So, while I’ll still serve my legal clients, I’m going to stop limiting myself to that and now allow the right marketing and coaching opportunities into my world. What will that look like?

I don’t know for sure yet. I’m just now opening up to that question. I’m happy to hear your suggestions.

The only constant is change, and I’m finally ready to allow some major changes to happen-both internally and in this reality we all need to work with.

How does it get better?

This is an “Ignite” style event – all the speaker have 6 minutes with 20 slides on auto-timers.  If you’ve ever been to an Ignite event locally, do it.  You’ll find that these are very high-energy programs and I’m sure this Legal Rebels program will be a crazy good time – at least a crazy good time for lawyers.  :-)

Here’s the list of speakers:

Paul Lippe

Gregory Norman Fernandez

Stephanie Kimbro

Kevin Houchin  (That’s ME!)

Ron Baker

Alexis Martin Neely

Kevin O’Keefe

Michael O’Connor

Francine Ward

Matthew Homann

A video of each talk will be posted at legalrebels.com during the month of September.

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If you are not yet registered for the ABA 2010 San Francisco Annual Meeting, please take a moment to register now at www.abanet.org/annual/2010 .  For specific registration questions or details about the Annual Meeting in General go to www.abanet.org/annual/2010<http://www.abanet.org/annual/2010 or call 312/988-5871.

This information IS that important.

A lot of people are waking up to “Conscious” Business, instead of just stumbling though business and life in the usual fog.

Conscious Business is a trend in business that’s getting a lot of attention.

Doing well by doing good.

The new discussion on the table is how are we consciously generating  business and what is the process of consciousness in business development?

Business as it has been done is just not working. . . and conscious business is more than  people, planet, profits and passion.

Dawn and Rikka will both be speaking at a single event here in Fort Collins next week.

August 4, 2010

9 am to 1 pm

Rikka will be speaking on the subject of Getting Out of Your Own Way and Dawn will be giving a talk on Conscious Business Development.

Rikka Zimmerman

Rikka’s Background:

Rikka Zimmerman; author of  soon to be released “21 Secrets of the Universe” and Access Consciousness Facilitator is a world class leader in the consciousness movement. She is a gifted speaker and workshop facilitator domestically and internationally. Her work empowers, enlightens, engages, and inspires.

Dawn Todd

Dawn’s Background:

Dawn Todd is a Collaboration Strategist, a Client Attraction Expert, a Certified Coach  and CEO of Wildly Successful, Inc.  She is the creator of The Inside Edge ™ , Founder of Wildly Successful Network and author of Make Money, Change the World – Conscious Business Development for Entrepreneurs and The Power of Positivity. She has been a small business owner for over 25 years.

Access Conscious Business

• Learn the practice and structure of using consciousness in business
• Expand your clients, income and business
• Eliminate beliefs that prevent your success
• Bring conscious business practice to ground for you and your company
• Hands on, practical tools for  more sales,  better systems,  and conscious leadership in your organization

Conscious individuals transform business. Create a new framework for how business works!

RVSP NOW

- Comments Welcome.

Get the free “No Lame Names” ebook by entering your email address at the right (Middle column, just under the video over there…). It’ll automatically redirect your browser to the PDF or start a download.

Have a great weekend.

I receive a lot of email with offers for all kinds of different programs. I’m sure you do too. It can be a bit overwhelming for sure – especially when you also have client work, family, and community projects that need your attention.

Yesterday morning there were 3 new urgent client matters to deal with and an urgent matter for one of the community organizations I’m serving – all popping out of the blue. You’ve been there; you know what it’s like to be a solo or small firm attorney.

With all you have going on, why add more to your plate? Because adding the right thing at the right time can actually make your life less complex. I know it’s a paradox, but it’s true. The challenge is knowing when and what to change.

Hopefully, I can help. I’d like to make at least a part of your life easier.

We’ve all faced the fear of not knowing where the money to pay the bills would come from next month, let alone 6 months from now. Most of us don’t even want to think about 6 months from now, and if we do, we know in our hearts that any planning we’re doing is really just a fantasy.

That’s where being a member of The Space Between Center lawyer mastermind programs can help. One of the first things we do is help you free yourself from the trap of hourly billing and implement some flat fee models (customized to your practice, not mine) that will give you some benchmarks for REAL planning.

Does it work?

Here’s an email I received late last week from one of the founding members of The Space Between Center lawyer mastermind.  Remember this is after less than two months in the SBC program:

“I wanted to share with you that I landed one of the prospective membership clients considering my program (the other is just having me do a TM registration on a project basis for now) – his reaction was ‘I think that you have a great formula with the different tiers of service. Frankly, I wish we had met earlier so I could take more advantage of it…’- <- he is a very early stage start-up.

Once I showed the new membership client the math for the services they were looking for over the next year they signed up – at the $1500/month level!

Not only has this one client more than covered the cost of the Space Between Center program for me, but having knowledge of that recurring cash flow over the next year is already freeing me to focus on creatively growing my firm.”

Brian Fletcher, Esq.

The Fletcher Law Firm PLLC

Alexandria, Virginia USA

Founding Member, Space Between Center lawyer mastermind

Does it work?

Yes.

How good would it feel to know you had at least $1,500/month on the books through this time next year? How about $3,000, $5,000, $7,500?  How much better would your life be if you could look at contracted revenue of $10,000/month for the next few months?

That’s just one example and we’re too early in the program to have generally expected performance results to share, but it’s a great indicator of the results you COULD get if you become a member of our program and actually implement the approaches we’re discussing.

It’s about sharing.

It’s about experimenting.

It’s about moving through your fears and into the excitement & success that self-employment can offer.

It’s about being creative and taking control of your life and future rather than trying to fit your future into the model that some lawyer started using in England centuries ago. We’ve all been trapped by that guy. I’d like to throw some rocks at him. His billable hour model has caused unconscionable damage to lawyers and their clients over the centuries.

It’s time to get out of his trap.

• Are you ready to take a few simple steps to get control of your life?

• Are you ready to take a few simple steps to reach the potential you know you have inside?

• Are you ready to share your knowledge and experience with like-minded business, estate planning, and collaborative family lawyers who would like to share with you?

• Would you like some real support and guidance in building a legal services business and go beyond just “practicing?”

If you’re ready to get control of your life, then join us this Wednesday at 2pm for a free informational call about The Space Between Center’s lawyer mastermind programs.

We have openings in our small business mastermind group, and we’re introducing two new tracks:

• A track for estate planning attorneys led by estate planning attorney Candice Aiston; and
• A track for collaborative/family law attorneys co-lead by Michael Sherman and Steve Worrall.

Join us for the call.

The easy steps we’re talking about literally changed my life and took me from the depths of bankruptcy, fear, and anxiety to a place where I could plan, grow, succeed, and enjoy my profession. It can do the same for you.

Again, the call is this Wednesday, May 19^th at 2pm Eastern.

You’ll be able to learn what we’re doing in the programs, meet the leaders of the different tracks, and ask some questions to make sure the program is a fit for you.

Sincerely,

Kevin E. Houchin, Esq.

Founder, The Space Between Center for Creative Spirit in Business.

P.S.  These programs are NOT for everyone.  If you’re satisfied in the billable hour model or if you have no intention of taking action to make the changes that will improve your life, then this program is not for you. If you’re ready engage with a mastermind group, share, implement, and receive, then you owe it to yourself to find out more.

Oh, and feel free to forward this post to other small practice attorneys that you would like to help succeed.

Attracting clients is not just an issue for lawyers, it’s an issue for everyone – especially if you’re a service provider.

He’s doing his homework and asked me to share some ideas about how he should approach his target niche.

While this type of information is at the heart of the discussions we’re having as part of The Space Between Center lawyer mastermind groups (business law, estate planning, & collaborative/family law programs), I thought I’d share what I told this young man over coffee this morning.

Here’s what I suggested:

1.  Consolidate his knowledge of the target niche area of law into a short (say 20 pages) ebook that outlines the core issues his target clients should be thinking about.

2. Distill that ebook into a PPT presentation.

3.  Offer to give that presentation to as many groups in his target market as possible.  Free.  In person and via Webinar when he can.

4.  Constantly blog with short value-providing articles for his potential clients and use social media (twitter, facebook, linkedin, youtube) to build friendships and increase the number of people he’s helping with his blog.

5.  Break out sections of the ebook into blog posts and submit those post to other blogs/sites read by potential clients.

6.  Offer the full ebook as a free gift in exchange for people getting on his mailing list.

7.  Use the ebook and blog to qualify potential clients.

8.  Build a flat-fee engagement model to build relationships.

9.  Have a merchant accounts to take credit card payments.

10.  Tell clients that your initial consultation fee is rolled into the engagement if the potential client wants to engage, otherwise, it’s a fee of $XXX due at the end of the meeting.  He can always waive that if he wants, but it sets the expectation of value in the initial meeting and lets the tire-kickers move on to someone else for free advice.

These 10 elements work in every services business, not just for lawyers.

For the lawyers reading this:

If you’d like to learn more about how to attract more perfect clients to your practice using these approaches, you owe it to yourself, your clients, and your family to be on our informational call next Wednesday, May 19th at 2pm Eastern.  You can sign up for that call here. We’ll be sharing some tips and tricks and also giving you the details about how you can be part of The Space Between Center lawyer mastermind group.

Very quickly, those changes include:

1. Lowering membership fees.
2. Adding a program for family law attorneys.
3. Adding a program for estate planning attorneys.
4. Welcoming our first three “Fellows” to The Center.

We’re hosting a free informational call next Wednesday, May 19^th at 2pm Eastern to explain the full details about what these changes mean for you, so please register to be on the call or receive the recording. You can find out a few more details and register for the call here.

Oh, and if you have never signed up for anything before you also will get a copy of my Fuel The Spark: 5 Guiding Values for Success in Law & Life Action Guide as a complementary gift for joining our community.

Go ahead, sign up for the call now.

“It’s Foolproof!”

“I think you’re nuts.”

-       Finding Nemo

Are you attracting the type of clients you want?

I’m surprised at how many lawyers and non-lawyers answer “no” because it’s really not that hard to do. It seems that not a week goes by when I’m not asked how I’ve been successful in attracting the clients I love to work with – entrepreneurs.

You can use my system to attract your perfect clients, no matter who they are. You don’t need a massive marketing budget either, because you can do everything on this list without spending a dime.

Here are the steps.

1. Know the type of problem you will be helping people solve until they put you in a hole.
2. Create a product or service offering to solve that problem.
3. Share information of value to people experiencing that problem for free via your blog.
4. Let people know where they can find what you’ve posted on your blog.
5. Allow people to hire you to help them solve their problem.

Want to know more?

I thought so.

Here’s how you do it.

Step 1: Know the type of problem you will be helping people solve until they put you in a hole.

That may sound crass, but when you know what you love to do – the thing you can’t NOT do – you’ll have recognized your purpose in life and retirement will be an obsolete concept.  The day you commit yourself to aligning your income streams with that thing you love to do will be the day you “retire” no matter if your 65 or 25. For instance, I’ll be helping people share their creativity with the world through entrepreneurism until the day I die.  I can’t NOT help those people. What will you do until the day you die, happily, and for free?

Step 2: Create a product or service offering to solve that problem.

You have to “package” your passion into something people can repay you for.  Notice I didn’t say “pay you for”, I said “repay” you for.  You MUST provide value first. You have to put it out there.  You put it out there for free initially (see the next step), but don’t expect people to take a risk on you – you must take the risk on them.

If you have a service offering, package it up in some way that doesn’t equal a blank checkbook – in other words, do you absolute best to avoid pricing your service by the hour.  Hourly fees are lose-lose, you only end up trading your life for a few bucks.  Sometimes you’re not worth your hourly rate, sometimes you’re worth a thousand times more. It’s a bad, outdated, shortsighted metric of value. If you can build in some continuity, such as a monthly flat fee for your services that lasts for a year, then do it.  Trade a long-term relationship for a higher project fee every time you can.

If you have a product offering, price it to move, but at a profit.  The key to success is to make a lot of people a little happier, at a profit each time. If you can build in some continuity (and you can), do it.

Step 3: Share information of value to people experiencing that problem for free via your blog.

There is no excuse for not having a blog. None. You can have one set up for free inside of 10 minutes. Just go to http://www.wordpress.com and you’re good to go.  If you have 20 minutes, you can get your own domain name and have a wordpress blog set up in your own name or brand, like http://houchinlaw.com , http://www.spacebetweencenter.com or http://kevinhouchin.com . It doesn’t take a technical genius, it only takes a bit of passion for your message, which shouldn’t be a problem if you took step one seriously.

The thing I hear most often is “but I don’t know what to write…”  Ugh.  Yes, you do know what to write.  At least if you took step one seriously you do, because if you took step one seriously you have something to say.  It’s more likely that you probably have so much to say that you don’t know where to start and are simply overwhelmed.  Or, you’re really just afraid that you can’t write.

So, just have a conversation.

Imagine a perfect client sitting in your plush office.  What question do they ask you?  That’s a blog post.

• What do they fear?  Each of those fears is a blog post.

• What gets them jazzed? Each spark of enthusiasm is a blog post.

• What’s the latest and greatest thing in their life?  That’s a blog post.

• What just made YOU happy about the progress toward solving the problem from step 1?  Blog post.

• What just made you angry about a setback? Blog post.

Are you starting to get the picture?

500-1000 words.  Just a few paragraphs.  FYI, we’re at just under 800 words right now.

I work with a lot of lawyers. There is absolutely no excuse for lawyers not to write because the one thing law school did to benefit each of us was to thrash the fear of writing 500 words in 15 minutes out of us. The place lawyers screw up is that they think they have to write like we did in law school or for the court. They think they have to include footnotes and case citations proving up every factual statement.

When lawyers write a blog post, they should write for clients, not other lawyers. No footnotes. No case citations. Minimal statutory citations (only if they’re REALLY helpful.)  You don’t get brownie points for acting smarter than your clients. They expect you to know the source, and they really don’t care where the answer comes from, just that you know how to help them, so don’t slow them down for the sake of your ego. Only your competition cares about the citation. Help them if you want, but I’d rather focus on attracting clients.

If you’re afraid you can’t write, then record yourself and pay someone the $12/hour it takes to have that recording transcribed.  If that’s too technical for you, trade services with a copywriter who can interview you for 15 minutes and type up a blog post for you.  There’s nothing wrong with “ghost bloggers” helping share your message.

If you don’t write or don’t want to work in the written word, record yourself and post audio files, or even better, do video files (known as a “vlog”).  None of these will take much money or any real programming skill.  If you can use a computer, you can accomplish these tasks.  If you’re not willing to do any of this, get used to looking at the world from the inside of a cubical – if you’re lucky.  These activities are becoming more critical to successful businesses of any size every hour.

Wordpress blogs also have “Pages” where you actually share how people can REPAY you for the valuable content you’ve shared with them via your blog by hiring you for your services or purchasing your products – maybe even both – but we’ll talk about that in step 5.

Step 4: Let people know where they can find what you’ve posted on your blog.

This is where social media comes in. You know, Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn, and if you’re a video-savvy person, YouTube. These are speed-networking-on-crack and blow the roof off of conventional media outlets.  Sure, you’ll want to submit your great articles to major publications, but get the quick stuff out quickly – via your social media networks. Provide value and share the value.  Your blog is the hub. Media outlets are the spokes.  Almost all of the good ones are free.  Again, no excuses.

You can very quickly and easily set up your system to update your twitter.com status every time you post a new entry to your blog, and have that update Facebook and then LinkedIn, AUTOMATICALLY sharing your content with the world even EASIER than copy/paste. Again, no excuses.

If you are comfortable speaking in public, start giving talks to groups of people who personify the ideal of your perfect client. When you show up to speak, you’ll walk away with clients.  The key is to create as many avenues for people to engage with the content on your blog as you possibly can.

Integrated Marketing Model for Lawyers

Step 5: Allow people to hire you to help them solve their problem.

If you’ve thoughtfully, sincerely, and regularly completed steps 1-4, your perfect clients will find you. They’ll ask for your products and services.  You just have to let them.  Too many people say “I’m just doing this for fun” and fail to create an income stream from their passion or hobby that will allow them to escape the day job and “retire” doing what they love.

If you take just these few steps and practice them regularly, the income streams will appear and you’ll be able to focus as much time on them as you want. You’ll “retire” well before you’re 60s because you won’t think of quitting what you do for a living – what you do FOR a living will be aligned with ACTUALLY LIVING, now. What could be better than that?

This is the only life you have (at least right now), why waste another day of it doing something you don’t love?

Here’s my response to the job seeker.  Yes, I addressed it to him personally, but I’ll keep that private for his sake.

[NAME],

I recently received your resume & cover letter.  While I’m not hiring right now, I thought I’d give you some feedback that might help in your approach.

1.  Take the three minutes or so that it requires to research each firm to at least get a name to address your letter to someone.  I don’t like being called “Dear Sir or Madam.”  Especially when it would only take about 30 seconds to find my name online.  This shows that you did NO research into my firm to see if you might be a fit for what we do.  You are trying to push the match onto me.  I don’t need you to make more work for me. I only hire people who make my life easier.

2.  Your cover letter was all about you, and frankly, none of your experience has anything to do with my firm’s work.  Again, if you had taken just a few minutes to search online, you would have found out what we do.  Then you could make a decision.  You could either write a cover letter that tells me how you’ll make my life easier, or you could save a stamp.

You have an interesting background – especially the National Outdoor Leadership School training.  In Colorado, leading with that might be more effective than leading some of the legal experience you’ve had that really doesn’t translate to the local legal market.

I wish you the best in your job search.

Sincerely,

Kevin E. Houchin, Esq.

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The model just got the attention of the American Bar Association – specifically the ABA Journal online edition. They are currently running a short feature on the model and the firm on the front page of the ABA Journal Web site.

ABA Journal Online Home Page

I’m sure it won’t be on the front page forever. So I grabbed a screen capture.

ABA Journal Online Article

The full article will probably be online indefinitely, but I grabbed a screen capture of that too.

Many might question the wisdom of sharing that I’ve been through a personal bankruptcy and the struggles surrounding that time in my life, but it’s part of the story and helps put the who issue in full context. I learned a great deal during that experience and I believe what I learned has value to other people in both that as I survived, so will they and that it’s better to try and fail then to never try at all.  Then get up and keep trying new things until something works.

I think I’ve found a system that works, for me, and for my clients.  Other people are starting to think so too.

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