Taking a Week-Long Walkabout
I’m swamped. At last count, I’ve got ten different business projects on my plate, along with a significant number of personal things going on in my life.
Starting today, and continuing until next Friday, I’m going to focus on, well, focusing. The television is going into storage, the extra stuff cluttering up my apartment is going to Goodwill (or the dumpster), I’m going to re-acquaint myself with my music collection, and my only time on the internet will be for e-mail.
I’ll post details on the Soulard Idea Market, but that’s it. See you soon!
The Client is Not Broken
Have you ever come across something so forward-thinking you read it several times and said “Wow” after each read? Maybe it’s the caffiene or lack of sleep talking, but I came across this post, titled The User is Not Broken: A Meme Masquerading as a Manifesto, from K.G. Schneider on Free Range Librarian that hit that spot for me.
I’m cherry-picking the best ones (OK, almost all of them), but they are all that good. If you are not a librarian, and I know many of you aren’t, I’ve taken the liberty of replacing “librarian, library, and user” with “lawyer, law firm, and client.”
All technologies evolve and die. Every technology you learned about in [law] school will be dead someday.
You fear loss of control, but that has already happened. Ride the wave.
The [client] is not broken.
Your system is broken until proven otherwise.
That vendor who just sold you the million-dollar system …doesn't have a clue what he's talking about, and his system is broken, too.
Most of your most passionate [clients] will never meet you face to face.
Most of your most alienated [clients] will never meet you face to face.
Your website is your ambassador to tomorrow's [clients]. They will meet the website long before they see your building, your physical resources, or your people.
It is easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than to find a [law firm] website that is usable and friendly and provides services rather than talking about them in weird [legal] jargon.
Information flows down the path of least resistance. If you block a tool the [clients] want, users will go elsewhere to find it.
You cannot change the [client], but you can transform the [client] experience to meet the [client].
Meet people where they are--not where you want them to be.
The [client] is not "remote." You, the [lawyer], are remote, and it is your job to close that gap.
The average [law firm] decision about implementing new technologies takes longer than the average life cycle for new technologies.
If you are reading about it in Time and Newsweek and your [law firm] isn't adapted for it or offering it, you're behind.
Stop moaning about the good old days. The card catalog sucked, and you thought so at the time, too.
If we continue fetishizing the format and ignoring the [client], we will be tomorrow's cobblers.
Your ignorance will not protect you.
This kind of work is what’s so amazes me about the Blogosphere. K.G. Schneider is a writer and librarian. As I sit here today, this “Meme Masquerading as a Manifesto” is at least as good (and frankly, IMHO, much, much better) as anything I’ve seen Tom Peters or Seth Godin write this year. I’m looking forward to reading what she has to say next. Your thoughts?
links for 2006-06-06
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Add this one to the food arcade.
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The Compliant Idea always wins.
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Bad back? Try sitting on an exercise ball. Make sure to read the comments.
Only Four Decks of Cards Left
I was going back over some old posts this morning, and found this one. Seems there are only 209 days left in the year as I write this. That’s only four decks of cards “worth” of days left of your original seven decks.
What do you expect to accomplish before year’s end? Even more importantly, what did you expect to get done by now? If you are looking for ideas, I’d suggest reviewing my Resolutions for Lawyers series.
For your clients, maybe you could schedule a “mid-year meeting” (at no cost to them) and use the opportunity to ask your clients what they want to get done before the year is over? Then use the decks of cards as a visual planning tool to help them accomplish their goals.
technorati tags: client+service, resolutions, lawyers
Computer Programs I Want: ToDo-per Scooper
Saw this about scheduling productivity “dashes” on 43 Folders, and had this thought:
Say you’ve got 10 (30, 200?) items on your To-Do list, and you are so overwhelmed, you don’t know where to start. What you need is a Random Task Generator, (alternative title “ToDo-per Scooper”). Here’s how it would work:
1. It would take the list of your to-do’s, either inputed directly or scoured (scooped?) from your Outlook tasks list, along with the estimated amount of time you think each task will take.
2. It would automatically add 50% more time to your estimate (to account for innacurate and overly-optimistic estimating).
3. Whenever you set aside a certain amount of time on your calendar for non-specific task completion, it would fill in that time with a randomly-selected To-Do (or To-Do’s) that fit the time you set aside.
4. The randomness could be changed to give more weight to more important tasks — kind of like adding more balls for the bad teams in the NBA lottery.
BONUS: If this feature were incorporated into an enterprise-wide calendaring and task-management program (legal software vendors, are you listening?), the business could set aside an hour each day when everyone could get access to a fresh set of to-do’s to complete in that hour. I think it could make the whole enterprise more productive.
Anyone want to build this application with me? Or is it already out there?
technorati tags: productivity, procrastination, lifehacks, software, web2.0
Soulard Idea Market - Update
I’ve found a location for the Soulard Idea Market that will accomodate 30–50 people, and am ironing out the details with the landlord. I’ll have more information soon — perhaps as early as tomorrow. Stay tuned.
Make Money by Specializing? Bank on it.
In an interview in the New York Times, the Chairman of ING Direct shares explains why his company specializes and avoids cross-selling:
Q. Does the question simply become one of pricing, of being able to offer the highest return?
A. In every country where we are, we have competitors offering higher rates than we offer. But you've got to be very careful, because, you know, consumers are smart. We have a product offering that has no commissions, no minimum, no tricks. Does the competition offer any tricks, like ties to something else that you have to do to be there, or a minimum balance, or a minimum usage? We have to be better than the next most comparable alternative.
For us, cross-sell is not what we want to do, because we want to keep it simple. We know that out there, the largest pool of earnings in the retail banking world comes from savings and mortgage — those are the only two things that we want to do. If you try to cross-sell too many products, you confuse the clients about what you are and your costs escalate exponentially.
Here are three questions every small business person should be able to answer:
1. What is your most pofitable service or product?
2. If you focused exclusively on selling that service or product, could you sell more?
3. What’s stopping you?
I’m not suggesting that small business owners abandon their passions to concentrate on making the most money possible, but I do believe that most business owners — and this goes double for lawyers — don’t even know what their most profitable service or product is. Answer the first question, then the second, and finally the third, and you may be on your way to a more profitable business. And if not, at least you’ll understand the trade-offs you are making in your business and your life.
What Color is Your Waiting Room, and Your Business Card, and Your Letterhead, and Your ...
Have you thought about what your marketing materials’ color says about you?
In North American mainstream culture, the following colors are associated with certain qualities or emotions:
Red -- excitement, strength, sex, passion, speed, danger.
Blue -- (the most popular color) trust, reliability, belonging, coolness.
Yellow -- warmth, sunshine, cheer, happiness
Orange -- playfulness, warmth, vibrant
Green -- nature, fresh, cool, growth, abundance
Purple -- royal, spirituality, dignity
Pink -- soft, sweet, nurture, security
White -- pure, virginal, clean, youthful, mild.
Black -- sophistication, elegant, seductive, mystery
Gold -- prestige, expensive
Silver -- prestige, cold, scientificMarket researchers have also determined that color affects shopping habits. Impulse shoppers respond best to red-orange, black and royal blue. Shoppers who plan and stick to budgets respond best to pink, teal, light blue and navy. Traditionalists respond to pastels - pink, rose, sky blue.
Who Can Your Potential Customers Call?
Ethics considerations aside for just a moment, can anyone imagine a law firm doing this?
Here are over 100 people from around the world that know our software better than anyone else (except us of course). Feel free to ask them about our software, our service, tech support, anything you like. There is nothing better than getting an answer from someone like you!
Your Customers Don't Want to do Business With You
Mark Cuban said something Friday that really struck home for me. Writing about the struggles of promoting movies through traditional newspaper and magazine channels, he tells those industries:
Each of us is looking for the holy grail of promotion. A way to leave you as a customer.
How scary is that ? A huge customer of your industry would prefer not to do business with you.
I think the same can be said for most people who deal with lawyers. If there is a real alternative to using lawyers, how many of our clients would jump at the opportunity? What are we going to do about it?
Mark’s advice to the magazine and newspaper businesses:
So its time to buck up. You either squeeze what you can and cry when it happens, or you step up and create cost effective alternatives. The days of a movie review and the ad for the movie wont cut it for much longer.
So those of you in the entertainment sections and sales groups of newspapers and magazines have two choices, come up with new ideas, or a new version of your resume…
I have some more thoughts on this issue and will share them soon.
Why Blog?
Christopher Carfi pointed me to this essay by Chris Brogan titled Cavemen at the Fire that captures the essence of the “why” of blogging for so many of us:
But the truth is, I'm getting value. I get value in talking with you. I've met so many engaging people, and every time one of you risks delurking and sending me an email, I meet a new friend…. I feel that every day I post something new is another micro resume. I'm telling people out there what I stand for, how I think, what matters most to me. Some days, that's probably not going to land me a job. Other days, it's something that people might relate to.
Be Ready to Leave Your Best Message
Here’s a great tip to keep in mind next time you call a client:
Prepare for every telephone call expecting to get voicemail. This will help you focus your message and prevent rambling. You should treat your voicemail message as a short presentation, thinking it through ahead of time, not during the recording…
From this 1999 Report, via 43 Folders.
A Lesson For Lawyers ... and Buick?
Here’s a piece from The Truth About Cars arguing that GM should abandon its desire to lure younger buyers to Buick, and instead position Buick squarely as “The Pensioner’s Best Friend.” Like the piece on Ford I’ve already highlighted, this article contains some pretty radical advice that should not be ignored by lawyers looking to find their elder-law niche. For example:
With a little development, Buick is the logical choice. “Beyond precision” lies simplicity: a brand offering vehicles with cost-effective innovations and equipment levels. Cataract-friendly gauges at the heart of basic instrumentation. Oversized switchgear. Heated, cooling, massaging seats that swivel to ease entry and exit (remember those?). Extra wide door apertures with reinforced hinges to ease entry and exit. OnStar. Electric everything, with power sliding trunk floors for easy loading and unloading, and power pedals within a Rockport’s reach. Adjustable warning chime/turn signal volumes. Electronic medication reminder timers. Run-flats. Oversized sunglasses bins for granny’s favorite set of Terminator shields. Two words: Rascal storage.
Every possible safety feature should be standard, from lane-departure warning systems to self-parking. Electronic nurses? Loads: SRS + ABS + EBD + DSC + ASR + BA = AARP. The ordering and purchasing experience must be simplified as much as possible. This author has railed against illogical options bundling, but the geriatric niche is one segment where simplified trim levels actually make sense. If higher-end features like satellite navigation are deemed a marketplace necessity, so be it— but designers must ensure that they’re simple, intuitive designs, preprogrammed with relevant waypoints— drug stores, casinos, cat hospitals and Cracker Barrel restaurants, say.
If you were building a firm from scratch to only serve a certain population, where would you start and what would you do?
Four Eyes for Clients
Ever have clients come by your office who need to read documents? Get a load of this tip (for waiters and waitresses) from Tricks of the Trade:
Keep a pair of reading glasses at hand. At least once every few days you'll get a customer who forgot their glasses and are unable to read the menu. Produce your spare pair and a good tip is secure.
Reading glasses are cheap at Wal-Mart, Target, etc. Grab a few pairs and your clients will “see” what a great lawyer you are. I know, bad pun.