Lawpreneur Radio, Author at Lawpreneur Radio

068: Nathaniel Slavin of Wicker Park Group discusses listening to your customers

As a founding partner of Wicker Park Group, Nat works with law firms to strengthen client relationships through client feedback and other client-facing initiatives. Previously, Nat served as Publisher of InsideCounsel (Corporate Legal Times) and held various editorial and management positions for this management monthly for corporate legal executives. Nat has authored more than 100 articles on legal department management and frequently speaks on legal department management and marketing strategies. Nat is a 2014 Legal Marketing Association Hall of Fame Inductee.

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Listen as Nat reminds us that if we do not take charge of our own future, someone else will.
Nat discusses realizing that he was uncomfortable with someone else deciding his fate and how he pushed back hard.
Hear how Nat shows that it is important to remember who was with you from the beginning to make your success possible.

Tell us something good

Nat describes how he recently helped a large law firm realize that their assumptions about the future of the business were wrong and that the business that had driven the success of the firm to that point had changed radically and wouldn’t support the past level of business in the future.

What’s on your desk?

Conducting in person interviews to understand
- opportunities with their clients
- How do businesses make the decision to choose this firm
- what drives client loyalty

Favorite Resource

Nat’s innate ability to stop talking and start listening. And, why that should be important for all of us.

Favorite Books:

The Ultimate Question 2.0 (Revised and Expanded Edition): How Net Promoter Companies Thrive in a Customer-Driven World Business loyalty guru Fred Reichheld revealed the question most critical to your company’s future: “Would you recommend us to a friend?” By asking customers this question, you identify detractors, who sully your firm’s reputation and readily switch to competitors, and promoters, who generate good profits and true, sustainable growth.
Setting the Table Danny Meyer shares the lessons he’s learned while developing the winning recipe for doing the business he calls “enlightened hospitality.” This innovative philosophy emphasizes putting the power of hospitality to work in a new and counter-intuitive way: The first and most important application of hospitality is to the people who work for you, and then, in descending order of priority, to the guests, the community, the suppliers, and the investors.

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This information is coming to you to inspire you and drive you forward. Be bigger than you know yourself to be! If you haven’t already done so, please take a minute to leave a quick 5-star review rating and honest review on iTunes by clicking here. Miranda McCroskey – host of Lawpreneur Radio

067: Cheryl Bame of Bame PR discusses public relations.

As a former television news producer, reporter and anchor, Cheryl Bame of Bame PR understands how the media operates and how to strategically position a client as a thought leader. She has been representing professional services firms for nearly 14 years so she understands that targeted publicity should support a law firm’s business development and marketing goals. Her clients include national, regional and small law firms, as well as businesses in professional services, real estate and non-profit industries. Cheryl is a frequent speaker at local, regional and national legal industry events and law firms who seeks her expertise on best practices in public relations and social media. She is also the host at LegalPRAdvice.com.

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Listen as Cheryl reminds us to trust our gut. She provides the example of taking on a client that was outside of her niche where the client turned out to be a nightmare and had to be fired.

Tell us something good

Being in business for 9 1/2 years.
Referral marketing is very important to the business.
Currently working with a bank CEO for media training before a big announcement. Cheryl reminds us how important it is to have the message and the correct story key in your mind as you prepare.

What’s on your desk?

Developing thought leaders through article placement.
Researching speaking engagements.
Researching awards and rankings for trade associations.
Social Media Training – Especially LinkedIn.

Favorite Resource

LinkedIn
Business Journals / Newspapers
The Internet
LegalPRAdvice.com

Favorite Books

Own the Room: Business Presentations that Persuade, Engage, and Get Results Own the Room, by Eloqui owners Deborah Shames and David Booth, assists the reader in creating the expertise perfect for creating vivid narratives. Own the Room shares how to excite your audience’s emotions and intellect. And Own the Room will give you a communication toolkit to make any presentation lively, compelling, and memorable.

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066: Myrna Arroya of Pepper Inbound Marketing discusses inbound marketing for law firms.

Myrna E. Arroyo of Pepper Inbound Marketing has been doing online marketing since 2001. She is a serial entrepreneur, and has experience marketing companies in fields as diverse as real estate sales, law, estate planning, safety consulting, travel, and coaching. She loves the joy of checking the web traffic and conversion reports each day for her clients and seeing the arrows trend up! Myrna has an MBA/JD from Tulane University and is a licensed Louisiana attorney. After practicing law actively for about 12 years Myrna semi-retired from legal practice to become a sommelier. Now, she has found her true calling, which is helping business owners create lead generation systems using inbound marketing. Because of her legal background, she loves working with attorneys to improve their online marketing and drive more revenue to their law practices.

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Myrna tells us that Lawpreneurs must learn how to market. They don’t teach it in law school so it has to be learned somewhere else.

Tell us something good

Listen as Myrna tells how no one was going to her husband’s website and he asked her to take over the marketing.
- Blogging just twice a week, they quickly started getting over 2000 visits per week.
- Now the website is a top 10 hit for the category.
Myrna reminds us that having a strategy and following it are key to success.

What’s on your desk?

Hear as Myrna outlines the online marketing program that she offers, including creating a strategy for long term action.

Favorite Resource

Favorite Books

This Time I Dance!: Creating the Work You Love What is most difficult in making a career change is deciding to make the change, especially when you are good at what you do, and wonder whether you should just stick it out in an unhappy-albeit well-paid-environment instead of taking a risk and starting over doing something you love. In This Time I Dance!, Tama Kieves shares the inspiring wisdom that led her from being a successful Harvard lawyer to an even more successful writer and life coach. The best part? She’s happy with her career!

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065: Daniel Gamez of Gamez Law Firm discusses overcoming the fear of going on your own.

What makes a Lawpreneur? Daniel Gamez of the Gamez Law Firm is an attorney in San Diego focusing exclusively on debt settlement as an alternative to bankruptcy. Mr. Gamez has a long history of service to the community first as an advocate for juvenile services both as a youth counselor and as a probation officer successfully rehabilitating juveniles. Now Mr. Gamez is committed to helping families in fighting creditors, reducing the total amount owed, and providing his clients with a life free of debt through debt settlement.

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Listen as Daniel talks about how he wasn’t succeeding in his old firm at the level that he needed to survive and thrive. He saw that he had to take control.
Daniel reminds us that we have to beware of putting too much trust in other people.
Hear how Daniel got over the fear of being on his own.

Tell us something good

Daniel explains that he gauges success by what he is doing for his clients, not what he’s bringing in.
- As an example, he had an elderly man with $39,000 in debt owed. He was able to reduce that to $4,000.

What’s on your desk?

Daniel points out that any debt not secured by property is negotiable.
- This includes student loans, where he has been getting great results.

Favorite Resource

My Case is a web-based legal practice management software built for the modern law firm. Start your free 30 days with My Case today. Tell them Lawpreneur Radio sent you!
Networking – Especially Provisors
Speaking engagements

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064: Aaron Wilson of Omnisoft discusses why you need to back up your computer and other IT needs

What supports a Lawpreneur? Join us as we hear from Aaron Wilson about his journey since he joined OmniSoft Inc. over 10 years ago. He is responsible for overseeing as well as implementing network security, web-design, web-filtering and information systems for schools and small business. He has supervised system administration for specialized data center for satellite testing. He is also a key contributor to services for data encryption/protection, information backup and archiving, and specialized information tool development. Outside of work he is busy keeping up with his son. One of his favorite hobbies is building model helicopters.

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Fail fast to succeed faster:

Listen as Aaron tells how when he got bored managing a Blockbuster Music store he choose to move in to computers.
Aaron discusses the lesson he learned early from a client who thought they knew more than he he did about the system that was being developed and installed

Tell us something good:

Hear Aaron’s enthusiasm as he talks about being deeply involved in software development for the GOES weather satellite systems
Aaron explains that they also developed the data recording system for the data that flowed back from those systems

Services:

Aaron describes the three primary system development processes they offer
- Educational systems for schools (including helping to seek supporting funding outside what the school budget has available)
- Legal Firms from the Lawpreneur all the way to firms with 30+ employees
- Finalcial Firms ( including support to ensure that FINRA audits are passed)

Favorite Resource:

DropBox is a free service that lets you bring your photos, docs, and videos anywhere and share them easily. Never email yourself a file again!
Jungle Disk offers a lot, with scheduled secure online backups, folder syncing, and a shared drive

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063: Sarah Poriss of the Law Offices of Sarah Porris discusses how to love your solo or small firm practice.

What makes a Lawpreneur? listen in as Sarah Poriss of the Law Office of Sarah Poriss shares her journey.

Sarah Poriss loves being a solo! So much so that she just produced a 20-interview series with experts in practice management tools and techniques called “The Art of Being Solo: how to have a solo law practice you love and live the life you want”, which she offered for free to encourage others to succeed in their practices.

Sarah has practiced for 12 years exclusively in the area of consumer protection, focusing her entire eight years as a solo on defending consumers in credit card collection and home foreclosure actions. This area of law is populated almost exclusively by solos or small firm attorneys and she hates to see the burnout and turnover among her fellow consumer advocates. Her goal is to help all solos learn how to “do well by doing good”– that is, to live the lifestyle they want and deserve as well as help as many people as possible without compromising their health and happiness. Being a solo is the best kept secret and she wants to share it with everyone.

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Value yourself and the service you provide.
Consider that your money “programs” were created long ago, but are ruling your fee structure today.

Tell us something good

Doing consumer law Sarah finds success and happiness in helping families stay in their home longer, and deal with the current economic realities.
Consumer law has room for growth.

What’s on your desk?

Sarah has practiced for 12 years exclusively in the area of consumer protection, focusing her entire eight years as a solo on defending consumers in credit card collection and home foreclosure actions.
She also has represented people who have been taken by contractors or other service providers.

Favorite Resource

We are our own best resources – our common sense and life experiences are huge.
Abbacus Law: Abacus enables the success of legal professionals and secures their future by providing One-Stop-Shop Legal Technology Solutions that range from technology readiness assessments, to the design, deployment, implementation and management of In-Office or Virtual Office Law Practice Environments, offering complementary back-office support, such as IT, Billing and Bookkeeping Services.
National Association of Consumer Advocates – a group of consumer attorneys around the country

Favorite Books

All Your Worth: The Ultimate Lifetime Money Plan In All Your Worth, Elizabeth Warren and Amelia Warren Tyagi, tell you the truth about money. They lay out the new rules of money — the ones nobody talks about. They show you how to get out of debt, cover your bills, and start getting ahead — without needing to carry a calculator everywhere you go.
The Two-Income Trap Harvard Law School bankruptcy expert Elizabeth Warren and financial consultant Amelia Tyagi show that today’s middle-class parents are increasingly trapped by financial meltdowns. Astonishingly, sending mothers to work has made families more vulnerable to financial disaster than ever before. Today’s two-income family earns 75% more money than its single-income counterpart of a generation ago, but has 25% less discretionary income to cover living costs.

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062: Kandi Lee of One Eleven Network discusses personal growth, accountability and business strategies.

Who supports a Lawpreneur? Join us as Kandi Lee, Founder and CEO of the One-Eleven Network, shares her journey. Kandi Lee is a professional coach, speaker, trainer, and TV and radio personality. She has over 20 years of experience in the personal growth, speaking and television fields. She has been mentored by some of the leading experts such as Bob Proctor, Dr Reverend Michael Beckwith, and Mark Victor Hansen to name a few. Kandi’s company, The One-Eleven Network, is a coaching, speaking and training company that uses personal growth, accountability and business strategies to improve personal and professional results.

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Fail fast to succeed faster

You can’t trust your feelings: we all have a committee in our head. Don’t listen to them!
Failure is part of the process. Failure feels different depending what stage of the business you’re in.
Don’t look down! Look forward. Move forward the next 100 feet.
What feels like a failure today is really just part of the process.

Tell us something good

Listen as Kandi describes why she was knows as “the Terminator.”
Kandi references the different stages of business – formulation, concentration and momentum.
Having coaches in your life to support you moves you forward. Allow them to see you as bigger than you see yourselves.

What’s on your desk?

Kandi and One-Eleven Network is producing a television and radio network which streams 24/7.
The Extraordinary is Not an Accident event is coming on October 4, 2014 from 1:11 p.m. to 6:00 p.m. Click One-Eleven E vent Invite to find out more.
Check out their You Tube channel at One-Eleven Network.com.

Favorite Resources

Kandi values her iPhone, her hairdresser, and her staff.

Favorite Books:

Think and Grow Rich Think and grow rich is the most important financial book ever written. Napoleon Hill researched more than forty millionaires to find out what made them the men that they were. By following the advice laid out clearly in this book you’ll be the one with an edge. It’s time to stop wondering what it’s like to be rich and start knowing. This book will change your life!
Kandi’s own workbooks: How big is Your BHAG?; The Mindset Workbook; and Accept Your Greatness.

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061: Harley Bjelland, “The Best ERISA Attorney on the Planet,” discusses employee benefits, and executive compensation.

Who supports a Lawpreneur? Listen in as Harley L. Bjelland, the sole owner of the The ERISA Law Firm, shares his journey.

Harley’s focus is on ERISA (Employee Retirement Income Security Act), employee benefits, and executive compensation. With over three decades of experience practicing employee benefits law in California, Harley provides his clients with rich perspective and creative solutions to effectively respond to their needs and achieve favorable results.

Harley Bjelland began practicing law in 1980. He has extensive experience administering and operating plans both as a third party administrator and as a member of the benefits committee for four 100-plus attorney law firms as well as numerous small law firms. He has drafted thousands of documents for 401(k) plans and employee stock ownership plans, has served as trustee for plans and has served as fiduciary on numerous benefit plan committees. Harley has conducted hundreds of audits by both the Internal Revenue Service and the United States Department of Labor.

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Elder Counsel is a membership based program. Their passion lies in helping Elder law, special needs planning and veterans pension planning attorneys better serve their clients. They do so by providing education, support, the premier elder law document drafting system and a state of the art office management system, all with the goal of making their member attorneys more knowledgeable, more efficient, and, as a result, more profitable.

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Harley has been a Lawpreneur most of his career. However, in 2009, after being on his own for 15 years, Harley decided to go return to Big Law. Five years later he was out on his own again – and the separation was much less scary this time.

Tell us something good

Harley explains and discusses the why his firm is the ERISA Law Firm, not the Law Offices of Harley Bjelland. Consider your branding and SEO when you name your firm.
He suggests a Lawpreneur hire outside people to take care of your books and other aspects of running a business. Lawpreneur’s don’t have to wear all the hats.
A Lawpreneur needs marketing! Create yourself as a great resource for others due to your marketing.
Harley values control over his lifestyle as provided by being a Lawpreneur; he plays golf twice a week to stay young.
Listen as Harley shares being retained, and finding out the new client was opposing counsel from a recent case!

What’s on your desk?

Harley specializes in ERISA is the Employee Retirement Income Security Act.

Favorite Resource

Harley values networking, people and relationships.
A good IT person.
Smart phone.

Favorite Books

Bureau of National Affairs – ERISA book.

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060: Tim Santoni of Santoni Worldwide discusses mitigating risk and making crucial business decisions

What supports a Lawpreneur? Join us as Tim Santoni, President & CEO of Santoni Worldwide, shares his journey.

Tim is passionate about helping clients mitigate risk and develop information needed to make crucial business decisions. He also enjoys golfing and spending time with his wife and four kids. He is a Certified Private Investigator, continually partakes in Continuing Education for lawyers and has certifications in FCRA (Fair Credit Reporting Act).

Santoni Investigations is an industry leader in intellectual property investigations having completed more than 45,000 investigations in this space. They have also worked closely with attorneys and their staff since 1975 in matters involving insurance losses, business disputes, judgement recovery, fraud, theft, trade secrets theft and many other civil and criminal matters.

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My Case is a web-based legal practice management software built for the modern law firm. Start your free 30 days with My Case today. Tell them Lawpreneur Radio sent you!

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Tim discusses the opportunity that technology presented as the demand for instant data and the need to verify that data increased.
Hear Tim point out the current relationship between technology and case law.

Tell us something good

Tim talks about the value of thorough employee screening in creating a safer workplace, as well as a reduction in fraud and theft.

Favorite Resources

Linkedin
Evernote
Salesforce.com, Tim says, “I can’t imagine living without this one”

Favorite Books:

The 4-Hour Workweek, Expanded and Updated: Expanded and Updated, With Over 100 New Pages of Cutting-Edge Content. Forget the old concept of retirement and the rest of the deferred-life plan–there is no need to wait and every reason not to, especially in unpredictable economic times. Whether your dream is escaping the rat race, experiencing high-end world travel, earning a monthly five-figure income with zero management, or just living more and working less, The 4-Hour Workweek is the blueprint.
80/20 Sales and Marketing: The Definitive Guide to Working Less and Making More The 80/20 Rule is an inviolable law of nature, which makes it the #1 organizing principle of every business. Perry shows how to laser focus the 80/20 Rule in outsourcing, hiring, publicity, controversy, market research, lead generation, and web traffic; online, offline and social media.

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059: David Oates of Stalwart Communications discusses marketing and public relations strategy

What makes a Lawpreneur? Join us as David Oates, founder and president of Stalwart Communications, shares his journey.

David is a 20-year marketing and public relations veteran who holds extensive experience in developing as well as executing successful and measurable programs for a wide range of agency, corporate and government organizations. Prior to founding Stalwart Communications in 2006, David was Marketing Director for Financial Profiles, a 35-year old financial planning software company based in Carlsbad, California, where he directed all marketing-related strategies and programs, including lead generation, partner/reseller, customer/sales support, brand enhancement, public relations, competitive analysis and market strategy/situation analysis programs.

He also draws great strength from his days as a U.S. Navy combat and public affairs officer, where he honed his skills in leadership and corporate communications in various forward deployed operations, including Haiti, Hong Kong and the Middle East.

Sponsors

My Case is a web-based legal practice management software built for the modern law firm. Start your free 30 days with My Case today. Tell them Lawpreneur Radio sent you!

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Fail fast to succeed faster

Listen as David discusses that it doesn’t work to take on every potential client that comes through the door and how undoing past choices took away from growing his business.

Tell us something good

Hear how David developed his business on the Pay on Performance model and how that has helped to accelerate his business and the business of his clients.
David talks about the importance of a peer level power group in developing new ideas and handing tough business choices in a confidential venue outside the office.

Favorite Resource

The Flipboard App to aggregate news from all over the world.
TGG Accounting (Outsourced Account Firm)
Professional support for the business (e.g. insurance agents)