The Sterling Family Law Show
The Sterling Family Law Show is where successful family law attorneys share the exact systems they used to build million-dollar practices.
Host Jeff Hughes scaled Sterling Lawyers from zero to $17M with 27 attorneys.
Co-host Tyler Dolph runs Rocket Clicks, the agency in charge of supercharging Sterling and other family law practices to success using revenue-first marketing strategies.
Together, they share the playbook for building the law firm of your dreams.
If you're looking to grow exponentially, generate revenue, and get good at business, this podcast is for you.
The Sterling Family Law Show
Tom's Trek: What I Wish I Knew About Law Firm Hiring 10 Years Ago - #158
Law firm hiring struggles? Watch Tom offer a $140K salary but get only 3 resumes in 3.5 weeks - here's what we learned.
Most family law firm hiring fails because owners rely on job boards instead of direct outreach. This legal recruiting challenges discussion reveals attorney salary benchmarks and law firm growth hiring strategies that actually work when scaling your practice.
📲 Subscribe Now: https://www.youtube.com/@jsterlinghughes
📝 Get your FREE Law Firm Growth Guide: https://jsterlinghughes.com/
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📄 CHAPTERS
0:00 - Law Firm Hiring Challenge: $22K Revenue But Can't Find Staff
12:27 - Family Law Firm Hiring: Associate vs Paralegal Decision
14:13 - Attorney Recruitment Strategies: Indeed Results Reality
15:40 - Law firm Staff Hiring: $120-160K Salary Range Discussion
17:04 - Legal Practice Recruitment: Why Law School Doesn't Matter
19:22 - Law Firm Team Building: Direct LinkedIn Outreach Strategy
23:03 - Attorney Salary Benchmarks: Competition for 2-5 Year Experience
25:02 - Law Firm Hiring Process: Why New Grads Apply Anyway
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Have you wondered if it's possible to start a family law firm and go from zero to 20,000 plus a month in under a year? Well, we have been following Tom Harten as he has done just that, starting his firm last September of 2024. And here we are, finishing up June and he's concluded a second month in a row at 20,000 plus in revenue. Well, hello and welcome to the Sterling Family Law Show. My name is Jeff Hughes, I'm the co-host, I'm the CEO and founder of Stilling Lawyers. We are a 27 attorney family law firm doing over 17 million in revenue. And my co-host is also joining today, tyler Dolph. He's the CEO of our sister company and our purpose is to share our wins, our losses and equip family lawyers to have the firm of their dreams.
Speaker 1:And this week we're back with Tom Hart in one of my favorite monthly shows, tom. We have been following Tom since September, actually before September of last year, but he started his firm in September of 24 and has had two crazy good months in a row. Tom, this is starting to look like a trend, so I'm going to hand it over to you what has happened, number-wise, in the month. So we're sitting here in July obviously July 14th today, and then we're looking at June of last month. So what happened in June of last month?
Speaker 2:That's right. Yeah, thanks for having me, jeff, and hi to you, tyler. So we, yeah, june was. I guess that puts me at month nine, right Nine or 10. I don't know, too early for math, but yeah, around month nine.
Speaker 1:When you have to do math on the spot, it's really really hard. Yeah, the pressure. You know everyone's looking at you trying to add.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, may was the first month I crossed the $20,000 threshold and top line revenue and I continued that trend in June. So a little dip, but nothing substantial. May was $24,000 and June was a little over $22,000 in top line revenue, which is awesome. I love to see those numbers, obviously and, yeah, hoping those numbers continue to go up.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah. So break down your numbers, leads and consults, and what will happen there?
Speaker 2:Leads went up a little. So I had 11 leads, consults and I don't have the answer for this off my head, but consults. Six of them turned into consults and three of those consults turned into hires. So you know, I think leads wise. I'm trying to think of reasons why the leads did not turn into consults, because usually that number is much higher for me, especially since, as of right now, I am still doing free consults, right? So if someone calls and says, hey, I'm looking for a free consultation, do you do them and I say, yes, it's pretty rare for that consultation not to happen.
Speaker 3:You said 11 leads to six consults.
Speaker 2:I believe. So yeah, and I am Tyler. I know I'm working with the team at RocketClicks to get a CRM going. I am very poor at tracking these numbers, at least the lead number. Sometimes that is a little bit of an educated guess. The consult number and the hired number is definitely accurate. Little bit of an educated guess. The consult number and the hire number is definitely accurate. That CRM will be very important.
Speaker 3:But the interesting point you made a little more than 50% from lead to consult and then exactly 50% from consult to hire, yes, which I think that number, the 50% number from consult to hire, is pretty standard.
Speaker 2:Looking at my past numbers that's been about, that's probably about where I've been, average about 50%.
Speaker 1:I think you're doing this, tom, but I'll just offer this up for benefit of our discussion here in our audience. So, being consistent about your definition around what a lead is can be hard right, but you have to in order to be able to have the data you need to make a decision in the future about be hard right, but you have to in order to be able to have the data you need to make a decision in the future about your marketing right. So how are you defining what counts as a lead? If I called you up and said, hey, I've got a, I've got a small time criminal, owi or DUI type deal, are you going to count that Like? What are you doing?
Speaker 2:No, I shouldn't be right. So so a lead to me is somebody who's looking for a divorce or family law attorney. So some you know, custody issues, support issues, stuff like that, and and they're in my area, they're in Nassau County or Suffolk County or you know, I might take some cases in Queens County too. But so, yeah, I guess those would be my two primary factors. Are they in my practice area divorce or family issues and are they in my you know location?
Speaker 2:So, and you know, another thing that's up with leads is we were just talking about this offline is I'm still answering the phone. So you know, if someone calls at 9pm and I pick up the phone real quick and talk to them, I might forget to write that one down. So you know that becomes that's a little more difficult. So I am looking forward to having that, putting that CRM in place so we can track that number a little bit more accurately, and we probably should break that up into like total number of calls you know how many of those calls were actually qualified leads and then write that. So that should probably be a second step that we're tracking there. But yeah, that's hard to do without a CRM. Step that we're tracking there and but, but yeah, that's that's hard to do without a CRM.
Speaker 3:Tom, do you feel like uh of the 11 leads, and let's assume the numbers right at 11,?
Speaker 2:did you talk to all 11 of them? Uh yeah, I I wouldn't have counted it as a lead if I didn't speak to them. Yeah, and I can think of two that like two offhand that booked a consult and then one of them one of them didn't show up. She actually called back. It was supposed to be like a Monday morning consult. She didn't show up. She had some issues. She called back like Monday later in the day and asked to reschedule for later this week. So that's one I can think of off the top of my head and then, although we're talking about June, so I guess that one actually doesn't count.
Speaker 1:But so, tom, are you getting a sense yet as to what your average client value is from a standpoint of revenue?
Speaker 2:My numbers will be all over the place. So I have you know, I would say what's been driving my revenue in May and June has been probably like three cases that are just there's just been a lot of court appearances, maybe four cases, a lot of court appearances, a trial going on in one of them where their first trial date was in May, family court's so backed up, so full trial date in May and then, you know, half a day of prep before that. Second trial day was in June, half a day prep before that and then we have the last two days scheduled in August. So that's yeah, that's driving the revenue at. You know another client where there's just there's issues in family court and Supreme Court. So there's a lot going on there. Actually there's two like that. I have clients that have issues in family court and Supreme Court at the same time.
Speaker 1:Yeah, now Supreme Court in New York is different than every other state right, let me clarify that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, supreme Court is our lowest court in New York. Yeah, I can thank the Dutch for that tradition.
Speaker 1:Okay, yeah, Okay, and then on revenue are you counting revenue as billed or do you count it as received once received? What's your definition there?
Speaker 2:So I'll say that that is billed. But I will also add a caveat to say that my collection rate is 100%. I have not sent out a bill that I have not been paid for. So, yeah, I have not collected. So the way that I work is I send out, know, send out the bill earlier in the month, and then a lot of people pay by credit card. So I won't, I won't actually charge that right now. We're saying July 14. So I'll probably charge that next Friday, whatever that is, and that is when. That's when that money will be collected. But, yeah, that's so that that's the bill that was sent out. But, as I've said, my thankfully to to you and one or two other people who, early on, told me to focus on making sure my collection rate is very high.
Speaker 1:So I was very- Well, I was just going to compliment you on that. You're doing great with that. Yeah, congratulations on your revenue but, more probably important, congratulations on your collection rate, because you could have a lot of revenue, collect 50 of it right, and I know that that's a big.
Speaker 2:That's a big problem in in the family law industry and that's something you don't. You probably deal with less because you're you're dealing with fixed fees. Um right, so you, you probably collect more up front, but for me, who is wants to do fixed fee but currently is still doing hourly, yeah, that's, that's a big issue and I heard that, thankfully, from enough people before before I really got going to. You know, put those systems in place to make sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah, good, so all right. So, working on our way out of your numbers, you got a new office that you're in. Now let's talk about that transition. What's going on there?
Speaker 2:I did. Yeah, I mean I I don't have a ton to say it's, I mean I like it a lot better. It's literally across the street, so it was a really really easy move. Uh, hopefully didn't impact my map rankings at all. It didn't really seem like like it did, uh, but it is. It is much bigger. I have room to uh fit one or two other people in here, probably one, but I could even fit two if I needed to uh, which should segue us into our next. Probably our next talking point is hiring, but yeah, I mean the space is great. I'm really really happy to have it and it wasn't surprising. Like I said, same exact location across the street, probably two and a half times the size and same price. So I don't don't know why.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I don't know why I didn't make this move, yeah, 50 bucks more. You did bring up an interesting thing I want to double tap on, and that's the map rankings for moving locations.
Speaker 3:Tyler, maybe you 46% of all of our family law leads have come from a local search right Someone searching for a divorce attorney near me or attorney name plus city name and so ensuring that you are visible in the maps is paramount, because literally half of the available leads live there and so doing the right thing. Helping Google understand I've moved offices. I've set up a new. Helping Google understand I've moved offices. I've set up a new Google my Business profile. I've got the postcard in the mail with the code on it and I've entered that information. We did all this for you, tom, but if you're listening to this and you're thinking about moving, ensure that you help Google understand that you have moved and that you update your Google my Business profile so so you don't miss out on some of those map bases.
Speaker 1:So how did you do that, practically speaking Tom from moving across the street in one month and not see a dip? Did you have to plan that in advance, or what all took place there?
Speaker 2:What I did was I reached out to the team at Rocket Clicks and said, hey, I need to move because I was just having a lot of issues with my other location and they told me to expect a little bit of a dip. But you know, maybe they, you know, hopefully that dip shouldn't last more than you know. I think they said somewhere two to four weeks, something like that. So you might see a real, real short, temporary dip, just while Google does. I don't know whatever they do. That's why I have rocket clicks. I don't get too involved in that. But you know, whatever Google doing, whatever they do to re-index me in their search search results and yeah, I don't, I don't think I've seen any, really any dip as far as I can tell. But I guess I guess let me go back and look in August but look back at these numbers. But yeah, as far as I could tell, I haven't really noticed anything.
Speaker 1:So obviously the lesson here is you're moving, think ahead on this issue, because this directly impacts your lead flow, so get in front of it so you can make sure you minimize that dip.
Speaker 2:And of course so we're only right now speaking about my Massapequa office. Of course I still have the Melville one also which, yeah, to date that office has just that one's been really, really slow. This has been, massapequa has been. I want to say all If not. I have one client that could possibly have come out of Melville. I don't know how I wasn't tracking well at that time. I know he works in Melville but he lives in Seaford, which is the town right next to Mass Pequot, so he could have found me in either search result. So this is still by far it's my first location and still by far the busiest.
Speaker 1:Yeah, we've talked a little bit in the past about hiring and now it's starting to happen, so let's dig into this. This is a fun topic. Tell us what's going on there.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I am and yeah, we have. So we have talked about and I think last time I was still torn between whether I was going to go for an associate or a paralegal, and then I made the decision pretty quickly thereafter to just I want to go right ahead and hire an associate.
Speaker 3:And.
Speaker 2:I'm thereafter to just I want to go right ahead and hire an associate and I'm. I guess best answer is that I want to grow as quickly as possible. Realistically, I probably need both at some point. You know, hiring an associate without a paralegal Will they be happy about that? I don't know.
Speaker 2:You know, and I know different getting off topic here but different firms utilize paralegals differently. Different getting off topic here but different firms utilize paralegals differently. So I know I've spoken to attorneys who might have three attorneys for every paralegal and then I've heard the opposite where, like, one attorney might have two paralegals working for them. So you know, I, I know, I think you tend to lean more towards the latter, where you have your, your paralegals do a lot of, do a lot of. You know a lot of drafting and pretty much anything that's not you know, anything that's not giving legal advice or appearing in court or anything like that. There's no, there's no reason a paralegal can't handle it.
Speaker 2:But yeah, I don't know if I look forward and I still do. I don't like to talk about this too much but I still I do have the benefit of having that other job where I can pick up always pick up more work from that doing patent work on a contract basis? Right, so I can hire an associate. I can give them, you know, pretty much all of my, all of my new incoming work and some of the work that I'm already doing is as long as the case is like new enough, then you know I again, if my goal is to grow as quickly as possible, then it just made like the I don't know made the most sense to me.
Speaker 1:Yeah, makes sense. So you put up an ad on Indeed for a lawyer.
Speaker 2:Put up a listing and it's a sponsored listing so it should be should be appearing towards the top, and that just means I pretty much pay Indeed to have my listing go towards the top. Pretty much pay Indeed to have my listing go towards the top. And yeah, I've gotten, I think, only three again, it's only been open three and a half weeks, something like that at this point, and I've gotten three resumes but nobody I've wanted to interview yet. So it is definitely a difficult hiring market.
Speaker 3:And Tom, did you just choose Indeed because because it's one you've heard of versus yeah?
Speaker 2:actually, why do you have, if you have better, uh, ideas? I'm open, definitely open to it. It is, yeah, it was kind of like a test, like a quick decision yeah, I'm gonna hire somebody. This I think it's. You know, I think my the other thing I thought about would have been going the recruiter route. But you know, obviously then you pay them a fee and so I don't know, if I get desperate enough, I might, might, resort to that.
Speaker 1:But I've never had a good experience with recruiters and I've went back to that Well a few times. Yeah, um, we've had modest success on our State Bar bulletin board job listing board. That's been something that's worked well in Wisconsin. Ironically, we've had zero success in Illinois with that. I don't get it. I guess lawyers in Illinois don't look at the State Bar website and Wisconsin lawyers do. I suppose that's been something Overall Indeed is the winner for us too.
Speaker 2:Yeah, let yeah, so yeah, and I, I, uh, so, let's see, I, I know my, my salary ranges is where it should be, perhaps even even a little bit on the higher end. Uh, looking for someone. I think I put two to five years experience. You know, ideally I'm probably looking in that three year range. Um, I had.
Speaker 2:So, of the three resumes I could tell you off the top of my head, one of them had. One of them was an experienced attorney with no divorce or family law experience. Uh, they all like criminal, criminal law background and like, I think, some trust in estates work. Uh, another one was a fresh law graduate. Despite that, I had, you know, very clearly listed that I was looking for and they were. They came from like really good school and you know, I don't know, but still, you know, I need, I need someone with experience, especially given my, my background.
Speaker 2:So that one. And then there was another one that had had like five jobs over the past three years or something like that. So, yeah, all, none of those, none of those were people I was interested in hiring. And I think the other two I didn't even respond to, I think, the new grad I just responded to, like you know. Hey, I'm looking for someone with experience, you know you have. You have great credentials. Probably better off looking at, you know, a larger firm who's would be more likely to train you. You know, best of luck, something like that.
Speaker 1:Well, for what it's worth, I'll share some experience here to kind of maybe help you target where you're going after I have found that school means zip, zero, nada. It has no influence on a lawyer's ability to perform in family law. So that's been my experience. Now, maybe I'm telling you that because I came from a I don't know third or fourth year of law school.
Speaker 2:I was just going to say that. I've heard so many people say that, but I did take out the loans to go to a very good school, jeff, so I don't want to say that but you're in IP law.
Speaker 1:Maybe it's different there.
Speaker 2:No, I think, even less so. I think, even less so actually.
Speaker 1:Okay and I have also found that experience is important but it's not in the top most important. So legal experience the most important that I have found in family law is interpersonal ability. That is far more important than I'll take a. I'll take a 38 year old paralegal that's been a paralegal for five years, over a 10-year attorney all day long. I mean a paralegal has become a lawyer going to night school. Those people are incredible.
Speaker 2:I will. So I will agree with you 100%, with a slight pushback saying you have, at this point, systems in place to train someone, right? If?
Speaker 1:you bring in an associate with no experience.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I don't have that, I don't have the experience. Yeah, I don't, I don't have that. I don't, I don't have, I don't have the time to train them, I don't have, I don't, I don't know, I don't have. Right, I'm, I'm hiring someone. This is a a unique situation where I'm I'm hiring someone with more experience than me that probably yeah, and I'm not challenging your decision, tom, whatsoever.
Speaker 1:I'm sharing my experience, maybe for the benefit of our audience audience as they're looking at it, but at hiring.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, no I think if you have you have an established culture and established you know training system, yeah, I could definitely see the benefit of bringing on you know new law graduates because they you know, they get trained on your systems and they're not you know, they don't have that baggage coming from other firms and all that. But yeah, I don't. I'm not there obviously yet.
Speaker 3:So Tom, this is going to be a time suck, but you do have a really unique story and you and this is a unique opportunity for your firm because it's someone who can come in and really establish themselves and literally be like a major component of your practice. And one thing that we found over at the agency side is deliberate direct outreach via LinkedIn, and so we curate lists all the time of ideal candidates and then we like literally direct message them and tell them about the opportunity or what we're doing.
Speaker 2:I've thought about that and I, not only on LinkedIn, but even you know, I know of. I know of like three or four larger firms around here that I don't know, I guess are known for bringing people in and training them and they probably don't pay well and they're probably high stress environments. So they're, you know, the type of firms where people go, they work a few years and then they go work somewhere else. I think it's it's fairly common there. So I've almost thought about, you know, a lot of those firms will will list their associates on their website and their like email addresses and contact information and just reaching out to them by email. Also, I don't know, the worst thing they could say is not interested, yeah right, or the firm has some type of spam filter that just makes my message not even get delivered to them.
Speaker 1:Oh, they're not necessitated. I've done hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of those direct reach out emails and I can tell you that in our early years we had by far the most success in one-on-one reach outs. Linkedin. I mean both of our current managing partners. Today I reached out to them personally on LinkedIn and got their interest and got their attention and brought them over, so I would not underestimate that at all.
Speaker 1:Now you'll probably start to anger some of the other lawyers in town, but that's okay, none of them are sending you a check. So, yeah, right, just yeah, don't worry about it. Yeah, so, um, also in in Tyler mentioned this, and I'll let me go back on and kind of underscore this a little bit. Your story is pretty incredible, your growth story, your nine I can't do the math either on the on the spot, but you know, we just finished. Let's call it, let's see September, september, your 10th month. Okay, all right, we just finished and you're already at at averaging 20 grand plus a month in revenue, at least over the past two months.
Speaker 1:Okay, let's put that out there. So, um, you've got an amazing story to tell and that's like one of your biggest, I think, leverage points. You don't have all these other things. So I would lean in on that. I would also share the link to all of these interviews that we've done here together, because that really helps someone that is interested in getting in a growing, vibrant new firm with already two locations to get to know you a little bit better. So I would leverage that. I to know you a little bit better, so I would leverage that. I mean you're already out there. There are certain people that are really be drawn to that and drawn to you and your story and get to know you before they even meet you.
Speaker 3:So they get so much autonomy. Right You're? You want them to take on that responsibility. There's a lot of firms and a lot of founders who can't let go of the vine, who are, you know, there's a lot of firms and a lot of founders who can't let go of the vine, who are in the weeds on every single case.
Speaker 2:This potential new hire has an opportunity of a lifetime, right, yeah, and I said that, I think, on our last podcast, that I think it is an attractive offer, not only financially, but just the ability to come in and run your cases the way you want to run them. Yeah, come in and run your cases the way you want to run them, you know, as long as you're doing things ethically and you know, obviously I do, I think, need to have some kind of oversight of the cases, but you know, at a really high level, just making sure everything like firm personality I don't know, it's probably a better term for that but culture is being carried out and you know, like I said, if you're doing a good job and you know bringing in, you know getting good reviews from clients and you know good feedback and all that, yeah, you can. You can run the case the way you want to run it.
Speaker 1:What's the advertised starting salary that you've offered?
Speaker 2:I put I think I put 120 to 160,000, I think was the range Wow, which, yeah, great start, yeah. So, yeah, my target is, like I said, you know, two or three years experience. Probably you should expect to pay about 140 for that, which, yeah, I think it's probably on the higher end for my area.
Speaker 1:So for that which, yeah, I think it's probably on the higher end for my area, and have you got any feedback from other lawyers in your community that have said anything to you?
Speaker 2:about it. No, just the one I spoke to, who you know, said, you know, seemed like everything was in the right spot, but that there's just so much competition for associates in that you know that experience range, that you know range that two to five year.
Speaker 3:Jeff, are you seeing the same thing across Wisconsin and Illinois, and is this a bigger topic for our listeners? On the forefront of a hiring blitz that's coming.
Speaker 1:Well, we've always struggled to find really quality lawyers. As we've gotten bigger, however, it's been easier because our name reputation's out there. So it does get easier as you grow. But the first seven, eight years it was a constant struggle and we struggled too with just a lot of things internally, operationally, we kind of shot ourselves in the foot a little bit by creating a reputation that we didn't want to have, you know, just because we were operating so. But it's a struggle for everyone. It seems like.
Speaker 2:Yeah, again, I don't know Small, small sample size Right. It's only been only been out there three, three and a half months, and part of that was over. I probably didn't post it at the best time. It's like July. People are, people are traveling. I've been out there three, three and a half months and part of that was over. I probably didn't post it at the best time. It's like July.
Speaker 3:People are, people are traveling, People are taking vacations anyway, so you know silver bullet here Wait a sec. There's no silver bullet here. It's really just doing the exercise and having the conversations and finding the right products.
Speaker 1:It's so important for the next phase of your firm to ignore the rules and be a little bit more aggressive than others that they applied, even though the the ad said don't apply unless you have two years. Sometimes those people are worth talking to because you might find someone who's really autonomous and they can get going on their own and they can just go figure it out because they're willing to ignore the conventions that are put in front of them. Does that make sense?
Speaker 2:It does, yeah, it's yeah.
Speaker 1:I don't know it's probably worth your time to call them and just talk to them and to see maybe it's a future hire.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, maybe I don't know.
Speaker 1:I think. I think I would have been someone you would have wanted to hire because I was very autonomous I can just figure it out on my own, even as a brand new associate and I would have ignored those rules. I was I'm just going to apply. What are you going to do? Say no to me, that's okay. It would have been no anyway. So that would have been my mentality, and so I would not exclude those people that apply outside of your conventions.
Speaker 2:I agree, I think, I think if maybe, like someone, had one year experience or something, you know something, but I am, I am. I don't think I'm in a position to hire a new grad right now as my first.
Speaker 1:I don't want to challenge you on that time. You would have hired Jeff Hughes 20 plus years ago. I just had, I was just aggressive, I just wanted to go. I was in court day two on my own. You would have been totally happy with that. I would have known pretty much as much as you do right now starting off, but then you would have left your own firm. Well, so what? I'm kidding Maybe you would have created a, maybe you would have created an opportunity for me that I would have stayed and been your managing partner. All I'm saying is that I want to challenge that thinking.
Speaker 1:Well, they're not two years so I can't talk to them. You may find it's worth a conversation and you don't know right away. If they're scared of their shadow, you'll sense it and you'll just move on. But if you sense this like hunger and aggressiveness and pushing and those are rare people, they're not like, they're like one in 20. But if you get that person, you may like I'm just going to give you a chance and we're not going to start you off at 120, jeff Hughes, because you don't know anything. You know and you cheated and whenever you applied you shouldn't have applied. But I'm going to let you in at 90. You know, you know whatever I mean. Tell the story to them and just challenge them.
Speaker 3:I'm a product of that. Just for the record, I met Jeff Hughes on a plane and had a little.
Speaker 2:That's right I didn't know that story until like two months ago. It's an awesome story, it's funny. Yeah, I'll consider it. Jeff, I am, I don't know, I don't know, having someone come and you know, I guess I would need to set the rules, like you know, hey, you have to figure everything out.
Speaker 2:You know, I don't, I wouldn't want that. You know, hey, you have to figure everything out. You know, I don't, I wouldn't want that. You know, someone coming in their first week and be like, hey, how do I do this? Right, I don't, I don't want to be training someone on the legal side right now. I don't, I don't have the time. Uh, even right now, like one of the reasons I expect my revenue in July to be a little bit lower is I have so much administrative stuff that I don't, that I haven't had time to do, like setting up a CRM, setting up billing systems, I don't know. There's just a lot of stuff like that that I need to do, and so if I hire someone again, my goal is to offload a lot of the legal work to them so that I have room to A do some work on my other job. B do a lot of the administrative stuff at my firm and at least get systems in place the way I want them to be in place.
Speaker 2:And then, of course, you could hire someone to run them after that and C start doing some more in-person networking and getting involved on that side and trying to bring in business locally. Like that I don't think we do on a statewide level. I believe we do on a in like bar associations, like local bar associations. So I know, uh, I am thankful to know the president of the Nassau County Bar Association, uh, who is James Joseph, who is a friend of yours that I met through. I always forget if it was your podcast or another podcast, um, but you, yeah, you know him, I know you. You guys interact, uh pretty frequently, um, so he, I I've heard him talk about how they have that in the Nassau County Bar Association, which that's, that's my county, where I practice in Nassau County, um, so, yeah, but obviously then you need to. I'm not currently a member of the Nassau County Bar Association. I probably should be, um, but yeah.
Speaker 1:I know they have that.
Speaker 2:So it's, you know, obviously something I need to pay to get, to get into.
Speaker 1:And I don't think it's that cheap.
Speaker 2:But it might be worth it. Yeah, just a thought. Yeah. And even on a I, when I was first starting I, I reached out to two James to ask for like a couple template documents and and he gave them to me without a second thought he's, he's been he's been awesome. He's wonderful, yeah, although I will say, james Joseph, if you're listening to this, he is starting to run LSAs in my area, which I expect, nothing less. He's a. I know he's looking to grow and he's he's got a great firm.
Speaker 1:All right, anything else on your mind?
Speaker 2:No, I don't think so. I think hopefully by next month I'll have some I don't know better news on the hiring front and hopefully business keeps going. But we didn't one thing we were going to talk about. I forget if we hit it briefly or kind of glossed over it, but uh, answering service yeah, you're coming.
Speaker 1:You have a vacation coming up here in august that you're gonna be out a week. So how are you thinking about?
Speaker 2:it's not like it's. It's a vacation where I could still answer if I had to. Yeah, I would like not to right like so.
Speaker 1:I took a vacation in april and that was the disney world, which is an impossible place to answer the phone even if I, even if I heard my phone ringing it's a small world, yeah right, yeah, um, but I would say fortunately or unfortunately.
Speaker 2:I think I got like two calls the entire week that I was there, so fortunately for my kids, unfortunately for business, um, but that you know that was that was a slow month and but yeah, if things keep going in this direction, I don't expect expect August to be slow like that.
Speaker 1:So this is. You know, we're going to a lake.
Speaker 2:You know I could probably be available to answer my phone much of the time, but yeah, I prefer not to be. So I know, you know, long-term I would love to have someone in-house, that's that's answering my phone, you know, during, during all hours and after hours. But for now I almost feel like I need like a Band-Aid for now, because I don't think that I'm there yet and if I am looking to hire an associate, I can't also hire like a full-time, you know, receptionist or intake team or whatever the right term is at this point. So someone you know at least to answer the phone, you know after hours or while I'm in court, something like that, or while I'm on vacation, and I can still, you know, I can still be the one answering the phone during normal business hours if I'm just here working on other stuff.
Speaker 3:Tom, I personally think this is a great idea.
Speaker 3:The fact is, you're only going to get busier right.
Speaker 3:Your firm is going to continue to grow, and we talk about this a lot on the podcast, but the fact that when someone calls in to talk about their divorce, normally this is the first time they're telling someone that they don't know outside of their friend or family circle about a terrible thing that's happening in their lives, and so they don't want to do that.
Speaker 3:Three, four or five times. Answer rate is so important to generating growth within a family law firm because you have to have the at bat, and if you're not calling them back within five or six minutes, they are now telling that story to someone else and they're not going to tell it to you, and so we coach our clients at RocketClicks all the time on the importance of answer rate and the importance of callback, and so I would just encourage you to to find a solution here, whether it is okay you're going to do it yourself, or you're going to find some after hours, or you know call center that can at least pick it up yeah, I agree, and like I said it's, it's a new problem.
Speaker 2:I've been, you know, for the first again we're in month 10, for probably first eight months I was answering. You know 98% of my calls, you know myself and you know scheduling the consults and everything like that. But now court has been a big one.
Speaker 2:It's you know, obviously you can't pick up the phone while you're in court and you know starting to get more calls on weekends and stuff which you know. If I see it ringing I'll answer it. It's not like I'm not answering my phone on weekends, but yeah, sometimes I'm away from my phone. Especially I spend a lot of time at the beach in the summer. Hard to answer your phone when you're in the ocean and it's funny. I actually find some people are taken aback when the attorney answers the phone and like in a I don't know if it's in a bad way or not, they're just like oh, I wasn't expecting to get the attorney right away and I haven't. I haven't encountered a problem with that, but I almost feel like it looks better if someone else answers the phone.
Speaker 3:You could really lean into it and talk about the importance of every client.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and I do. Yeah, of course. So, yeah, I don't know. I think probably I'm familiar with some of the bigger answering services, like answering legal or another one, something receptionist, so I don't know if that's.
Speaker 1:Ruby or something like that. Yeah.
Speaker 2:Maybe that's one that might be a temporary solution that I, you know, sign up with. Maybe that's you know, something I do for the end of the year and I'm sure there's easy ways to schedule. Like, I'm available to answer it this time and I'm not in court today, so I can answer it. Or I am in court or I'm on vacation. I need you to answer it at this time and I don't know how it works. Again, it's a new problem, but I'm sure they've been around a long time.
Speaker 3:So I'm sure they've been around a long time so I'm sure they've got it figured out, but I know a lot of integrated AI answering service companies popping up all over the place.
Speaker 2:I'm reluctant to use that and that might be a personal thing. I hate calling places and getting automated answering services, so I don't know. I agree.
Speaker 3:The power of the human is important.
Speaker 2:Yeah, right, especially in what we do. So, yeah, I guess that's something else. I'm looking into something else. I need more time. For another reason not to hire a fresh graduate.
Speaker 1:Yeah, all right. Well, good to Tom. This has been a great month already, so looking forward to hearing what's going on.
Speaker 2:And for the month of July yeah, good Tom, this has been a great month already, so looking forward to hearing what's going on for the month of July Next month Cool, all right, thanks, guys.
Speaker 3:Good talking to you. Appreciate it, tom. Good to see you.
