servant worked in a small office next to a butcher shop. Also a practicioner of law, the Servant’s practice was much different than the Guru’s. People went to the Servant when they felt they already knew enough about their case, but just needed someone to do the work. Rather than being known as a creative expert, the Servant was seen as the person to go to when you needed legal work done.

The Servant was always happy to go out of his way to satisfy a client, and he took on any client that would come to his office. He took pride in always delivering excellent client service.

Though very different, the client and the Guru were both bound by the same set of laws. Their main difference: perception.

In today’s legal marketing, I often see the same split in perception/projection. There are Gurus and Servants.

The Gurus are attorneys and firms that are known by name and reputation. They often charge high rates, and clients come to them. They are at an atvantage in that they can pick and choose who to represent.

The Servants are the attorneys and firms that focus only on client service. These firms take the opposite approach in that they go looking for clients. They convince clients that they are competent and will focus on the needs and wants of the client. In this case, the client is the expert, they attorney is just doing the legal work.

I’m drawing no value judgement here; I’m not saying one is better than the other. Sure, everyone would love to be a Guru, but one does not become a Guru by just charging a lot of money and living atop a hill. But Gurus would do well to take on some of the Servant’s commitment to service.

These are two extremes on what is a continuum of legal service approaches. Where do you fit in?

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I’m currently reading a book on what could best be described as the “first humans.” The book explores the origin of consciousness and more specifically, the birth of language. In it, one scene describes early humans in a cave doing random activities. Picture a caveman chipping away at stones, and in an instant, he recognizes that a sharp stone is something he can use. The discovery turns a piece of meaningless rock into something that has utility and definition. From that point forward, sharpened rock is a necessity.

When I’m reading, I have to admit that I’m not consciously looking for parallels to legal marketing. Thank God. What a tortured existence that would be! But after processing the text, I started thinking about the “New Necessity” as something that, in our modern capitalist society, businesses and entrepreneurs are constantly striving to find.

An invention, a piece of software, a new gadget: all good enough. But if you really want to make a splash, you have to bring something to market that everyone “must have.” Now, I’m not going to debate the definition of “must have” here. Surely, as a species, we don’t need iPods. In fact, I don’t have one and I’m able to function just the same.

Getting out of the realm of physical products, there are several new necessities in legal marketing that have developed over the years.

1) The Logo- As competition among law firms increased, firms realized that a visual representation- something that triggered thoughts, feelings, and remembrance of a firm could be beneficial. Though the results and efficacy of law firm logos are often debated, that is beside the point. A logo is just something a firm has to have.

2) The Web Site- Like smashing at stones in a cave, the early WWW was seen as an academic exercise. But when the broader business community saw the web as an opportunity to promote products and services, competitors had to follow suit. If the firm down the block has a web site, you better have one too. The law firm web site became a new necessity.

One thing that can be said of the new necessity is that it is a game of innovation followed by assimilation. The new necessity has a life cycle.

1. Someone does something completely different and stands out.

2. People notice that the new thing has a potential to be beneficial.

3. Some jump on the bandwagon, others see this new thing as just a fad.

4. The people that resisted the new give in and join the rest.

5. The “new” isn’t new anymore. It’s a given. Now no one stands out.

So what will the next new necessity be? Will it be blogs? I don’t think it will be. Because right now, the quality and frequency of blog posts have a direct relationship with the blog’s success. In other words, it takes effort. So those people in law firms that say “Blogs aren’t worth our time” won’t be the people that finally give in and say “Fine, everyone has one. Guess we should too.”

With blogs, you can’t just phone it in. Just having one doesn’t put your firm on par with the early innovators.

So, what’s the new necessity in legal marketing going to look like?

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On Tuesday, the MegaMillions jackpot is estimated at $135 Million. And whenever the lottery gets over $100 Million, I find myself daydreaming, thinking of what I’d do with that kind of money.

But here’s a question for you: imagine that you win, but have one restriction. You have to spend the money on growing your law firm.

If you’ve ever seen Brewster’s Millions you’ll have a better idea of what I mean. In the movie, Richard Pryor stands to inherit $300 million. But in order to get the $300 Million, he first has to spend $30 Million in 30 days without gathering any assets.

So let’s play the same sort of thing with law firm marketing. You have $1 million dollars to spend solely on “marketing”. But from that $1 million, you have to generate at least $2 million in new business. Accomplish that and you’ll get a huge payoff.

So what would you do?

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Seth Godin has a great post today called “Top ways to defend the status quo.”

It’s a list of 17 things people say to reject any new ideas or proposal for change. Take a look at the list and I guarantee you’ll nod your head knowing you’ve heard these before.

How many of these have you heard, and more importantly, how many have you said yourself? Kind of makes you cringe.

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RJon Robins has focused on legal marketing from nearly every conceivable perspective. He started his career as a solo practitioner right out of law school. He then was a Practice Management Advisor with The Florida Bar’s Law Office Management Assistance Service, helping other attorneys grow their practices. He is now a marketing consultant who develops self-coaching systems, e-books, audio programs, and teleseminars for solos and attorneys in small firms.

A frequent contributor in the comments section here at lawfirmblogging.com, I asked Mr. Robins if he’d like to do a short interview. The results follow.

LawFirmBlogging: I’ve listened to your audio programs and know that you opened your own firm right after law school. Are you still actively practicing law?

Mr. Robins: I still have a handful of legal clients whose businesses and/or goals I know too well to refer them to other lawyers. And I still get lots of calls from former clients and even people who were never clients looking for referrals to other lawyers, accountants, etc. but I’m no longer actively marketing my law practice.

LawFirmBlogging: You say that law schools do not adequately teach law firm management and marketing skills. Why do you think that is the case?

Mr. Robins: The evidence upon which I base my statement is the fact that only a handful of law schools offer even a single course on law firm management or marketing. This is despite the fact that they know, or should know, that statistically-speaking the vast majority of their graduates are going to end up running their own law firms someday.

What do I think causes most law schools not to include these subjects? Well, think about it for a second. . .law professors are, for the most part, either, Former practicing lawyers; Actively practicing lawyers; or Law school graduates who for any number of reasons chose not to practice law. In each scenario, the law school professor is teaching what he or she learned when they were in law school. So it’s an incestuous cycle. Of course there are exceptions, but unfortunately for the legal profession and everyone who has ever struggled to manage or market his or her own law firm business, the exceptions seem to be few & far between.

LawFirmBlogging: So, how did you learn the right techniques?

Mr. Robins: I was lucky in three ways:

First of all, I grew up in a business family. Some families talk politics around the dinner table. For others it’s sports. Mine has always talked business. So I went to law school with a pretty clear understanding of the distinction between what it means to work for a business vs. having the business work for you.

Second, my law school was one of the few that actually offered a course on law firm management. Back then it was a non-credit course offered only at night and I think we had to bribe the custodial crew to leave the lights on for us. But we had a professor who volunteered - she wasn’t even being paid for the extra teaching load - who described her first job out of law school as being a managing associate. The way she describes it, even though she was only the associate, as soon as the owners of the firm realized she had an interest & some management skills, they pretty much let her call the shots on how to run the business part of the law firm. By the way, I’m very proud to say that my alma mater has invited me back for the winter term to teach a full credit, semester-long course on small law firm management & marketing during daylight hours!

Third, despite having known better, I still mixed-up the job of being a lawyer with the responsibilities of owning a law firm business and managed to make just about every mistake in the book when first I hung out my own shingle right out of law school. Fortunately, The Florida Bar has a great resource called The Law Office Management Assistance Service and I guess I must have been a pretty heavy user & b/c they eventually offered me a job once they saw that I was actually getting great results with the advice they were giving me. Being a Practice Management Advisor with The Florida Bar is really where I got the most experience.

LawFirmBlogging: One of the biggest gripes I have with marketing books and speakers is that they will often try to make their material very generic; kind of a one-size-fits all approach. In doing so, they never give specific, useful techniques that can be employed right away.

With that said, are there certain practice areas that are better suited for the skills you teach?

Mr. Robins: I wouldn’t say there are certain practice areas that are necessarily better suited for the skills I teach. What I teach is basic-to-moderately-advanced law firm marketing and management skills. I’d say that my sweet spot has less to do with any particular practice area, and more to do with the size of a law firm business a lawyer practices in.

The vast majority of my experience has been with small law firms. I have helped lawyers get great results with my systems, skills & techniques in all kinds of practice areas, but almost exclusively with small law firms.

I suppose there could be some practice areas that you’d only find in larger firms that I’ve never run across where my skills would not be well suited. And I wouldn’t presume to advise anyone about the in’s & out’s of technology or web site design. Just fundamental marketing & management skills for small firms. But you’d be surprised how far you can grow a law firm with the fundamentals!

LawFirmBlogging: On your website and printed materials, your tagline says “Helping small law firms make a lot more money.” What’s your definition of “small” and “a lot”?

Mr. Robins: It’s funny that you ask. I’m actually having an e-mail correspondence with a fellow consultant about where to draw the line for a small law firm. I consider any firm with five attorneys or fewer to be a small firm, and that’s the part of the market where I have the most experience. The ABA & most other consultants consider anything under 20 lawyers to be small, but I don’t think that a lawyer sitting in an office by him or herself or even with a couple of partners or associates has much in common with the day-to-day experience of someone in a 10 lawyer firm with a full-time administrator and a comparatively substantial marketing budget.

A lot is a relative term. If your best year ever was only $75,000 in revenues and I can help you break the six-figure mark, then the extra $25,000 is a lot to you. I’ve also helped lawyers go from taking home a hundred thousand dollars, to taking home two and three hundred thousand dollars. So it all depends on what your goals are, and what you’re willing to do with the skills and systems I can expose you to.

I should also mention that some of my most satisfied clients aren’t necessarily taking home that much more money than they were before they met me. . .just working a lot less hours to maintain the level of income they need to support the lifestyle their families have come to expect. So I suppose if I help you take home the same $200,000 you did last year, but now you get to attend your kids’ school events and have a life, that also qualifies as a lot more money relative to the amount hours in the office.

LawFirmBlogging: I’ve read the articles from your free ezine, and there seem to be some common problems that many new solos face. What do you see as the most common, yet solvable issue facing the new attorney?

Mr. Robins: I was having this very conversation yesterday with a new attorney. Without a doubt, the two biggest problems that many lawyers who are new to small practices face are:

1. Not exercising the discipline to narrow their practices to just one or two complimentary areas so they can make a name for themselves as the go-to-lawyer for X and achieve operational efficiency in that practice area; and

2. Listening to bad advice about the need to pay your dues, usually from more senior attorneys who are only too happy to eliminate the competition or justify why they themselves aren’t more successful in the business of running a law firm.

LawFirmBlogging: This site being lawfirmblogging.com, it’s pretty obvious that I’m a believer when it comes to using the internet and blogs for legal marketing purposes. What’s your position on legal blogs and web sites?

Mr. Robins: I have to admit, I am pretty new to the world of blogging and I’m even relatively new to web marketing, so excuse me if I seem a little simplistic. The way I think of it a website and/or a blog is just another channel you can use to communicate with your prospects and clients. And as communication channels go, blogs & website are very efficient so I take a very pro position on them if used the right way. But too many lawyers seem to use their websites and blogs as if they are just complying with some unwritten rule that you must have a web presence. I think a lot of law firms would be a lot better off if they just scrapped their web sites altogether and invested all their blogging time on more productive activities, like coming up with an actual strategic plan for how they want to position themselves to the market in the first place.

On the other hand, there are some lawyers who seem to really get how to use a website and a blog to deliver more value to their clients and prospects. They use the web site to offer tons of free resources and other useful information that legitimately helps to educate prospects about what to look for in a lawyer, how to do a preliminary evaluation of their own case, and even how to solve some basic legal problems without even using a lawyer. After all, if someone has a problem that simple, why not just tell them the answer instead of dragging it out? But those sites also include a mechanism to capture information and get permission to stay in contact, so that the technology can be used to maintain top of mind awareness until the prospect reaches the end of the buying cycle and they’re ready to hire a lawyer.

Even more impressive to me are the law firm websites that are geared to improve the experience of current and even former clients: Intranets; Weekly client status e-mail updates; and websites that provide holistic information beyond just the boundaries of the client’s legal needs or firm specialties. And there’s no rule that says each law firm is only allowed to have one website. Trash all the flash motion graphics and give me a site specifically geared to me if I’m thinking about hiring a lawyer, and another that addresses my concerns once I become a client. The first family law practice that offers a virtual filing cabinet for current & past clients is going to make a killing!

LawFirmBlogging: Marketing a solo practice differs from marketing a firm. In many cases a solo attorney does not have the budget, time, and resources to dedicate to traditional marketing activities. Or at least that’s the perception. So how can a solo make the most of their marketing time?

Mr. Robins: First of all, if by traditional marketing activities, you mean things like brand-building advertising that doesn’t create a compelling reason for a prospective new client to pick up the phone & call or raise his/her hand and ask for some free information, then I need to make it clear that in my experience, solos and small law firms shouldn’t even be trying to duplicate the traditional marketing activities of larger firms. Large firms have legitimate reasons for doing some things with their marketing dollars that are completely inappropriate for a small law firm.

But to answer your question, the most effective use of time for a solo practitioner or a lawyer in a small firm with limited resources is to make Sales Calls, because that’s the only time & place where you can actually get a new client or cultivate a new referral source. And by Sales Call, I mean when you sit down or have a conversation with someone to identify the highest priority need or opportunity they are trying to deal with, and demonstrate in a systematic and organized way how you can help them find a solution to that problem or opportunity. Everything else we do is either a lead-up or else it’s a stall-tactic to avoid making the Sales Call.

LawFirmBlogging: I’ve listened to several of your audio programs while driving, and must admit that it made me feel a little sense of accomplishment to learn while stuck in traffic rather than just swearing under my breath at the driver in front of me. Having an audio CD is a nice alternative, but I was wondering why you decided to make CDs rather than just books.

Mr. Robins: When I was in law school I discovered the course review programs on tapes - I didn’t even have a CD player back then. I figured-out that if I listened to the course reviews before the semester began, then I could always stay a step-ahead of where the professor was leading the class. To this day, I still think of the benefits of establishing yourself as a Holder In Due Course, every time I drive by the spot on Biscayne Blvd in downtown Miami where I first got that concept while listening to the negotiable instruments course review program in my car. And every time I need to recall the concept, I still get a flash of that intersection in my mind.

Later, when I was working as a Practice Management Advisor with The Florida Bar’s Law Office Management Assistance Service logging around 4,000 miles-a-month on my car doing onsite consultations with small law firms, I rediscovered audio books - by then of course I did have a CD player in my car. I would go to do speeches and workshops all over the State and lawyers and legal administrators in the audience would always be so impressed that I had read the latest books or reports on all kinds of different subjects. My secret was that I subscribed to Business Audio Briefings and spent the hours in the car learning instead of just listening to the radio.

So when I was trying to figure-out how to deliver the most value to lawyers in small firms and teach them how to have more fun and spend less time in the office, I figured that it would be pretty hypocritical of me to ask them to spend that free time reading a book. Believe me, producing a high-quality audio program is about ten times harder than just writing a book, but so far, people seem to appreciate the extra effort.

LawFirmBlogging: Rather than just harping on legal marketing questions, I’ve got to finish this interview with something a little bit off topic:

Apparently you really dislike traveling. In fact, on your bio it says:

After living out of a suitcase for several years, Robins now lives and works on Miami Beach where he enjoys boating and scrap metal sculpting instead of travel. Why do you dislike travel so much, and how did you get into scrap metal sculpting?

Mr. Robins: Well like I said before I used to log around 4,000 miles on my car each month & then later when I went into private consulting I used to live on an airplane & in hotel rooms. It was exciting for awhile but being away from your family & friends 3/4 of the time gets old after too many years.

Scrap metal sculpting - ok, here’s the story. . . I used to come home from work or home from a trip exhausted but exhilarated from all the lawyers I had helped in so many meaningful ways that were highly personal to them & me. But then my family would ask how my day or trip had been & it was literally too exhausting to recount every nuance & detail of what I had accomplished, and besides, a lot of it was confidential. So I’d usually just end up brushing-off the question with some kind of lame answer. That started to isolate & frustrate me, so I started looking for how I could express my creativity in a way that I could share with friends & family, and especially without having to explain a lot of things. I had a friend who was into welding & one thing led to another. You can see some of my sculptures for sale at www.RJONROBINS.com

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