Working Remotely Part 3: Marketing

February 23, 2019 by Galia in working remotely, lessons

In an industry that historically has been run entirely based on word of mouth and personal referrals, I’ve had a few people ask about marketing a virtual firm.

I feel like I could write five blog posts just about the online marketing we do, but generally I’d split it into:

Social media marketing: Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Townsquared, Nextdoor
Content marketing: webinars, videos, articles, newsletters
Remote networking

Tenet #1, of course, is no matter what, Always Be Marketing. But with that assumed, let’s dig into each.

. Social Media Marketing

The more people see your name, the more they’ll remember you, and the likelier they are to send you a referral or call your office. Obviously, there’s a line between being visible and being obnoxious, but we’ve made it a point to have a presence on every major social media site, even the ones that wouldn’t be obvious for a law firm like Instagram or Nextdoor.

Linking back to your website from social media sites also boosts your online visibility when people are searching online for a lawyer. You’re more Googlable!

We post self-made content, but also share other links and articles we think would be useful to our followers. Obviously, social media marketing is very intertwined with content marketing: we write an article, then make a short video blurb of it for YouTube or Instagram, then blast it on Facebook, put it in our newsletter, and so on. But each platform has different things that work, so we tailor what we blast depending on the medium.

The goal is not that someone will see our brilliant tweet and hire us (though we of course wouldn’t mind if that happened). The goal is to create top-of-mind awareness (as in, they remember you exist because they just thought of you recently), build trust, and frankly to show the world that we’re one of the few law firms that knows how to use technology.

2. Content Marketing

Content marketing refers to all of the content you’re creating yourself, like articles, videos, newsletters, and webinars. Content marketing boosts your visibility when people search for a lawyer for two reasons: 1) people tend to search for answers to questions, not for specific people, so if I create content that answers their question (e.g. “Should I be an LLC or a Corporation”), they’re likelier to find me; and 2) Google’s search algorithm values useful content (quality over quantity), so the more useful it is, the higher they’ll list you. Content marketing also has the added bonus of showing the world that you’re an expert in your field, and letting people get to know you and get a sense of who you are.

Our law firm also has an explicit mission of focusing on education, as well. We want people to know when they need us and when they don’t, because a lot of business and employment law mistakes are just because people don’t know what they don’t know. Educating people and sharing what we know is one of the things I enjoy most about my job.

3. Referral Marketing

Referral marketing is the practice of receiving (and asking for) referrals directly from your network. Usually referral marketing is done in person, by attending meetings or getting coffee with someone, and building relationships over time. Referral marketing took a backseat to online marketing while I was out of town, but it still played a big part in our growth. I made sure to keep up with my network while I was gone so our relationships wouldn’t atrophy. I also made plenty of new connections, and met new people over the phone or video chat, many of whom I think will turn into great long-term collaborations. (This, incidentally, was a good way to figure out if a potential addition to my network was tech-savvy and modern in a way that my clients would desire and which was compatible with me and my firm.)

I’ll also group Yelp and Google reviews into this category. A surprising amount of our clients find us through Yelp and Google, and that relates back to having an online presence in the first place. People who find us on Yelp will review us on Yelp, and then more people find us on Yelp, and onward.

A key part of referral marketing and receiving reviews, of course, is also just providing a client experience that exceeds expectations. You can’t build up a great online presence and then provide terrible service. The reality is this: if you don’t meet expectations, people will say bad things about you. If you meet expectations, people will say nothing about you. Only if you exceed expectations will people go out of their way to tell other people positive things about you, whether that’s writing a Yelp review or telling their friends. So all of this is useless if you don’t deliver above and beyond. The client experience is something we constantly have on our minds and are constantly trying to find ways to improve even more.

Lessons:

Key fact: all this online marketing is FREE. My favorite kind. Yes, it does take time, but the payoff has made itself incredibly clear. Also, why would I pay someone hundreds, or even thousands of dollars for something I could do myself for free? Maybe I’m just clinging to the frugality of an entrepreneur, but I’d rather spend my money on payroll for an awesome team than on outsourced marketing. But that’s just me. You do you.

The only downside of people finding us online instead of via personal referral is that there may be more upfront cost to weed out clients who need services we don’t provide. If done well, people who are sending personal referrals would weed those people out for you, because they’ll already have a good sense of what you do. But ensuring your network knows exactly what you do and what type of clients you prefer to work with is a long-term and time consuming job itself.

My main lesson in all of this is that I really don’t have to be in the Bay Area 100% of the time for this business to thrive. I think being there in person does make it easier to build one-on-one relationships, but the main benefit of being in the Bay Area is just to have face time with my team members themselves.

I’m not sure how it would’ve gone if I started the business remotely. I do think it still would have worked, but I would have had to put all of the eggs in the Online Marketing basket, instead of trying to diversify between online and referral networking, which I think is more beneficial overall.

Part 4 will go into the actual how-tos of the hardware, software, and resource tools I use while working on the road.

Working Remotely Part 2: How My Virtual Law Firm Works

February 09, 2019 by Galia in lessons, working remotely

So, how does it actually work to run a virtual law firm day to day?

The Client Experience:

A potential client will either find us online or get referred to us, and make initial contact by phone or email or by booking an appointment online with our paralegal/client services director, Mary Lou. If it seems like the person would be a good fit for our firm, we set up a video meeting for them to talk to me. All I need for these meetings is my laptop, a good wifi connection, and a wall that looks professional enough for business meetings. (This wall part has actually been the hardest part of the entire thing.) If they decide to hire us, the rest of the work is done by phone or email.

Because I’m not tied to court appearances, I can do my work whenever and wherever. Very little in business law is a true time-sensitive emergency. And almost everything I do is some combination of thinking and writing, so all I really need is a laptop and some wifi. And sometimes some coffee. (Okay, often some coffee.)

From the client’s perspective, they’re getting the same exact service that they would get from any law firm, plus what we intend to be the additional perks of ease, accessibility, and efficiency because we’re using technology that most other law firms aren’t using yet. The clients are getting the quality but don’t have to pay for the overhead or inefficiencies (think: no rent, no parking, no public transit fees, no gas, no commute, no copy machine rental, phone system, books, file cabinets, storage, furniture, time spent on printing/copies/scanning, and on and on). And clients don’t have to sit in traffic and find parking whenever they want to talk to one of us. If someone prefers a traditional law firm with a traditional office, then they’re not the right client for us anyway, and we’re happy to refer them to someone who might be a better fit.

The Team Experience:

Because we’re not all in an office rubbing shoulders every day, we have to consciously create time to communicate to make sure everyone knows what their priorities are, what next steps are, and also just so they don’t feel completely isolated and alone. We have one all-team meeting once a week to review our client projects and make sure things keep moving. We have another all-team meeting every other week or so to work on non-client projects such as business development, marketing projects, or to do all-staff training. I also have at least one one-on-one meeting with each of them every week to batch questions/answers and check in. All group meetings include some time to talk about non-work things for a few minutes, as well -- we’ll start our staff meetings sharing one good thing that happened or one thing we learned that week -- so we can all continue to learn about each other and keep up the feeling of a true team.

I try to make sure I’m reasonably available to them if they need me, but it’s also a really good practice in making sure all of our procedures are solid, that they have all the information they need in order to do their jobs, and that they know what’s an emergency and what’s not so we can all work as efficiently as possible. Most of our non-meeting communications are done via email unless it’s a true emergency. The goal, whether I’m there in person or not, is to have the law firm depend as little on me as possible, because that would be the mark of a successful practice. That part is a process, but it might even be easier to get there with me gone than if I were there; I’d still have the inclination to try to do everything myself, and there wouldn’t be as much immediate incentive to change it.

Our team is still working really well together, and I won’t speak for them, but my personal impression is that everyone seems happy and invested. If anything, I think it contributes to a shared feeling that we’re doing something new and blazing a trail together.

The virtual law firm also gives me an opportunity to give my employees one benefit that many other companies can’t or won’t: the benefit of being able to control their own lives and schedules, just as I can. I may not be able to give them big bonuses every year (yet!), but what I can do is let them prioritize their own lives amid the work. Everyone has things that come up in life — babies, illnesses, family challenges, or even just routine things like appointments or finding out at the last minute that you’re the one that has to pick the kid up from daycare. My employees are able to work from home and get their own flexible hours to live their lives how they want. And they know that I value their lives outside of work. After that, it’s hard to want to go back to commuting an hour in each direction to sit your butt in a chair for 9 hours straight. It brings me joy to be able to give that to them.

My Days:

I try to work normal hours (9-6ish) on weekdays. I sometimes work nights and weekends, but conversely, sometimes I take days off to travel or spend time with people or be a tourist. The main challenge with doing regular work hours on the road is that, to the people we were staying with, it often looked like we were working too much. From the outside, it seems like we should be on vacation, so even working 9-6 seems like we’re workaholics because people expect us to be relaxing, hanging out, and exploring. For us, we’re just living our lives, working normal hours, and we spend as much time as we can exploring outside of working hours.

Ultimately, I can do the work anywhere, so it doesn’t make a difference to clients, to my network, to my employees, or to anyone else whether I’m in Oakland or not. And when I do go back to the Bay Area, I plan to still run my law firm this way. It saves me a ton of time (I joke about my strenuous commute from the bedroom to the next room over). I’m much more productive working from home because it’s much easier to set up and protect time for deep, uninterrupted work. And I get to keep my PJ pants on when I’m on video chats. It’s definitely my dream job.

The Results:

I keep a close pulse on the stats of my business, and my business has measurably grown while I’ve been on the road, by every measure.

The truly interesting and funny part is: the things that help my business run well with me remote also are things that help my business in general. They’re also things that help me and my entire team have more flexible, independent lives that keep us happier. Putting our systems and technology and teamwork to the test by me being gone may have actually accelerated our systems and technology and teamwork. It’s a really rewarding experience. For example, if I had stayed home, I probably would have continued to do at least a few in-person client meetings a week, and never would have tested and found out that doing them all online can, and does, work, which saves everyone time, money, and hassle.

So while I do have luck and privileges that gave me a leg up to make this all possible (and I never lose my gratitude for them), I do think that this lifestyle, or at least certain aspects of it, is possible for a lot of people if it’s really something you want to do. In fact, even if all you want to do is stay put, there’s a lot you can do to at least build in more flexibility and efficiency so you can get more done in less time and for cheaper. It does require a lot of discipline and some good tools, but in the end, it’s a lifestyle that, for me, is a pinnacle of fulfillment and adventure.

In Part 3, I’ll go into how we do some of our marketing and networking from the road.

Working Remotely, Part 1

November 11, 2018 by Galia in lessons, working remotely

Working remotely has to be the number one hot topic that comes up over and over again on our trip. I’m working full-time, and Mike is working part-time, all remote. This is something that many people haven’t seen done yet, and we honestly didn’t even know how it would really work out ourselves, so I’m constantly surprised by the depths of people’s interest in this topic. Mike’s experience is similar to mine in a lot of ways but very different in others, so for now I’m just sticking to my personal experience. I wasn’t sure what people would be most interested in, so I’m breaking it up into multiple parts to focus on a few different aspects of running a law firm remotely.

Part I: The One Where I Talk About Myself

Before we get into the nitty gritty of actually running a law firm remotely, some backstory that might help:

I’m a lawyer, and have owned my own law firm for a little over five years now. I practice business law, which means I help small business owners protect their businesses and their families by creating customized business documents that limit their liability. (Plug!) We do a lot of business formations, consulting about independent contractors vs. employee classification, trademark registration, contracts, HR and employment policies, etc. Anything that comes up in the course of a business, other than going to court.

Before I started this firm, I spent a long and difficult year doing family law. I think I would have ended up working for myself eventually, anyway, but the combination of family law + that particular job made me learn a lot more quickly that a) I would only be truly happy with the kind of independence that is hard to find unless working for yourself, b) I don’t want to be bound to the courtroom anymore, and I ideally want to be able to work from anywhere or at least have more control over my hours and ability to travel, c) I want to practice a kind of law where everyone is on the same side and shares a concrete goal, and d) the legal field is far behind and someone needs to help move it forward, even if in small ways. Which, fast forward five years, is what brought me to where I am today. Namely, conducting client meetings in an RV at a truck stop, and networking on the phone while sitting on a bench at the National Mall in DC. Or, literally at the moment I write this, sitting on an airplane.

Before we started the trip, I had what I’d call about an 80% virtual law firm. A virtual law firm is one that doesn’t have a “real” office, and most services are conducted online. In order to both keep the overhead low and also give myself the flexibility I wanted, the law firm was set up using a coworking space as our headquarters. I’d go in a few times a week for client meetings and to get the mail. The rest was done from home or out and about. My employees all worked from home, but would occasionally come in to Oakland to join me for meetings, networking events, or our in-person seminars. While it completely worked to not have a “real” office, I still felt like I was spending most of my week just driving around the Bay Area and not being as productive (or calm) as I’d like to be.

The trip would put the virtual law firm to a true test. I’d be working remotely 100% of the time, changing locations, changing time zones, and still working full time. I’d see no clients and no contacts in person for a year or more.

Near the beginning of the trip, my employees all expressed in one way or another that they were worried. They thought the firm wouldn’t grow with me away, that they wouldn’t get the support from me that they needed. I was worried they might feel resentful, like I’m traipsing around the country while they’re doing all the hard work. None of us knew whether we’d still get clients, or whether people would demand to meet in person before hiring us. But, the irrationally optimistic entrepreneur that I am, I thought we could make it work. It was at least worth giving it a go. And secretly, my goal was not only to sustain, but to grow the business even more while I’m on the road.

Months into the trip, my employees all separately admitted to me that, to their relieved surprise, it’s actually been totally fine. Nothing’s changed. Everything’s working, and everything’s growing. At one point I even said in passing, “When I get back, we’ll do xyz…” and the response was, “Oh yeah… you’re coming back! I forgot!” Nothing makes me feel more confident that this can work than my employees telling me they believe it. And, goal achieved -- we didn’t just sustain the business, we grew it substantially.

I can’t discuss working remotely without also acknowledging some of my many privileges, all of which I feel deep gratitude for on a daily basis:

First, I am very privileged to have a team that has fully embraced the sometimes maddeningly change-focused philosophy of my law firm. Seriously, they are all amazing. I know this would have been much more difficult with a team who wasn’t willing to jump in and take risks and grow and change with me.

Second, I am also incredibly privileged to have a job that I can do on the computer. For people who work with their hands, or who need to be present at their jobs for one reason or another, a trip like this would be much more difficult and maybe seem impossible. I know I gave myself a huge head start by picking a career that only needs internet.

And finally -- having a partner who’s also up for it! I try not to take this for granted. How lucky I am!

With the backstory in mind, the next installment will talk about how a virtual law firm actually works.