EP097: The Law Firm Rainmaker Playbook – With Ken Hardison, Steve Nudelberg and Alan Margulius

What your hope is that my client will refer you over the next 10 years, two to five new cases, maybe more. And so we need to think about that. And when you represent them, you need to create that referral mindset of doing. I call it under promising and over delivering, being very client centric, informing them keeping in contact with them, don't want to complain to the state boards across the country is that lawyers don't turn calls. They don't keep the class informed on what's going on with your case. And so easy. Always look for opportunities to ask for referrals go sometimes they think you're so busy that you don't only business

Welcome to the 10 Golden Rules of internet marketing for law firms podcast, featuring the latest strategies and techniques to drive traffic to your website and convert that traffic into clients. Now, here's the founder and CEO of 10 golden rules, Jay Berkowitz.

Good morning. Good afternoon. Good evening. Whatever time you're listening to the show. Welcome to the 10 Golden Rules of internet marketing for law firms podcast. My name is Jay Berkowitz. We've got a classic episode today, one of my favorite episodes of all time. This is called the Law Firm Rainmaker playbook. And we call it that because rainmakers are the kind of people who rein business down on their law firms and their ad agencies to. And these are the kinds of people who bring in business and one of the frustrations I hear all the time from attorneys is that the young lawyers don't know how to bring in business. And so we got some superstar experts, some really, really top class experts who are great rainmakers, today you're gonna hear from Ken Hardison, who built to multimillion dollar law firms sold those law firms. And now he teaches lawyers through pill Ma, the personal injury lawyers, Marketing and Management Association. He teaches them through these masterminds and great amazing conferences, how to build your book of business, and how to become a rainmaker. The second expert we have, you don't want to miss this guy, Steve noodle Berg. He's one of my great friends. And he's built a huge, amazing business, teaching people how to build their personal brand, and how to really use social media to build your business. So today, you're gonna learn like LinkedIn secrets and how to build a network and a funnel of people are going to send you referrals on a regular basis from one of the best in the world. And last, but certainly not least, my friend Alan Margulius is a real Rockstar expert on training young attorneys. He's actually been hired to train young attorneys on how to build their book of business. So he's got a whole method that we learn here today. So listen up, stay tuned. If you want to see the guys with some of the slides, you can go to our YouTube channel and search for the law firm Rainmaker playbook. And while you're there, please give us a subscription to YouTube. If you're listening to this on iTunes, we'd love a five star review while you're at it. But without further ado, let's learn how to make it rain and give traffic and business or referrals and leads to our firm. whatever business you're in. You're gonna love this podcast. Enjoy.

Well, good morning, everybody. And thank you for being here. This is the law firm Rainmaker playbook. My name is Jay Berkowitz, and you'll meet the panelists in just one minute. I first wanted to talk about what is a rainmaker and if you know, saw the movie, or read the John Grisham book, The Rainmaker. This young attorney becomes a rainmaker meaning he starts getting his own clients for a firm and then he generates his own firm, creates his own firm and does very, very successfully because he can bring in clients. And the Merriam Webster Dictionary says, a rainmaker is either a person who attempts to produce rain, by artificial means, for for our purposes today is a partner in a law firm, or a business who can bring in new business, also a person whose influence and initiate progress or ensure success. And so if you're starting a business or if you're a young attorney, or a young professional, of any kind, we've got three world class experts today to teach you how to make it rain for your business, how to get business into your business, how to get business while you're still working, and billing hours or doing whatever it is you have to do. So my name is Jay Berkowitz. I come from a place called Winnipeg, Canada, one of the coldest places on earth. And one of the most beautiful places in the summer. And I got smart, my wife and I moved to Boca Raton. There's our dog Parker. And early in my career, I worked for McDonald's restaurant, I worked for the ad agency. And then I had a job as the director of marketing for McDonald's. And after that, I got lucky I came straight to e diets.com. And that's when I moved to Florida, and went from selling some of the most delicious high fat food in the world to losing about 10 pounds working all day every day with fitness, nutritionists and, and focusing on diets. While I was at EA diets, I was asked to write a presentation and present at the Direct Marketing Association. And I wrote a presentation called the 10 Golden Rules of online marketing, and 10 golden rules has come my signature presentation, and I created this presentation called the 10 Golden Rules of online marketing. And that presentation became the name of my company when people asked me to do consulting, and we became an internet marketing business 17 years ago. Today, we're an internet marketing agency focused on helping law firms and other professional services organizations. We work with firms all across the country. Here's the new website we just created for Stewart and Stewart in Indianapolis, Indiana. And like I say we're so focused and specialized on law firms. But today, we're here to help you make it rain. We've got an awesome panel, including Ken Hardison, Steve Middleburg and Alan Margulius, and you'll meet those folks in just one. So here's my take on Rainmaker. And the first principle of being a great leader Rainmaker is to give with no expectation of receiving anything in return. I spend as much time as I can, just trying to help people and just trying to be a giver. I was on next door and my one of my neighbors was looking for a plumber. My buddy, Kurt Kyle has a great plumbing company. I connected him and it gave me great joy to see Kyle's plumbing out in front of my house. Here's a guy I met in an online group and he was looking for someone for his board of directors. And I recommended my friend Richard King. This company was looking for a florist. This individual is looking for someone to edit their company's Wikipedia page. And I connected him with someone looking for window treatments. This guy who sells sophisticated hospital hospital medical plans, I connected him with my buddy. Here's someone who wanted help with a home inspector. My friend is one of the top predictive index guys in the country, helping you hire great people. And on and on, I think you get the point. But the position here is that a great Rainmaker gives with no expectation of anything in return, you want to be a connector, be that I got a guy or I got a gal. And give with the law of reciprocity, where you're not expecting anything return in return. But I promise you, it comes back to you. And it's great when you're top of mind when people think of you as the person who can help the person who can connect the person who can make things happen. The second sort of philosophy I have as Rainmaker is that your network is your net worth. And the more things I'm involved in, the more great things that come back to me and my business. For example, I'm a member of a group called the strategic forum. It's a CEO networking group based in New York and Florida. But I'm also based very locally in my BNI group, which are local networking groups. And it's fantastic to have people on a national scale, who can help your friends and business associates out and have a local plumber or a local air conditioning through BNI. I'm involved in one of the largest lawyer marketing associations, and I participate in my local FLN, Florida lawyers network. I'm involved with a group called the Internet old timers. And that's been over 10 years and some of the most influential people in Internet and Internet Marketing and publishing in that organization. And I'm an advisor for a local, locally based international startup. I'm on a board of directors, and I participate in an online book club. By the way, we just read this book, it's about the Americas banana King is called the fish that ate the whale. And it's a really fascinating story of how an immigrant created this multimillion dollar banana company. But seriously, it's being involved in all these things that helps me make all these touch points. And then the more you give, the more you get. So the more I participate in boards of directors or get involved in organizing, organizing events in organizations, I get people looking to me. Now by the way, all of these organizations are looking for help. And it's a great idea to go to any any of these organizations that you're interested in that are in your industry, and see if they need some volunteers. And if you volunteer and help with an event, next thing you'll end up on the board. I always recommend start with a skill set. So I As a marketing guy, I started on marketing. And then eventually I took different roles, maybe a finance role, and maybe writing press releases. Because I was more of a business marketing guy, I learned how to write press releases, so rainmakers build relationships, they connect with people. And you're the last person you want to be, is that guy at a networking event who's handing out as many business cards as possible. Now, nobody's doing networking events. But really, it's not about making as many connections as possible. It's making quality connections. And a quality connection starts with a one on one. And so every time I'm in a networking group, or any of these zoom meetings, I look for two or three people who look really interesting, that look like they're connectors that look like they're, you know, a part of the organization or something. And hopefully, they have something to do with my business or I can help their business. And I send them a little note, hey, can we can we connect for a one on one. And Steve Newberg, who's coming up in the presentation today, we did a little one on one, virtual meeting and virtual coffee, if you will. In the old days, we used to go to Starbucks. And now we do it by zoom. And when you get to know some when you know, like and trust someone you really build a relationship with. So your network is your network, again, give with no expectation of getting anything in return. Join powerful groups, become the I got a guy, I gotta go and do these zoom one on one meetings, because that's where you build a relationship with people. And that's where you start to really connect, and really understand how you can help them immediately follow up on everything you said you do. And the goodness will come to you in return. The final piece is just sort of expanding on that building of relationships. These zoom coffees become very, very powerful. The reason we're here today is what I call thought leadership. And what we're doing is we're doing a webinar, it's a thought leadership level. And I've written my four books, so that helps me become a thought leader. I've speak at conferences, but we're not doing that. So now we're doing these webinars.

Ken's a great example. And then you're gonna hear from him in a minute. He wrote a number of books on legal marketing. He used to run some of the biggest conferences, and I assume now they'll shift to running some of the biggest zoom conferences in the entire industry. And he also runs masterminds. And so he's become known as a thought leader about running a law firm and legal marketing. Steve Newberg, who you'll meet in a few minutes, runs a daily huddle every morning at 8am. He's firing up salespeople and firing up his salespeople. 345 100 people are on the Zoom and Facebook Lives. And then in the afternoon, he interviewed someone for his live with new book, it's called Tell Me Something good. And he interviewed me on his podcast. Here's an example of a young woman who just started once a week teaching a yoga class. It's called Yoga with Adriene. Now she has over 8 million subscribers to her YouTube channel, and probably makes over a million dollars a year, just from people watching those videos and seeing the ad at the start of the video. My buddies, the Nathan's and brothers send out a video every single week. But it's that religious attention to every single week, sending out a video that they come top of mind when I'm thinking of a mortgage guy, or real estate. My friend Chris ream did a series of training on LinkedIn. He's a he's a life insurance guy who really mastered LinkedIn. And now he's sharing his expertise on LinkedIn. My friend Brewster kill gets his blog every single week, every single week, he sends out a blog post. And he's become such an expert on branding that is regularly appearing on national TV, talking about branding. I mentioned the webinars. And you guys, everyone who showed up here today got an email about the webinar. And we are doing these every single month. And it's thought leadership, it's sharing our expertise and my panelists expertise on different topics. We send out the email, we post on our company's social media. And then I posted on my personal social. And we send out three emails before the webinar and one email after the webinar with the recording. And that gives us the ability to communicate and be top of mind as thought leaders about legal marketing. Here's the final tip I'll share with you and this is kind of like the secret sauce that works really, really well for turning this kind of marketing into business opportunities. So when you registered for the webinar, you got to a thank you page. On the thank you page. It said, If you can't wait for the webinar to learn about our topic today. Click here to schedule a strategy session. And I'm using a software that I absolutely love. It's called Calendly. And it lets people click and see my calendar and book a meeting and it automatically sets up a Zoom meeting sends an email to you, and sends an email to me and locks it in on my calendar. And every single month, I'm getting 56789 leads from these webinars because of this technology. And it's super simple. And by the way, I absolutely love calendar, I highly recommend it. I also use that software, every time I meet someone that's interesting that I want to connect with on LinkedIn or wherever I just send them my Calendly link and say, Hey, set up a meeting. Let's get together. Let's have a one on. So to summarize, the great strategies of thought leadership. Number one is creating great content. You saw a range of different things, you don't have to do everything. You just have to pick one. My buddy Brewster co writes one blog, the Nathan brothers record one video, and artisans all over awesome content, books and seminars and masterminds. But start with one thing that you're comfortable with, create content and then calendar it, send it out on a regular basis, once a week, once a month, like our webinars, whatever you do, stick to it. Cascade the content. That's what we talked about with the email becoming the social media. And start with one piece of content goes on your on your blog or your website, and then drop it on on your social media. It's like a river cascades down into a waterfall. And finally, Calendly is an awesome tool for setting up meetings, appointments and events. So without further ado, I'd like to get to my first speaker, Ken Hardison was a pie of personal injury lawyer for 35 years, he built and sold to law firms, is recognized as a top 100 trial lawyer and a million dollar advocate, which means he's got really, really significant recognition from the industry. He's the founder of filma, powerful, innovative lawyers Marketing Management Association. And as I mentioned, I've spoken at conferences, and they are the awesome leadership conferences for legal marketing. And he's known as a millionaire maker, because of his ability with these masterminds to get law firms to a million dollars to $10 million and above. So without further ado, can make it rain. All

right. So I'm gonna talk today about referral systems, I didn't want to say one thing, that was a really good presentation, Jay. And he reminds me of stuff in a gentleman told me one of my mentors years and years ago, you give people what they want, you'll get what you will, in. And it goes with, like giving without expecting, and I think that's, it's got a lot to do with what I'm gonna talk about today is kind of like the premise of the basis or the foundation, what I'm gonna talk about. So I'm gonna talk about some referral systems, I actually do a presentation where I go through 15 Different referral systems. But with the time limitation, I'm just gonna pick like, the top four or five that I have used in my members use in my coaching class use to get a pretty steady pipeline of referrals. So here's the referral rule. And this is what studies have shown is that 20% of your people that you know, are past clients will refer your business, even if you don't do anything, you don't ask them or whatever, just raving fans, and 20% of them will never referred to you, no matter if you got them timsy in dollars, or, you know, made them you know, whatever, but the 60% that they would refer you some business. And if you create a referral system, and educate them on how to refer people, people just don't know how to do it. And number one, they got to know that you want it. So another rule is I think you got to be reformable. And what I mean by this is, is would you if your mother or your son, no matter what kind of law you're if you're in a mess, boy, if they were getting divorced with you how your law firm? If, if, if they got hurt in a bad accident last leg, would they How would you be cut off sending them to your law firm. And if you know, then you got a problem. And also, if you Google Plus ratings, Google Business ratings, you don't have a lot of testimonials, and a release like a 4.7 or better on your business page, your Google business page, and you got a problem. So you got to be referral. And I think class services a must. You know, just everybody assumed that lawyers are gonna do a good job. And for the most part, that's true. There's exceptions, every rule but you know, you went to law school, you took the bar exam, you're supposed to know what you're doing. So so the big deal is class service. People want to be treated with respect and dignity and then as a human being. So I think also you got to get in your law firm, you got to get the referral mindset. I think class was born to meet you do word of math. A little bit just trying to look you up on the web sites. And everyone in your firm must understand that referrals are the most common is a better way to acquire new clients. And then the other thing that I think people forget that they do not market to their past clients, they're more worried about how can I spend some money up front on the front end trying to get people that don't know who I am. And Jay, hit it right on the nail on the head when he said, people are going to do business and refer people that they know like, and trust. That's just the bottom line. So who better than your past clients that you did a good job for? And know you and like, and trust you, hopefully. But then there's another element of this. And I think most lawyers never think it is a lot of businesses. But I don't think law firms do is you can't look at this. A client is a one time shot, you need to think about a minute, what's the lifetime value of a client, I mean, what you would hope is that a client would refer you over the next 10 years, two to five new cases, maybe more. And so you need to think about that. And when you represent them, you need to, you need to create that referral mindset of doing, I call it under promising and over delivering, being very client centric, informing them keeping in contact with them, then one complaint to the state boards across the country is that lawyers don't return calls. They don't keep your class informed on what's going on with your case. And so easy. But like I said, I mean, you got to have attitude, but under promising and over delivering, and always look for opportunities to ask for referrals, because sometimes they think you're so busy that you don't own a business. So why would somebody give you a referral. Everybody always thinks goes, they're gonna try to help you. But really, and it's like Jay was saying what he does with all his friends, he says people love to be helpful to their friends and family. And they want to be, you know, because people are just nice, and they want to do that thing. Not everybody, but at least 80% of the people. And then they want to help you because they trust you and lacking and so you got to do a good job. Okay, so let's go over these bad proven and test tested referral systems. Okay. Number one is set up a client advisory board. This is one that probably a lot of you never heard of. So when you're in a business, you see business people all the time get asked to be on the banks advisory board of directors, and they really have no power. But what it is, it's a thing to where it gives them some status, it makes them feel important, and hopefully to make sure this big business person's deposits and get some new business well, well, this is the same type of deal, you want to go back to your past clients and pass referral sources and set up a client. I call it a past client advisory board. And we'll improve I've got the whole thing set out we don't have time of day but the gist of it is this the psychology of it, is you want to bring them in and like every quarter recommend serve them dinner at some restaurant, the amount of three question questionnaire and see what how you're doing. And then you want to encourage them to an imperfectly announced they come in, in public, in front of their peers for referrals. You want to ask them how it was that they have referred Are they happy with you. And then what you want to do is you want to create a VIP card, a client advisory board VIP card and set it up with a number that's not listen to give it an endless number. And give these people you know 1020 30 album and tell them when they leave the meeting that dinner. When you see somebody needs my services, give them this card and tell them this is a backdoor number to get in. So you don't have to get through all the red tape and then have that phone number go into somebody. It's it can be your cell phone, it can be your office managers, it can be your head paralegal, whoever you know, it's going to be able to handle that call and give them great class service and close the deal to sign them up as a new client for your firm. Newsletters and holiday cards. Here's the hope I see a road warriors give up on newsletters too quick. It takes about a year for this to grab hold of. And I think it works better if you lease them one out every other month. I think that the paper ones are more important than the email ones because only at tops 20% of emails get out. And so the whole premise on this thing is top of mind awareness. So by doing the Holiday cards I used to do a Valentine's Day card to my clients Thanksgiving card, July 4 card and then in between I was sprinkling Every other month the newsletter so what is the stop amount awareness. All lawyers think that their past bots remember them forever. And that's just not true. I wish it was, but it's not. And so what we need on top of mind awareness, when they see somebody or their friends or family get hurt, if you do in your law, or if they get into a divorce or get into a traffic ticket, that you're gonna be able to talk to my, okay, you can also this is one thing I did check, would you state more. But get that referral mindset, I had a contest, and you can do it either quarterly or annually by annually, I need an annual and pay the top replaces from referrals from our staff. And that generated the last year I did it, it generated 40 to 48 new cases. And basically what I did, I gave him a week off and a full paid vacation to Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, because I had a condo down there. In a second place, I give him something else and whatever. But you get the gist. A fourth thing is something that's really overlooked. And let me tell you this, we'll help generate more referrals. You need to write handwritten thank you cards and take your logo, get a printer to set it up and put your logo on it. And in a little thank you. And you can write about three sentences. Thank you, thank you for referring John Doe referrals, the biggest compliment you can ever give us a law firm, we appreciate it. And we'll do everything we can to to help Joe. Joe in his case, and then you send it to him. And when you do that, you got to know that

that person knows you appreciate it, because I know you're busy. If you took time to hand write it. And you don't have to, I usually his handwriting give it to the secretary, she fills out the envelope send it to, because here's what happens if you don't acknowledge is they'll put sent on to you because they think you don't really give a damn, and you don't care, you know, appreciate it. So take the time to do this. It will it will pay dividends tenfold, I promise you. Alright. And then this is I just make a book. And one of the books I wrote is how to how to build a practice with a book, I wrote seven different customer books for every little different niche I had, that I did. This one was for call wrecks, or whatever. But But I can tell you that there's a lot of ways to leverage a book, because it makes you the authority to go to person expert. But here's how you leverage it to get referrals. Every new client I had, I will give them two or three month books. And I will say when you see somebody been hurt, give them this book and tell him this and the lawyer I used. So two things happen. There are three things. Number one, it makes it really easy for your client and your past clients to to break that ice breaker. So it makes it easy for them to refer you. And that's what I said at the beginning. If you can figure out a system that makes it easy, and show them how to do it. Because they just don't know how to how to broach the subject. And so I would give them two or three books at the beginning. And then when the case closes, I get two or three more books. And these books do all the selling for you if you get they're done properly. And when I say two books, they're like 5060 pages, they're not warranties or anything like that. And also, I would give them out in the advisory, what I had my advisory board, I but also give them the core, but also give them three or four, maybe 10 books, and tell them and give them both those things. So you give them a VIP card plus a book. And I can promise you that, you know these are going to generate more and more referrals and new cases, I can promise you. So I wanted to offer. I wrote a book or we were talking about systems. This was an Amazon bestseller. I've written several books. This is the one that probably was my most popular book. And it's only like 140 pages. It's not a real website. It's a pretty easy read. And if you want one of these books I got to do is email us at office@pillman.org and just puts this systematic marketing book in we'll put your address and we'll mail you a copy of it. We'll even pay for the for the postage, but we'll go into these things. It's a lot of different systems. Like I said, there's 10 other systems I got four referrals we didn't get into about going To the other lawyers and other professionals, and we just don't have time today. But anyway, that's my, that's my spiel, Jay, in

that. That's awesome. And, you know, the last time you spoke, you talked a little bit about the client Advisory Board and the VIP dinner. And I loved when said you do it at a Golden Corral. Yeah, you mind expanding it a little bit on

shore? Yeah, I did it at Golden Corral, because it was cheap enough to pay for the room at a buffet, so everybody could do it. In this pandemic, it's gonna be harder to do that, right. So, you know, you still could do a zoom meeting and send out pieces and everybody or whatever, you can do a lot of different things. But I'm just saying when this pandemic is over, this is probably one of the most effective ways to get referrals and past clients. And it's cheap. I mean, it's going to grow, you get 3040 people out there, and it might cost you five $600. Tops, you know, and think about, you got 30 People in half, I'll send you one case in the next 90 days, if we have your next meeting, as 15 new cases were $600 is crazy. And I'll give them some swag to, you know, I like to give a little bit something extra, like more than just pins and, you know, cup holders and, you know, I've give out T shirts, I would give out umbrellas, I'd give out stuff playing 1540 bucks apiece, I give them better than just a regular swag. And they appreciated that too. And they would wear it and use it. And so yeah, it was it was we got a lot of our pillow members doing this. And the dealers, you had to do it consistently about every three months, because what you'll see is a spike, the next 30 days, and then a level up and then it'll drop off. So you had to you had to keep doing it every three months. I

love it. So you take class clients invite him to what you call a client advisory board. Essentially, it's a dinner. They schmooze with you, they meet your other lawyers, they go home with a bunch of, you know, knickknacks and swag, and, and copies of your book. And I think you mentioned like a VIP business card that says, hey, this is my direct cell phone number, my direct phone number. And you really leveraging those relationships, and the good work you've done for past clients. Right? Right.

Yeah. And that is, that's why it is number one, it really is the number one way to get past clients and report your people. You got a book and even works better. I mean, it actually multiplies it. Maybe 30 40% better when you got a book,

and nobody's really tried to do it like a Zoom meeting.

Yeah, not that I know. Nobody's tried it yet. I think we got someone we're waiting to see. They thought we were gonna get over this, but I think about rethink it.

Yeah. And you touched on your books a couple of times, can help put the offer up before we finish. And I emailed that list, and I got the book, talk a little bit about how you use the books, both for law firms. And now for your consulting business.

Well, I've never even when this book was the Amazon bestseller, I've never made a dime off a book by selling it. And I've never even tried to sell it. I mean, it's on Amazon and some people buy it. But it's all about to me, it's all about credibility. And it's a lead magnet. And that's why you know, you know, it's, you get goes back on your prep. So I've given out a lot of great value information. And you know, everybody, and I'm hoping that half the people will appreciate it, and maybe follow up with me or want some more information. But it's just a really good. I think it's just a great way to set you apart from your competition to make you the authority. People read it, they get to always try to put a little story about me in the beginning. So they get to know me like me, trust me. And it's just a good way to do. So who you're about what you're about and build a relationship. Because especially when I deal with lawyers, lawyers were very what's the word? Very cautious, skeptical, even sometimes. And because we're getting hit with so many people trying to sell stuff unless in our practice for over 30 years. I know they want a weaker body and get two or three people saying I got the latest and greatest thing it's gonna get you rich. You know, that's why everything I do would peel me as 100% Money Back Guarantee ever conference, every membership, anything I do. If you don't think it's worth the money, I just give you a refund. Because you know, and believe it or not, when I practice law, I did this I A little Adri all continuously work so I didn't have to return the money. But I just tell him first 30 days is not completely satisfied the way we treat you and your case, you can get you out no fees, no costs. And what happened was, that's a risk reversal. And with the same amount of money I was spending my leads went up like 23% would let one change in one day. So you know, sometimes. But that's what I use it for to get I digress. But the books I picked are a really good way to set yourself apart. It's a good lead magnet, and you've given value. And it kind of gives people what you're about. Yeah, I

love it. Someone told me very early in my career that your book is your $5 business card. Yeah. And it's it's been a great value to me to have my books, because often I'll get referred as you know, talk to Jay Berkowitz. He's the guy who wrote the book. Yeah. And you know, it just meant that I hammered away for about 100 days and spent an hour or two every day just getting it done getting it done getting it done. Yeah. By the way, it helps to have a deadline. So somehow create an artificial or real deadline for yourself. That's fine. All right, Ken will Awesome. Thank you so much for for doing this. And in fact doing it again. Next up will be Steve Newberg. And as I mentioned before, Steve has a really amazing amount of rainmaking going. And if you follow Him, and please do follow him on LinkedIn and Facebook, every morning at 8am, I get the one of the first things I see is noodle berg is live for the daily huddle. And it's a sales huddle. And it's motivational. It's informational. And there's four or five 600 people across the different devices and, and there's great networking in there. And people are connecting and talking. He's doing the podcast, he's written a great book. I'm actually rereading your book, Steve, excited

to be here. Congratulations to you, Jay put together a great panel. It's a great topic, because people really need to focus on how are they going to make it rain. And so I'm thrilled to be able to share the stage with the other gentleman and yourself. Quickly, who am I I'm a guy's 40 years in sales have been one of those people that invested in the people early on in my career, I have great mentorship, I have great strategic partners, I've been very blessed that the people still remain the most important part of any business. And I'll prove that out in my presentation. But I've been in lots of different categories. And I'm thrilled that at this point in my career, I get the opportunity to share what I know and how people are modernizing what they do. So you know, let's get in, let's get let's get after it. Here's where I want to start, I want to start with the obvious there is change, there has been change going on. And just like the Industrial Revolution, changed the way people did business, we're going through a massive amount of change. Now COVID added to the change, it's not the only change. So I wanted to go through some of the things that I think you need to pay attention to. Number one is, we have clearly moved from a transactional environment to a relational environment. What does that mean? Ken just hit on it you buy from people that know like and trust you, period, you know, so the idea that, you know, this idea of it's all about the people has never been more relevant. And as we get through my presentation, I will show you that you are no longer selling logo to logo, you're selling person to person, and the rules have changed. So I have a question for you today. And that question is, are you an investor? And when most people hear this question, you keep going, Jay, when most people hear this question, they immediately go to the money side of things. Are you an investor? Yes, I have an advisor Yes, I play the market myself. Warren Buffett defined it as the process of laying out capital now to receive money in the future. So it's all about a money conversation. I want to steer you to another kind of capital of which there are many there's financial which is the money side there's intellectual it's what you know, and what you're able to share spiritual certainly a driving force in a time when you know the world seems to be you know, at a at a spin. But the things I want to focus on today are relationship capital and social capital. Relationship. Capital is who you know, social capital is who knows you very significant to play this game the right way, because the results are tenfold So when people invest in any program, and again, it was great to hear Ken say that if somebody invests money in him and they don't like the result, he'll give them the money back. So that's a guaranteed return on investment either get what you want, or you don't? Well with capital, social capital, and with relationship capital, very different kinds of return. And I want to share with you the new metric is no longer ROI. It's R O R. R O R is return on relationship. And I am here to tell you today that the investment I have made in people 40 years ago, is still paying dividends. And now there are so many social tools that allow you to do that. So I want to have a who conversation with you, I think, Who besides being one of my favorite groups, who matters, and JF, you'll continue, you matter in the equation. For the years that I grew big businesses, one of mine was in the cell phone business, I had hundreds of salespeople, my corporation mattered more than any one individual, because what we were selling was the corporation, where we live today in the environment, you matter. And when you talk about who, who you are certainly who you know, matters, and that's why I have Captain Obvious up there who, you know, is very significant. And in the days when I was hiring all those salespeople, when they would come in and say, Well, you know, I know all these people, I go great, you're gonna be great and sales, it's no longer the only metric. Here's where it changed. Who knows you who's talking about you, who's saying, in other circles, that's my guy, that's the one who is the leader, that's the guy J wrote the book on it, you know, that's really what's the measurement today is who's talking about you when you're not, not around. And there are tools that allow you to control that, expand it. And when you get to that point, the entire business structure changes. So I want to share with you what I think the new funnel is, is an awareness game, the more people that are aware of who you are, keep going j, the more people that can actually consider what you do. So if not enough people know who you are, that's a significant issue in your business. Because the more people that are aware, the more people that can consider, and the more people that are considering you, ultimately, the right percentage of them will actually make a decision. And so I believe, as a guy that's always invested in behavior, rather than outcomes, I get my fair share of people making a decision to do business with us. Because we are totally focused on creating awareness of who we are, what we do, why we do it, how we do it, why we do it differently than anybody else, which has created so much more consideration. And the health of any business who wants to make it rain, whether it's an individual or a large organization is who's talking about you, who's really, really talking about you. So this is a reverse funnel, where most people are pushing stuff, outbound, you as an individual have the ability to become a magnet. And that magnet draws people to you. My, what Jay alluded to, in the morning, our noodle board, daily huddle, has attracted so much inbound opportunity, that it's immeasurable, I could not put a number on what it would cost to get those kinds of eyeballs to get those kinds of opportunities, and it's all organic. So, and it no matter what you do in life, I believe you need to have a game plan. Most people don't have a game plan of how they live their life for what they do. But certainly, if you want to make it rain, you need to have a game plan. And that game plan comes down to a fundamental basic process. The greatest athletes, the greatest leaders, the people who are achieving the most in life, have a guaranteed process that they own, they consistently do very disciplined and with persistency. So focusing on those behaviors is very significant. And it comes down to a conversation between building the right strategy, and then the right tactics behind it. So I want to make sure that we're clear when we talk about strategy. Strategy is really the destination of where you want to go. Some people call it goal setting, that's fine. I like to look at that, if you remember the days when we used to drive around all day long, most people had some kind of app that they used to sort of decide how they were going to get to places. So if you've used Waze, which was one of my favorite ways doesn't work until you put in the destination. Once you put in the destination, depending on all of the market conditions, time of day, all the other variables, it will give you a dozen different ways to get to the destination. And that's what tactics are tactics are the individual if j if you can hit it, again, the tactics describe the specific actions that you use to get there. And so I'll get into my specific conversation about how to make it rain, keep going.

First thing I think you need to do, if you want to make it rain is understand who your dream client is. And once you decide who your dream client is, and you do that, by building the right criteria, some people call it a persona. But that could be, you know, national footprint, volume of the company, multiple locations, how many employees what their favorite charity is, regardless of what the criteria are, you build the dream client, and then use new modern tools to get to them and you can go, Jay, you can put them all up, if you will, there's four of them. So these are just an example of the new rules. LinkedIn is the absolute number one networking marketplace to build your personal brand. It is not a platform to sell on, yet 1% of the population is using it properly. Zoom, we've been teaching people zoom for many years. In fact, I posted two plus years ago on LinkedIn. But how grateful I was to Eric Yan, who is the new the world's newest billionaire. He's a CEO of zoom, I thanked him because it allowed me to coach people at scale, geographically no boundaries 24 hours a day. And he hit me right back and said, thank you. And now he and I are connected. It just shows you the power of that medium is so unique. Using them together has been fantastic for our clients, people got pushed into using it this way. But I think there are tremendous benefits. And I don't look at it as a negative. video art is it really interesting tool that allows you to video yourself and embedded in emails. So we've modernized the way people are using email. It's not just the flat text anymore, it's with a motion and it's with, you know, sort of personality, if you will. And then lots of people use GIFs and emojis and stuff in their social conversations. We absolutely believe that it takes a place in a business conversation. It's like it's fun, it shows you have a sense of humor, and it breaks down the walls, and allows you to build excellent relationships, all new, all basically free. Yet again, most people not using them. So years ago, we came up with something called 50 cups of coffee. It was an interesting program that we created very early in my career. And I had all of the people that work for me handwrite a list of people that they wanted to have coffee with. Why because when you meet people for coffee, the guard comes down, you're not bringing brochures, you're not one person's not pitching the other. It allows you the opportunity to have a social setting that allows you to understand more about each other, and in my mind, earn the right to share your story with them. And the ultimate outcome would be they either would be interested in learning more, or they would know somebody who would well, all the new tools that happened a couple of years ago, we now make it virtual. And Jay and I prior to you know doing, you know, when he introduced this opportunity me to me and asked me to do it. We had a virtual cup of coffee. And you know, two years ago when we started introducing that to people, they were like, Wow, man, that's really cool. I've never used zoom. What what's a virtual coffee? Well, now it's become vernacular for all the people that work with us. Because all we're doing is taking something that was done in the real world and we made it virtual, it's quick. It's easy. I don't have to drive along town. I don't need to worry about somebody listening in across my shoulder. I don't have to worry about getting a table at Starbucks. The benefits are enormous. We block this into a 15 minute opportunity. We can meet and build relationships with people at scale, which is what rainmaking is all about. So as Jay said, I do a morning show. I do it with my son, my son Son 10 years coaching college football years, a year ago, he jumped out, he joined the company. He's now the president of the company. And we do real content. We give away real stuff in the morning. And Ken alluded to it. And I'm sure everybody here is alluding to it. We are in a value driven world. If you give value, people understand what they're buying from you, and they buy quicker. So I welcome you to join us every morning. At eight o'clock, we usually go for 20 minutes, we have a hard stop. And it's actionable sales stuff that will allow you to grow your mind and your practice no matter what you do.

You know, Steve, you mentioned the power of these meetings, and we talked about it. I think yesterday, that it's not, it's not just the business, it's coming to you. It's a business. It's coming to everybody in these huddles. And what I love is there like minded people, like anyone who's going to show up at 8am Ready to, you know, fire themselves up with a daily huddle that their sales manager didn't tell them to go to is going to be, you know, a pretty like minded person for me. And I mentioned, I met a guy named Larry long Jr. And he, you know, we, I sent him the Calendly zoom connection, he set up a meeting on my calendar, we hopped on a Zoom meeting, I found a couple of things that I could help him with. He has an attorney that he could help me with, I sent him over an analysis of that attorneys website. And like, immediately, we're doing business. So talk to me about that, the power of that that group. So

for years, we had a live event called Eat Drink, think. And basically what it was, was a live networking event. It was the last Tuesday of every month. We held it at YOLO. in Broward, so people from Palm Beach County and from Dade County could come and meet in the middle. And it was invite only. So we secured the right people in the room. And for our clients that we brought there, we would bring strategic introductions, so that they would have the opportunity to meet in a social setting and do business. And we took nothing for it. All we did was do what great rainmakers do is they give, they consistently create value, create introductions, create strategic partnerships. So it validated everything that we talked about. And we just decided that, why would we limit it to people who could physically go on the last Tuesday of every minute of every month, we just opened it up and said, We're going to create value every single morning, we will, word of mouth will take care of itself. And by the way, that's still the number one marketing tool is word of mouth. And so we just lit a match boom and watched what's happened. There are 1000s of people that join us. The comments we get are amazing. And we promote within to say, Hey, listen, reach out to each other. This morning, there was a new guy that I actually am on the board for a company called grape stars. He joined I didn't even officially invite him He just joined. I welcomed him in. And right away three other introductions of people want to learn what grape stars is and how they can help. And so I'm shocked that we're the only ones doing it this way. But it's sort of a unique platform. And the one takeaway about modernizing all the things you do is the stages on limited.

And I highly recommend that meeting. One of the things about joining on LinkedIn, I know you're also on Facebook, or I guess it's the same for Facebook, you're on LinkedIn, you can immediately connect with people. It's really, really functional.

Yeah, that's the whole point is that we're all swimming in the same place. LinkedIn, which we you know, we teach in our course, is really Yelp for salespeople, you know, so, you know, why would you listen to me telling you how great I am? Why don't you listen, all the other people I do stuff with? So the best validation is hearing you say, hey, wow, that's great value. These guys know what they're doing much more than me blowing my own horn

was the word you used. And it's like a common word. But I think it's so important. I want you to expand on it. And that's awareness. And you talked about, you know, the huddle in the podcast and posting constant value on social media. And then people are aware of you and then they they start looking to do business with you want to expand on that a little bit, because I think it's so important

today. Yes. So my big successes in my previous career. One was in the cell phone business. We were tremendous advertiser. We spent money in like newspaper and print and radio, TV and everywhere you could think of we marketed ourselves. So people knew who we were, then my sales teams would go out and have a conversation with somebody Oh, yeah, I've seen you on TV, I've seen you on the radio, you know. So we sort of did the art of war mentality, which is create air cover. And then you'd be the ground troops that go in the art of war is that you send in planes, they dropped the bombs, and then the troops go in afterwards. That's a fundamental way to gain territory. So that's how we did it in the past. Now, we can create our own air cover using social media, sending the planes drop the bombs of value, and then people come to you. And my intention always was never to sell anybody anything. It was always to be one of the choices when they needed us as a resource. So whether it was cellular phones or marketing services, or bizdev, or now coaching and all the other things that we do, if you're thinking about getting being a coach, I want to be one of the three people that you call, and I'll take my chances. And that's where that's consideration is I don't need everybody. I'm never going to sell everybody. We're not a fit for everybody. But when people inbound from all over the globe, reach out and say, I've been following you. I love the way you think I love who you work with. I'd like you to work with me. What does that look like? The first time that happened? I was like, I thought I was on Candid Camera. I was like, what do you what do you mean, you know, now it happens all day, every day. And so I've realized that strictly by telling my story, documenting what I do and who I do it with, which is what social media does, it just has allowed me an opportunity to globally build my brand in a way that you could never do it any other way.

Awesome. Well, Steve, thanks for making the time. I know you got a million things always going on. Just awesome, awesome content. And thanks for being here.

My pleasure, man. You're you're awesome for doing this. Congratulations to the other guys as well, Alan, it can do great work.

Thanks, buddy. Well, now I'm really pleased to present my friend Alan Margulius. And Alan spent 25 years building global business development teams. He's the managing director at acumen corporate development, which helps professional services firms like law firms, accounting firms, you know, sort of train and motivate their young professionals, and turn them into rainmakers. He's doing this all day every day. He's also a board member at Urban recipe, unique organization that delivers food security. I'm gonna ask you a question about that at the end. And most importantly, I think he's a Winnipeg Jets, and Blue Bombers fan. And I don't believe I've ever had one of those on my podcast because we grew up together. Matter of fact, this might be a picture of Alan because we, we were able to go to the our Team Blue Bombers in the Canadian Football League, we were able to go to their first return to the Grey Cup, and we won in 1984. It was a cold day and everything. I'll tell you that. You know, Alan, it's great to have you. And I look forward to your training for rainmaking strategies for law firms. All

right. Well, thanks, Jay. And thanks, everybody at 10 golden rules. And thanks also to Stephen Ken, for their very insightful talks. And mostly thanks to all of you for joining us. Like Jay, I exited Winnipeg, I don't know if you can, if you saw behind me, but I'm living in Atlanta where it's very humid. Great to be with you. I've got to picture the Indian Ocean behind me because it's just what I want to look at these days. And I guess you can tell I'm not a native but so I am not a lawyer. I'm instead a lifer on the sales side. But as I'll explain, I feel like I've really never sold anything. And I think you've heard from the other three fellows, basically the same thing. And there's no intent of being tricky here. And of course, there's different ways to get things done. But this is just just how it evolved for me. And I think it's a very effective approach for lawyers to think about, as you start to think about how you're going to build your practice, expand your practice, etc. So I come to this law, firm business development, or BD, as we like to call it in a rather unconventional way. And it's something I'd become really passionate about, I really feel that the lessons learned in more conditional sales organizations can be modified and applied to help lawyers make rain and consistently grow your buildings. So just for a little bit of reference, more of my work has been with corporate law firms and multi practice areas, but you know, regardless of what you do, I hope some of what I share today will resonate with you. So just to jump right in again, many of you equate rainmaking and business development efforts with with selling used cars and I know you're listening I know you're here I know that look on your face when we walked into a seminar and and you know, here I am. I'm the Lead use car salesman and I hope you're not thinking that way. But if you are I just ask for a few minutes. Take a deep breath. And let's get into the zone where you work at becoming a trusted adviser, you grow your practice, but you're staying in the no selling zone. So, you know, a couple guys mentioned, there's no question these are clearly unprecedented times, many of us can really relate to this picture. If you're looking at the news and watching what's going on, it would be very easy to conclude that this chaotic world is is where we are and where we're going to be for a long time. Next slide. But here's a completely different picture of the same world, obviously, much more Kay, and much less chaotic, rather more organized and workable. So I just to be clear, I'm in no way making light of our current conditions. But for me, and I hope for you, it's really time to get back to basics back to business and get my brain away from the chaos. And I showed you this slide really just to emphasize how important mindset is, and we'll speak more about that in a few minutes. So yeah, there's chaos in the world. But you know, the world is not ending and opportunity abounds. If you create a plan. I think you heard everybody mentioned that a plan is critical. It's not the only thing but it's critical. And as you listen to myself, and you think about what the other fella said, think about your own world and your own business development efforts. And are you are things chaotic, are they organized, you've clearly if you're a lawyer, you have invested in your education and you got it done. Now you need a plan, a reasonable plan that you can grow with for you and your firm. So

so to this slide, you know, I think this is really important. Most lawyers are by nature, overachievers, and again, if you got through law school, you have skills. So whether you're an introvert or an extrovert, male or female and rookie or a wily veteran efforts to put you in a box and tell you what to do, and who would do with they just don't work well. In my experience, so as a BD practitioner for law firms, you can imagine that being very challenging, but for me, this ends up being you know, a lot of what is the most rewarding part of the work and we can help a formerly anti BD lawyer, create a practical common sense BD plan and execute, it's really rewarding. And then even even better is when we start to see you make rank. So remember that you are who you are, and your personality regardless of personality type, your commitment, education and performing at a high level it gives you most everything you need to be a rainmaker and to be successful at business development, regardless of how social or not that you are. And it's one of the biggest misconceptions I find with professional service firms and specifically with lawyers. So just never ceases to amaze that, that how many people equate business development with with disturbing people, or that you have to show up at your kids baseball game with a bullhorn and a bunch of bunch of business cards and be annoying to people. It's just not that way. I know lawyers who do it, I could never do it. I don't think any other guys on this panel could do it, but works for you great. But there are certainly other ways. So don't put yourself in a box and remember again, that there's so many different ways to get this done. And you heard everybody say the same thing. And it's regardless of how you do it, or what you do. You have to learn how to consistently build high integrity relationships and and typically the best plans focus on simple repeatable stuff. So today, Jay asked me to focus more on strategies for up and coming lawyers. And, and no question that strategies for sole practitioners as established associates and partners will be different, but the same basic principles and, and here's the key the execution techniques apply. So there's so many things that you can do, as a young lawyer to build relationships that will ultimately lead to revenue. If you're a speaker, speak, if you're a writer, right? If you're passionate about a committee or volunteering, join and participate, and if you're really social, you know, organize happy hours or networking events. I know some of those things are very difficult right now as the other fellows noted, but there are things we can still do. And soon we're going to start to get back to normal. I hope. So focus on putting yourself into good situations where where you can help people solve problems and create solutions. You heard a couple of fellas mentioned and this is absolutely critical. Pay attention to your network, grow your network, keep up with the people that you went to school with, where did they work? Who's in their network? What type of legal services might they need that there's a goldmine there. So challenge yourself, find out who you are as a business developer and do what works for you and then repeat the heck out of it. Don't worry about having a pretty plan. Just focus instead on tangible steps you can take to actually advance relationships and and be reasonable with yourselves. Young Lawyers and bosses of young lawyers. I really beg you here. overly complicated strategies will not make rain in the beginning as you're as you're learning to become a lawyer. They take away from your primary responsibility, which is to become a great lawyer, so you don't want to get into that box. But research so you know, you're respecting yourself, you're respecting your other obligations. This is not 100% of your time. Respect you respect your prospects. We use the word vintage a lot with young lawyers and and staying within your vintage early in your career is often the quickest way to becoming a consistent Rainmaker. No way am I suggesting that young lawyers can't close business, you can't, but you need to follow the right approaches. So, you know, deadlines and lawyers go hand in hand. Again, don't be thinking this is 100% of your time. But you can add a little bit of focus to business development make great things happen. So you know, this is a bit cheesy, but it's done with that intent. It's meant to leave you with this really top of mind, most of us walk into prospect meetings, we've got good intentions, we know how to solve their problem, we know how to impart knowledge. But we haven't even thought about what might be on the client or the prospects agenda. So that's why we stay laser focused on their agenda. And it's not easy, I still have to check myself here, I'm, am I coming at this the right way? Or am I just get ready to come in and flex my ego and tell them, You know what I know before I know what they need. So it sounds basic. But when you stay laser focused and keep that cheesy term in your head, it'll, it'll keep you centered. And really, it's as simple as this, when you keep your prospects agenda at the top of your solution platform, your relationships are going to get tight, and you're working your way to getting into that trusted advisor status. So, you know, lawyers are generally highly skilled at research. And you know, it's a great benefit and tool that you have use your skills here, and then apply them to your business development strategies. This is kind of like planning for meetings. There's so much information available something as simple as perusing a company's website or even an individual's Facebook page, you can you can gain amazing knowledge about their culture, their their mantras, their initiatives, their challenges. You heard Steve talk about LinkedIn, he's truly an expert, I really encourage you to talk to Jay and Steve can about other ways to use digital strategies that can work for you not just for research, but but to enhance your entire practice. So you know, one of the things that also comes from research that I find is really misunderstood is sometimes you get to dead ends. But isn't it better to get to a dead end before you spend valuable time and resources working on something that's unwinnable? And of course, again, also, it's not always possible to, to research. But I think you get the point. When you're thinking about the client with thinking about the prospect, you're putting yourself in a position to really gain trust. So you know, my fellow introverts, and yes, I am one of them. You know, this should be welcome news, this is what the no selling zone is all about. It takes away and dismantles this perceived personal selling pressure that we have. And instead, you know, gets us focused on laying strong relationship foundations, by making it all about them instead about us. So you still need to know your wares. And you need to know how to present what you and your client can do. But this is really a huge factor, especially for young lawyers as you're looking to grow your practice. So this, this really is my favorite slide. So you know, imagine you're walking into a prospect meeting or dialing in these days, you've researched their business, you understand the personal matter that they're that is going on as best you can. You're already way ahead of the game by just investing that that little bit of time to get that done. So then you can ask questions and listen more than you talk. And that's when these eight hands that you see is at eight or six. Anyway, there's a lot of and that's where you can reach for whatever resources you need, depending on where the conversation goes. And I think this is really critical. And it's one of the most important relationship development approaches that anyone can have, regardless of what you do. Your competitors will typically stay focused on themselves and what they have to offer. But again, you're working towards trusted adviser status and listening really worse. So another way quickly to think about this is to you know, imagine walking into a meeting as the leader of your resources, you're asking questions, and then you're reaching back for the resources that you need. Again, no pressure on you and no selling. You know, you heard I don't have much to add to what the other fella said. I can't say it any better rainmaking and business development in general is about building strong relationships, research searching for solutions, problem solving. And when you do it this way, and this is really what you're trying to get to. It cements relationships in ways that selling never can and authenticity matters when people in general prospects or not when they see and feel that you're are genuinely concerned and truly invested in their success or solving their problem. That's where your relationships are going to be very hard to break, you get to that trusted advisor role and good luck to your competitors once you're there. So, I love this guy. I don't want to be this guy. I've been there, I'm sure you have as well. An amazing mentor once told me I rarely see bad sales plans I'm quoting here, I rarely see bad sales plans. But stinky execution is very common that that word never meant has never meant the same for me. But it stuck with me. It pushes me to make execution that piece the centerpiece of really any plan. We have to start with a plan. I thought Steve said it very well. If you don't have a plan, where are you going? You need a sheet of music to sing from the plan isn't usually the hard part. And again, that's my great mentor said the plans are usually pretty good. You can build a plan we have a one page business development plan specifically for lawyers. And it really helps you build in some accountability measures it respects your time. It includes goals and action steps and resources that you need timelines, status metrics, all on one page, and we get to specific things and we coach you how to really make this work for yourself. So excepting for extenuating circumstances, you've got your plan and now mindset becomes the driver and really determines how well you how well you execute. So

again, we always have great intentions but we get in our own way. So I was noticing this myself I personally have a a mindset coach that I work with, I always give him a plug. His name is Ricky calm. And he's amazing. It's made a massive difference for me with execution rainmaking and, and life in general. And he gets me out of me out of my own way so I can focus on my plan. So now a few words from the boss, about accountability. And not much of this works without you whether you're a one person firm or you're managing 1000 lawyers if leadership is not engaged, don't don't expect great things to happen across your firm, rainmaking business development efforts, they absolutely require a top down commitment and engagement. So you know, if you're a managing partner, you're a practice area leader, you're the glue that is needed to to achieve rainmaking consistency at your firm and then once the firm sees that you're engaged, and there are some metrics built in and you're rewarding people for for taking strides, then you can start to build a peer to peer accountability platform that's even more powerful. Nobody wants to be embarrassed in front of their friends and their peers. And the last thing on this notice is hired to this. I'm a huge believer having dedicated aspiring business development initiatives and expectations for new hires as soon as they start. You know, creating good habits is a lot easier than fixing bad ones. I hope I've shaken up your thoughts a little bit about what it takes to be a rainmaker. If you listen to all of us, we all talk about relationship building selling in traditional sense, does not have to be any part of it. I'm happy to speak to any of the things I covered in more detail. But really, I leave you with this, which world are you going to live in, think about that chaotic world or that more more organized world and focus on your mindset, you might not be able to run out and meet prospects and clients face to face right now. But use this time to build your network, research your contacts and reach out and reasonable ways that suit who you are. So that's it. I'm going back to Jay, my fellow diehard Winnipeg jet and bomber fan. That's all for me. Awesome.

Thanks, buddy. And great job. Of course, I'm not gonna let you off without a few questions. You know, I love your theme. And as a matter of fact, the conversation I had with Alan really stimulated my idea for doing this webinar. Because he said that, you know, big part of his job is helping, of course, the partners of the law firms, but as much as anything there, and I hear this over and over and over, they're frustrated that the other folks in the firm, don't bring in any business, the young associates don't know how or don't, don't try to bring into the business of use the term selling without selling. And I think you sort of live that you talked a little bit about it. But maybe talk a little bit about like if you if I give you three targets. What's one thing each of them should be doing the young associate, how should he be starting to do this kind of rainmaking? You know, the mid level guy in the senior partner?

So the Junior, as I mentioned, I use that word vintage and you know you and I have discussed it I think it's really important. It this is no way says and I said it exactly this. There's no way meant to say that you can't close business. But watch, watch your network and it's really critical. You know, if you went to school with someone whose father is the CEO of General Electric, you're still not going to become the lawyer for General Electric But there may be a way for you to introduce your firm. So if you want to go up, if you have those aspirations, look at your network, see who's achieving things. But again, go back to, I thought, Steve, and Ken said it better than I did. It's used your relationship building skills, whatever those are, stay within your vintage, this will start to pay off for you, it's not going to help you to call the CEO of Bank of America and try to tell you to tell them what your firm does, you're not going to get anywhere, unless that person happens to be your uncle, and then bring senior partner with you if you get to meet. So for the, for the middle, sort of senior associate or junior partner, your network is further established, you're in more of a position to talk specifically, you're a more seasoned lawyer. But again, it's still about building relationships. And this is where I think the sort of in the middle of your career where this research component is so important, because you know what you're doing. But we so often fall into that trap of, Oh, I know everything, no offense, I know everything. And I know what you need, before you even find out what they need. So you know how to execute. But you're 1520 years into your career, use that network, again, use your skills. And really, now you are in position to speak to the CEO of the bank. So you've earned your keep. And again, just keep building that network and for the senior partner, get a mindset coach,

there,

you know, you and I have discussed this, it's hard, it's hard to get senior partners to change their focus, they may have one or two huge clients, they don't have a succession plan, they're probably a little scared, but they really don't want to jump into BD. And this is where we're in our own way. And I find, frankly, speaking that senior partners are the ones that are that are that are more if we're more in our own way, then then then then people may be starting their career. So I would really ask you to take a look at your one page plan and figure out how you're really executing probably not as well, as you might think,

no offense. What are some of the component parts of that one page plan?

Yeah, so you know, so that I don't ramble. Let me you know, really, they're very, it's very simple. We're laying out. It's about specific action steps. And what I really liked most about the one page plan is it talks about specific metrics you hope to achieve, I want to increase my billings by 20%. I want to refer, I want my referrals to go up. And then it's important, how does your firm handle referrals? So we talk about specific metrics. But really what we talked about are what are the specific things you're going to do this month? What is the date that you're going to get this done by? What are you expecting to happen from here, so it is very basic. And again, every lawyer knows how to write a business plan. And if you don't, we can help you quickly or somebody or the partner in the office next door can help you. But it is about execution in the one page sheet of music, let you stay focused, and has some accountability built into it. Hope I answered that. Okay.

Yeah, absolutely. Now, one of the things I heard a couple different times from from you guys, and I made a note to myself, that I often don't do a good enough job is researching folks before the meeting, you know, I'll generally quickly have a look at their LinkedIn, but I loved what you said about having a look at their Facebook and, and understand the corporate culture. Because when I when I go into my second amount of research, I'm generally looking at the website and looking into competitors. And I get a feel for that, like what, you know, firms will post on their Facebook, what charitable initiatives they taking part in and whatnot. So, you know, can you break that down for us? Like, what should a you know, not a salesperson, but you know, a business a rainmaker. What should a rainmaker do before a meeting today, we're doing them on Zoom? Are there a couple of key steps that you know, obviously, looking at LinkedIn and and looking at Facebook?

Yeah. So I mean, look, in the old days, when you and I were getting going, we didn't have these tools we had to rely on Hey, Dave, do you know Joe, I'm going to see Joe and hey, yeah, I played hockey with Joe or whatever. But now, you can sit in five minutes and just go to their website, learn all about them. As you said, most companies, if we're talking on the corporate side, most companies are going to put up their corporate mantras and what they're into and as you said, their charitable pursuits. You bring that up, it is an unbelievable authenticity maker. If that's what it does, it shows that you genuinely cared enough. You're the big high powered lawyer, they're probably nervous about whatever is going on in their world. And you're walking in and you didn't make it about them you know about their business or you know about their personal matter if you can, and I don't know how else to say it. It's really the glue that starts to cement the relationship and show you as somebody that isn't just this big, bad lawyer that knows everything, but you actually care about what's going on. I don't know how to Say it any better, it just creates authenticity as the relationship develops.

I once paid a lot of money and bought a domain name, and I was going to start a software company that could compile that information and somehow connect Facebook and LinkedIn. Because for me, I find that a lot of times you learn this stuff. And then, like, I guess my question is, where do you start? If you don't have a CRM, where you put in all the information?

Yeah, I mean, I don't think you're trying to walk out with a novel on a particular prospect. I think if you go to LinkedIn, and you know how to use it properly, I'm realizing that I'm okay, but I need Steve seminar badly. But if you use the, if you use LinkedIn, if you use Facebook, and if you really, to me, on the corporate side, if you're looking at a company's website, if you can just grab a few tidbits of information, and it's not a game, it's not about some sales trick that you're walking in to say, Hey, I see that you just opened a new office in Miami, well, if there's something relevant to that great, but frankly, if you do say, Hey, I just I saw that you opened a new office in Miami right away, they know you're on their side. So it's, um, it's just grabbing a few tidbits. It's not a ton of time. And it's not about creating, you know, pages and pages of notes before you walked in, walk into a prospect meeting. You

know, when I asked that question, something popped in my head, I had a great opportunity to spend some time with Harvey Mackay was a few years ago now. But he wrote the great book, swim with sharks without getting eaten alive. And he's written a couple dozen books about selling his printing company back in the day that made envelopes. And he built a huge business. And one of the things he always did is he kept a list of I think there was 100 or 107 questions. And over time himself in the customer service, folks, the sales folks would build that list, and they try to answer all those questions. I remember he told the story of the guy who's just kid got in an accident. And he heard about it. And he always talks about, those are the moments where you really build a relationship with the customer. And he checked his notes, and he found out the kid was a hockey player. And he was a goalie and Harvey Mackay is based in Minneapolis. So he actually, of course, he played at a high level he had relationships with I think it was the Minnesota North Stars at the time, called someone over there, got an autographed goalie stick. And the whole team himself personally, went picked it up, took it to the hospital. I mean, that was a client for life, because of what he did for his kid. And because he was able to draw on this list of questions. And I guess that's part of my, my question for you is, you know, what do we do as, as business development people salespeople to sort of store that valuable knowledge we create over time?

Well, you know, I think first of all, what resonates with me to what you said, is one of the first things you started with today, don't be expecting anything back. I mean, that's an amazing guy. The story you told that's an amazing guy, and he's not expecting anything, he's doing something for the sake of doing something good. And just know that that's going to come back and multiply exponentially for you when when you operate that way. But, you know, in terms of of your asking, in terms of gathering up a little bit of research, and how to use that to your advantage, is that really what you're getting at? Yeah,

I'm saying how do you store that information? You know, only even for myself, like, you know, I've like have casual conversation with a guy and find out. He's a hockey fan. And I find him among the meeting, you know, three months later, and he's like, yeah, hey, are you still watching hockey? And I, I forget that. So give you Yeah,

so what I tried to do, and I have sort of a prospect file, not sort of a prospect, I have a prospect file. And as I do research, my memory is lapsing. as I age, I just make a few notes into hockey. His kids on a scholarship to a school that I know something about, I'm looking for conversation points. And what I tried to do is just to keep a little bit of info on in my prospect file specific to that client, I may have done the research today, the meetings in a couple of weeks, I'm not going to remember. So I've got that. And then it might dig a little deeper half an hour before the meeting as I'm getting ready. And again, I'm looking for authentic conversation points. I'm interested to know, how did that how did your kid get to be a division one baseball player, I mean, I'm into sports, I'm interested in knowing that and guaranteed your prospect is going to be happy to talk about that. And then it's not about business, you're creating the relationship on it from an authentic foundation. So I would just find a way to gather up a few bits of information, not an awful few bits of information on your prospect that you can that you can borrow from as you're engaging with them. I have

about six more questions, but I'll just give you one more good one. that, because I spend some personal time to answer my own questions with you on the side. But for everyone else, you know, I think you do some of this stuff. So instinctually I've known you obviously, for many years, that I want you to try and break it down for the rest of us. And you mentioned, when you go to your kids baseball or soccer, don't bring a bullhorn and hand up business. And I know you're tremendous at building relationships through golf. And talk to me about what's the difference between you know, being that jerk with the business card and building those authentic relationships? And what are the types of things you're doing? questions you're asking so well,

first of all, I wouldn't necessarily call him a jerk. I work with a lawyer who doesn't have a bullhorn because he doesn't need one. He's the loudest human I know, and he hands off business cards, and he's unbelievably successful. So I, it's not my way, it's not your way. But again, I don't know how to do this any other way than to just speak from an authentic standpoint, I'm genuinely interested in knowing what you're all about. If that takes us to a place where business can be done great. I often think sometimes it takes you to a place where there's no there's no nothing for me to sell, or nothing me to benefit from, but I can introduce you. And I got a guy I got a gal as you mentioned, that can be that's one of the best relationship building techniques and revenue generating techniques you can have when you're generating even to another law firm. you're recommending prospects. You're kidding me? You recommend it? Yeah, we don't do this. But these guys do. And you don't have to say after that, hey, give me a call. If you need something on state planning. They know it's done. You're you're you're there. You've done everything that you can do so many people make that mistake. I don't know if I've answered your question directly. But it's just again, be authentic, be genuinely concerned and do the right stuff.

I think the answer is there's no magic. There's no magic bullet. There's

no magic potions.

So last question, because I don't want to leave this as a hanging chad for anyone who heard my intro. Tell us a little bit about urban rescue. Ah,

yes, my pride and my pride and joy. I've actually just rolled off the board. We wanted some new blood, but I'm still very much involved. So urban recipe started in the inner city in Atlanta in 1991. By an amazing fellow named Chad Hill, who moved his family there were literally this is right near Fulton County Stadium, which doesn't exist anymore in Atlanta. bullets flying at that point, and he set up in the basement of his church, a food cooperative. So urban recipe provides food subsidy to low income families. It is a co op. So everybody owns a share. Each member pays four to $6 per week for a box of food. It's not a complete amount of food for the week. But it lets people focus and gives you a little extra food for lunches and things like that. It builds community, it changes lives. It is an amazing organization. I'd love to talk to you more about it. You can look up bourbon recipe online. They are amazing people and during the pandemic, the work that they've done is is spectacular. But what I think, you know, we help them with their marketing, and urban recipe with the tagline of dignity tastes good. That's really what this is all about. And I think it fits with not trying to be cheesy here. But I think it fits with what what all the speakers said today. It's the same basic concepts, but in a more important manner.

That's awesome. Well, thank you for giving back. Well, Al, thank thank you so much for doing this. This is awesome. And I could listen to you for another hour. Because I love learning how a real salesperson can sell without selling. Thank you very much for doing this. And we'll definitely be in touch on we've got a couple of things to follow up. Absolutely. Thanks

a lot and I learned a lot from the other guys. Thank you very much.

Thank you for listening to the 10 Golden Rules of internet marketing for law firms podcast. Please send questions and comments to podcast at 10 Golden rules.com That is podcast at t e n Golden rules.com