« February 19, 2006 - February 25, 2006 | Main | March 05, 2006 - March 11, 2006 »
March 04, 2006
Riskin Post: High-End Clients Not Happy At All.
It's here, from Gerry Riskin's shop, and it's based on a BTI Consulting Group Survey. And it's what I've been telling you for 6 months. Good news for smaller firms and boutiques willing and able to capture, serve and keep BigLaw clients.
Posted by JD Hull at 10:21 PM | Comments (0)
March 02, 2006
Once Again: Asia Law Blawgs, Anyone?
So far Tom Welshonce and I have located (and listed on this site) U.S./China-based China Law Blog by Seattle's Harris & Moure and ChinaBlawger by Beijing's well-known IP and business firm Lehman, Lee & Xu, founded years ago by my visionary IBLC friend Ed Lehman. Any other active and worthwhile English versions ones out there?
Posted by JD Hull at 09:17 AM | Comments (0)
March 01, 2006
Addictive "Del Bianco" Brand: Telecom Law.
Brands. Some lawyers become brands. In my litigation and environmental practices, I'm still working on it--but some lawyers of ours already are. Especially in telecom and tax. I was even thinking of starting a series showcasing lawyers in our firm called "It's Official: I'm the Least Well-Known and Likely the Least-Credentialed Lawyer in My Law Firm" but Tom Welshonce, the pluperfect associate in Pittsburgh who helps me with this blog, talked me out of it, mostly. Listen, Tom: telecom legal issues lurk in every deal these days. In straight-on telecom deals, obviously. But mainly in non-telecom deals. Mark Del Bianco figured this out long before it happened. See, as many clients and firms sans telecom lawyers are seeing, this link and/or this one and learn about Del Bianco, a telecom wunderkind, DC native, Yale Law grad and long-time friend who is of counsel to us, and you can see why I partially vetoed Tom on the showcasing thing. Del Bianco's so busy we can't even get him to raise his rates. Three months ago, Mark and I penned for The Pennsylvania Lawyer an article entitled "The Law of Telecom: Identifying and Resolving Telecom Issues in Acqusitions and Transactions". Judging from e-mails and inquiries, it's the most popular article we ever published in our 14 years. Enough said. Congratulations, Mark. Sorry, Tom.
Posted by JD Hull at 11:16 PM | Comments (0)
Tom Collins: "So What's a Good Time to Call?"
I learned something from this one. It's from Tom Collins at MorePartnerIncome. My "best time", until now, was Friday afternoons--a great time to call existing clients in rainmaking mode...but I guess it's not the only time to call. So my excuses to wait until then are now gone. Thanks, Tom.
Posted by JD Hull at 10:14 PM | Comments (0)
Tom Kane's "5 Biggest Marketing Mistakes" Per 4 Big Dogs.
Do see this series at The Legal Marketing Blog if you haven't already. Lots of good ideas from great people in a minimum amount of space. I don't have time to read or post about everything--but I've got time for this. There are "5-mistake" takes by Calloway, Riskin, Bodine, and Tom Kane himself. First-rate, and a fine advertisement for blogs, blawgs and whatever this is that takes an hour of my time every day.
Posted by JD Hull at 10:26 AM | Comments (0)
Return of Mark Beese, Leadership for Lawyers.
Mark Beese at Denver's Holland & Hart is back with Leadership for Lawyers after a 3-month blog-sabbatical. I for one am very happy about it. When we first launched this site, Mark noticed our efforts and its theme of boutique firms competing with much larger ones, and was encouraging early on. L4L is a first-rate site on lawyers as human beings, innovators and marketers, and on law firms as real laboratories for new ideas. Welcome back, Mark.
Posted by JD Hull at 01:42 AM | Comments (0)
February 28, 2006
It's Fat Tuesday in New Orleans: "Heck of a City There, Brownie!"
It's today--and I almost forgot. I've been in LA "celebrating" my birthday. On the way back, I was thinking that, while Los Angeles is a city where eccentricity is tolerated and even bankable, New Orleans is the real thing. Being different is celebrated daily. So hats off to New Orleans, the last urban Bohemia in America, where oddity is a way of life and today, Fat Tuesday, the day before Ash Wednesday, it's more like a real sport. See Why Have Mardi Gras? at Ray Ward's Minor Wisdom.
Posted by JD Hull at 05:25 PM | Comments (0)
February 27, 2006
Blawg Review #46
Sean Sirrine at De Novo has this week's Blawg Review. Along with a bunch of great links, Sean offers some helpful "tips" on keeping blogs fresh. Nice job, Sean.
Posted by Tom Welshonce at 12:19 PM | Comments (0)
Rule 9: Be There For Clients--24/7.
Rule 9: Be There For Clients--24/7.
(See the first 8 rules: 1-6 here, 7 here and 8 here.)
Get used to it. We attorneys, accountants and legions of other professionals with corporate clients--at big firms, boutiques or solos--are no longer royalty. In the future, "returning telephone calls promptly", "keeping your client informed" (like those two items should ever have been a big deal!), blackberries and having effective voice message and paging systems will not be nearly enough--if it ever were enough. Color all that barely adequate. Get a new standard--a new wave-length with your clients and customers. I posted about this recently in "Being There: Availability".
Family will always come first. Rest, time and re-bonding with family and friends is important to nurturing body, mind, soul and spirit. Vacations are important, too. We need all that recharging, and we need lots of it. But we now live in a world (1) that never sleeps, (2) in which delivering services based on problem-solving, know-how and judgment is as important as mass-producing, marketing and distributing widgets, and (3) where competition for good clients--amongst accountants, actuaries, consultants, stockbrokers, lawyers, you name it--is getting stiffer. In the next decade, and even for high-end clients, more and more "cookie cutter" and fungible services will be outsourced and done by very smart and far more cost-effective workers and professionals in Bangalore, Taipei or Mexico City. Just wait. What's left over will be specialty items and things clients need professionals and specialists to do at their highest levels of thinking and problem-solving.
Compete on service. Compete using your best skills delivered with superior service. If you really want "clients for life", and the rewards promised in all those happy themes you see on the shelves of the business sections of Borders and Barnes & Noble, consider being there 24/7--and telling your clients that you already are. No--it won't kill you, diminish your health, ruin your marriage or drive your employees away. Just let your clients know that you are totally accessible--no client worth keeping will abuse the privilege--and then show them. As a practical matter, you can assign two people (as my firm does) to be abreast of each client matter, no matter how small, and never charge for the overlap (it works). You can actively jockey to become the "emergency go-to" provider when a client needs to get something addressed immediately simply by doing the day-to-day work you already have for that client with uncommon enthusiasm and ahead of schedule. How you show them and how you do it is up to you. In order for most of us to be competitive, we have to get into the habit of "being there"--that means both quality time and any time. Good clients deserve this.
Posted by JD Hull at 12:24 AM | Comments (0)
February 26, 2006
Allison Shields: "Do You Know What Your Clients Really Want?"
Allison Shields at Legal Ease Blog has posted on one of my favorite subjects. It follows up on a shorter Seth Godin post. Note in particular what Allison has to say on learning about what the client wants and bringing those wants and expectations into line with what is probable, possible and not possible. It's excellent and it's here.
Posted by JD Hull at 09:58 AM | Comments (1)