Social Media Policies Made Easy

If your firm has a policies and procedures manual, good. That puts you ahead of a lot of other law firms. But, does it also cover employee use of internet social media?

Less than a third of US employers have one, so odds are your firm is overlooking it too. But your firm needs it to protect itself and to protect your people. Mashable has a good explanation of why you may need a law firm social media policy, click here.

With all the social network sites out there, it's almost impossible to prevent an employee's workplace from being linked up with the employee's identity, even if the employee tries hard to never let it happen. There are steps the firm can take to minimize the problem.

There's a free resource you can tap to quickly and easily create a social media policy for your firm, one that fits exactly what you want. It's quick. It's easy. And best of all, right now it's free.

Do you want your employees to refer back to the firm when they are tweeting, etc? Well, they might be and you might never know it. And do you want to require them to keep it social and not discuss work activities or personnel? There's a policy for that.

Business lawyer David Canton and his friends at rTraction have created an internet web site where you can answer a few quick questions and, presto, you've got a Social Media Policy for your firm. You can even email it to yourself for quick and easy firm distribution or to cut and paste it into your manual at work.

PolicyTool.net generates custom corporate social media policies based on your answers to questions online. In just a few minutes, you're done. We strongly recommend you give it a try.

Ronald Burdge
http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping attorneys practice law profitably, since 1978.

"Terms of Use" Page Can Protect Your Web Site Content

We continue to be surprised by the number of lawyers who don't take the simplest of steps to protect the content of their web sites from being plagiarized and outright stolen. And it is so easy to protect yourself.


If you spend dozens (or hundreds) of hours and thousands of dollars creating content for your web site, why not take a few minutes and protect it? Gordon & Doner learned the value of a little self-protection when they found an impersonator had copies their entire website and claimed it as their own, which can lead to your clients going elsewhere for legal help without them or you even knowing it.

Just adding a small "copyright by [insert your name here]" won't do you much good. You need a "Terms of Use" page on your website, with clear links to it from every page on your site.

Consider this page a sort of contract between you and your website visitor which states what the visitor can and can not do if they are going to use your website. While some writers fill them up with legalese, others take the plain and straight forward approach. Do what works for you, but do it.

The terms restrict how the website visitor can use your website in every sense, but perhaps its greatest value is now rooted in the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act, a federal law that lets you use your terms of use to act offensively by either prosecuting individuals for wrongdoing that comes from a violation of the terms or to seek civil penalties or remedies for legal injuries from what actually amounts to a breach of contract.

But don't use just any old boilerplate language. You can find lots of examples online (Google lists 192 million returns for "terms of use sample"), but then write your own terms of use contract to fit your particular site and the risks or uses that are relevant to it.

To be enforceable, the terms of use must be easily seen and understood. That means conspicuous and clearly written to state conduct that is and is not authorized. While you may not legally be required to put a link on all your website pages, at least one court has said that the terms of use are adequately communicated to your website visitor if the terms can be accessed from all the pages. Not sure? Then put a link everywhere.

Oh, and if you suspect someone has copied your content or used your site data or content in violation of your terms of use contract, then act on it. Like any other contract, if you are lazy about enforcement in the face of a knowing violation, it can amount to a waiver.

The Terms of Use page on your web site can protect your site content from being stolen. But it's up to you to make sure of it everyday. How? You can, of course, always run a search using a few specific phrases that come from your site content and then carefully look at the pages that show up.

If you've never done it, you'll very likely be surprised at how much of your content has already been "adapted" to someone else's web site use. If you can prove it's your's then ask them to take down the plagiarized content. If they dispute that they got it from you, your techie can probably do some forensic work on the web site host computer and tell you if they visited your site. It could well be worth it.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping lawyers improve their business since 1978.

To read the Burdge Law Office sites' Terms of Use page, click here.

7 Tips to solidify your law firm finances

We're continuing our series on how to improve your business. Today we'll talk about 7 things you should do to solidify your financial status. The good news is that if you made it through 2009 then the odds are your business will survive. Now that the recession is starting to ease up, the objective should be to make sure your business gets as healthy as possible, as fast as possible. Here's some tips.

1. Cut costs and add to efficiency. Yes, I know you did that. Now keep doing it.Look at your current suppliers and see if you are getting the best deals possible in the marketplace. Examine your routine practices again and see if the are adding to your profitability or are they just one more step someone has to accomplish without really adding a profit to your bottom line. And take another look (maybe for the first time?) at off shore opportunities for specific and routine task accomplishments that can be done cheaper and maybe more efficiently.

2. Take advantage of ready cash chances. If you have an intake staff that screens your cases or does other preliminary "prep" work on a file, consider incentivizing the workload so your people get the new cases in faster and more efficiently. Look at where your most profitable work is and market that area of your practice more aggressively. For paying cases, don't just charge interest for late payment but offer a reduction for early payment of legal services. And use slow time as an opportunity to provide current clients with more timely updates on the status of their files.

3. Reframe your budget. You do have one, right? Well go over it again to refine your cash flow and bills-to-pay projections. You've got a bad year's worth of numbers now so you should have a better idea of what to expect for both income and expenses as the marketplace picks up. And if you are looking at your numbers monthly, then start looking biweekly. Use slow times as a chance to better understand and know your numbers for rebounding and continuing profitability.

4. Watch client credit. If you don't get paid in advance, then you are advancing credit to your clients in the form of your time expended. So, watch your credit closely. give your best service to those clients who pay the bill promptly and without dispute. They matter to your next paycheck more than any others do. And be careful what new clients you take on. Just as last year was no time to take on a heavy load of long-term contingency cases, this year is not yet the time to stop worrying about paying clients either.

5. Rethink your practice areas and fee structures. If you took on a new practice area last year to help your cash flow, now is the time to look at the numbers that resulted and decide if it worked or if you need to do something else. And look at your hourly rates in your different areas of practice. One of the best ways to increase your income is to simply make a slight increase in your hourly rates. Another way is to shift some of your conventionally overhead costs into client paying costs. Rethink what you can do to advance menu selling in your practice too.

6. Keep managing your money tightly. Now that your general account is a little healthier, don't splurge. This is not the time to loosen your grip. Use "just in time" buying practices for your supplies and external services from third parties. And don't let client bills get behind. Times are still tight for everybody so some clients will still prolong payment of their legal bills. When it happens to you, stop working. Don't throw good billable time after an uncollectable client.

7. Get rid of unprofitable assets, including people if necessary. Chances are you already have looked at this aspect during the last year. Well, keep looking. If your law practice is to survive and prosper, you have to make sure your people remain productive and work cost-effectively. The economy isn't great yet and it may be months (some say years) before it gets there again. This continues to be the time to let go of unproductive or unprofitable or inefficient hard and soft assets. If an area of law isn't in your "core" practice, then consider dumping it.

Things are a little better than they were 6 months ago and, for some, maybe even a year ago. But this is no time to forget the hard lessons learned in the last year. Now is the time to begin to profit from them.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping lawyers understand the business of law, since 1978.

Have You Googled Yourself Lately?

Well, you should. And you should do it regularly. Not only do you want to know what is being said out there on the internet about you, but you want to make sure there are no "fake" web sites set up to steal your info and your clients.

That's what one law firm discovered recently.

Gordon & Doner, a Palm Beach Gardens personal injury law firm, discovered that virtually their entire web site at www.fortheinjured.com had been copied and reposted on GoDaddy.com by an unknown person, choicefully changing certain key contact data but not hardly anything else. If you didn't know better, you'd think it was them.

And that was the problem. If you were an injured client in search of the law firm, which one would you trust to be the right one? Likely, you'd give up and go somewhere else.

The fake site supposedly was for maslinassociates.com, a purported law firm in Manchester, England, and was copied wholesale right down to minor phrasing. But names were changed and dollar signs were changed to pounds and the law firm's home city was changed.

The site was up about a month before GoDaddy removed it after the Gordon law firm sued them and "John Doe", the unknown web site copycat culprit, for copyright infringement and everything else a good lawyer can think of, and for good reason. GoDaddy isn't talking. And who knows who John Doe really was. And who knows how much damage was done before it was discovered.

Don't let this happen to you. So how do you protect yourself?

First, search your name and web site phrases periodically to see if your content or your entire site is being used without permission. It also keeps you aware of what others are saying about you. Actually, you can set up a Google Alert that will email you whenever your requested search terms are used and that makes it even easier. How to use Google Alert is explained here: http://www.google.com/alerts

Next. post a copyright notice on every page of your web site. Let there be no misunderstanding about the matter.

Finally, you should also post a "Terms of Use" page that is linked to every page on your website, like this one here: http://www.ohiolemonlaw.com/terms_of_use.html. This is just one example but there are plenty of samples to work with on the internet.

The point is that you want to say you own the site content and you don't allow anyone else to use it without permission and that using your site is an agreement that the site visitor won't do that. Of course, being lawyers, we'll dress up the language into lots more, but that's the basics.

And while you are at it, why not post a disclaimer too. One that says there is no attorney-client relationship except on the stated terms that you will agree to, such as a retainer, etc. It's just good common sense.

Oh, and those Florida lawyers at Gordon & Doner, can you guess how they found out about the fake website that had copied their own site? One of the partners googled his name.

Protect yourself and your property. It's something we lawyers often tell our clients. Don't forget to say it to yourself once in awhile too.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping lawyers help clients. Since 1978.

Success from Failure

We're continuing our series on improving law office profitability. Today we're looking at the psychology of failure and its relationship to success. Heady sounding stuff, I know, but worthwhile thinking about.

First, a definition or two.

Failure isn't always failure. Sometimes it's just not having as much success as one thought would occur. In marketing your law practice, it's often hard to tell what approach is going to work best. And when it doesn't bear fruit quickly (after all, humans are getting to be a very iimpatient specie), we tend to view the effort as a failure and move on to the next marketing idea. Maybe that's a mistake.

It could be that the "fruit" of that marketing effort just takes more time than we'd like and what we are really looking for is a quicker result. It could also be that it wasn't a failure at all, we just didn't see the success we expected.

There's a great article on this idea of making success out of screw-ups and it just came out. It's in the January 2010 online issue of Wired magazine and, although it's pretty long and filled with lots of neuroscientific stuff. Still, it's worth the time to read all the way to the end. It's here at this link and it's called "Accept Defeat: The Neuroscience of Screwing Up."

It examines how scientists conduct experiments and come up with what at first glance seems to be a failure, a strange result, one that doesn't make any sense at all in view of what they thought would be the result.

That sometimes happens to lawyers too. And not just in their marketing efforts. The point is, however, that the unexpected result may not be a screw up at all. Sometimes there is much more to it than that. And sometimes you have to think outside of the box to see what the result really is.

And that can mean that maybe you should have been thinking outside of the box in the first place, in order to get the result you were after. So, when your next advertising idea comes up, your next marketing thought, take it outside of the box first, before you implement it, and see what it looks like in a different light.

Wierd advertising can work. Unusual marketing ideas can sometimes bear that "fruit" faster and better than the conventional approach to just running more ads on television or radio or in the paper.

As an example of using non-traditional approaches to marketing, there's a personal injury law firm in Ohio that sponsors a county fair (I don't even know how you get to do that), whose lawyers put in time at the local food bank, and whose partners cook at the annual Thanksgiving Day dinner put on by a long-standing charity. The have their usual "lawyer ads" too, but those extra efforts put the firm's name and its lawyers' faces out there in the public constantly too. That's smart marketing.

So the next time you question whether or not the result of your marketing was what you planned for or expected, try to ignore the reactionary thought and question the result more thoughtfully, Maybe the result was not a failure at all. Maybe it was just a different kind of success.

So, maybe you should accept defeat and look at the neuroscience of screwing up as an opportunity to find the success that exists in the screw up. It's probably there someplace.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping lawyers find success since 1978.

iPhone vs All the Rest of Them Comparison Chart

FutureLawyer just posted a link to a great chart that compares the iPhone vs the Droid vs the Palm Pre vs Nexus One here: http://futurelawyer.typepad.com/futurelawyer/2010/01/nexus-one-vs-iphone-3gs-vs-droid-vs-pre-decisions-decisions.html

15 different aspects are covered. Everything from camera megapixel sizes to the cost of phone plans for each.

If you don't know which one to get, this chart can definitely help you decide.

We're back from the holiday break and next time we'll return to our series on things you can do to improve your law practice economics.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping lawyers help clients, since 1978.

Books to Read on Christmas Break, Humor for Lawyers

(From the Orange Rag)

Ron Burdge
http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping lawyers help clients, since 1978

Importance of Your Web Site's Fold

Do it above the fold.

We're continuing our series on things you can do to improve your law practice economics. Today, the topic is getting more clients from your web site and specifically the importance of the fold.

Marketers call the fold of your web site the top part of your web site page that shows on the screen. It's much like what they call the "fold" for a newspaper: that part of the page that you see when the paper lays in its normal flat folded position on a table. That's important because most often the only thing that a lot of consumers see is what is "above the fold."

So, if you want to catch the reader's attention, you have to do it above the fold. If a consumer has to scroll down to read content, they won't do it unless you have grabbed their attention above the fold.

Second lesson? Make sure that on every page of your website your contact info appears above the fold too.

Web site visitors are notoriously impatient and sometimes a bit lazy. You have to make it very easy for them to contact you. You may be the right attorney for the job, but if they can't quickly and easily figure out how to reach you, by phone or email or whatever, they'll click on down the road to someone else.

So, do it above the fold. And do it lots of ways.

That means put your toll free phone number up there. Put a contact us link. Put a box for them to fill in info to send you, but keep it short. Put your email address there. Heck, put your regular (toll) phone number there too if you want. Just put lots of "point blank" ways for the visitor to see how to reach you. Make it quick. Make it easy. That way you can make a conversion of a visitor to a client. And it'll help your business too.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping attorneys help clients, every day.

Dragon Dictation for the iPhone is Here

Breaking News ... Dragon has just released an iPhone version of its famous dictation software and just days later (like yesterday) they updated it.

The reviews for it are pouring in and everyone seems to love it. If you use Dragon Dictation on your pc, and you've got an iPhone, this is the app to get.

Not only is Dragon a terrific program with a great track record for excellent dictation/interpretation from voice-to-type, but the iPhone app is FREE. How long it lasts for free no one can tell, so get to the iTunes Store and do a search for "Dragon Dictation" and download it right away.

A quick look-see indicates this is not a crippled, half-baked version, either. For instance if it has trouble with a name spelling, it'll check your contact names for a correction. We'll find out more and write a review of our own in the near future.

But for now folks, this is one app that'll be on the "top 10 app" list for every busy dictating lawyer.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping lawyers do business, since 1978.

7 Killer Methods for Marketing Without Money + # 8

We're continuing our series on things you can do to improve your law practice economics. Today, the topic is getting more clients with marketing and specifically what we think is the #1 web site for terrific marketing tips and ideas --- and it's unusually entertaining too.

The #1 unconventional marketing tv show isn't on tv at all. It's on the web and you can watch it there or download the podcast. In fact, if you don't watch it regularly, you are missing out on great ideas and tons of tips that are free every single week. I subscribe to the iTunes podcast so it downloads automatically whenever I hook up my iPhone. Then on the drive to court (or anywhere else), I plug in the iPhone and start listening to the podcasts.

But these podcasts are so good that I invariably end up watching them at my desk on their website too and making notes on the tips I get out of it for future implementation.

The podcast is called "Help, My Business Sucks" and the web site is http://www.helpmybusiness.com/. Now I like to think my business doesn't quite suck, but with a url name like that, and all the terrific ideas and content on the site, it's no wonder that it gets lots of attention.

Hosted by the admittedly unconventional, but vastly entertaining and lively, Andrew Lock, I heartily recommend that every business person (he calls them entrepreneurs) subscribe to the podcast for easy listening and viewing. But don't forget to visit the website, where you'll find even more info regularly posted and just as regularly updated.

Lock is, quite simply, the single most effective guru in marketing today. And he's fun to listen to.

The site is loaded with tons of valuable content that can kick start your marketing effort or really zoom it up, depending on where you are in the marketing process. There's so much on the site that I can't cover it all here, so you just have to trust me and head over there to see for yourself.

For instance, yesterday I downloaded his publication "7 Killer Methods for Marketing Without Money." It was free, so how could I go wrong? Dig around on the site and you'll find it too, but don't forget to sign up for his free tv show updates, so you don't miss anything.

So, how good were his 7 Killer Methods for Marketing? Well when I read through Andrew's 7 Killer Methods, I smiled when I suddenly realized that they were some of the very things that I was already doing. I just didn't view them as marketing methods but, as Andrew says, "marketing is everything and everything is marketing."

I can vouch for the accuracy of his 7 Killer Methods. They work, folks.

He is dead on with these methods and, best of all, they are free. All it takes is a little of your time and if you do it every day, it will definitely help your business get more clients.

But for lawyers, I'd add this tip as Killer Method #8 to Andrew's list: get on http://www.avvo.com/ and regularly answer the public questions posted there. It's a great way to show your expertiese to the very people who are looking for legal advice. You can even write articles (for both potential clients and potential referring attorneys) and publish them on the Avvo site. Also, you can limit yourself to answering questions just in your geographical area so you can get maximum impact and value for your time.

Okay, so the point is we can all use a little marketing help from time to time and Andrew Lock is one of the best resources out there. If you want to hear the best tips every single week, this is the web site you want to go to and the podcast you want to listen to so you don't waste your time or your money. http://www.helpmybusiness.com/ does just that. And it'll help your business too.

Ron Burdge

http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping attorneys help clients, every day.

Knowing the Cost of Clicks on PPC

We're continuing our series on things you can do to improve your law practice economics. Today, the topic is getting more clients and pay per click, or "PPC" as it's sometimes called. The key idea here is how to find out what the web traffic is for particular key words and what they cost so you don't waste your money. There's a web site that will give you that and a lot more and it's free.

There are lots of marketing ideas out there and PPC is one of them. That's where you use one of the search engines own marketing programs to set up a PPC ad. It's really reasy to do and the best part is it's free. At least it is until the clicking starts.

You've seen these PPC ads along the top and side of the screen whenever you have run a search on one of the major web search pages. The ad costs you only when someone clicks on it to activate the hyperlink to your web site. If you use the right key words, the theory is that your ad will show up on the side of search results for those key words.

There's lots of ways to spiff it so that your target viewer is much more narrow, but what we are going to talk about today is a nifty web site that you can use to see what the actual traffic is for some of those key word phrases and what the costs are. Keyword Spy is a terrific site that'll do the job.

It allows you to plug in your key word phrase and pick a country and then it'll return to you the stats for that phrase and others like it. You can quickly see just how many people are running searches and using that key word phrase and the others that are like it. Best part? They also tell you the current cost per click (called "CPC") too.

Let's take, for instance, "Lemon Law." As of this writing, there are 35 PPC advertisers using that phrase and the CPC is $18.27 and in the US there are 201,000 searches using that phrase each month.

Another great thing about KeywordSpy is that they show you, graphically, the last ten months of stats too.

Even better, with one click you can get the background info on those 35 PPC advertisers who are using the Lemon Law phrase. With that info you can see a screenshot of their website, domain name, their PPC budget in CPC terms, the number of PPC keywords their site uses and the number of perceived PPC competitors along with even more info. It's a gold mine for marketers trying to figure out the most cost effective way of using their internet PPC dollars.

With another click you can actually read the PPC ads and get an idea of the "return on investment" of the wording, which KeywordSpy calculates for you. Another click gives you the related keywords. Or misspelled keywords. And there's lots more.

And it's all free.

You can get even more results if you register for their "lifetime free trial."

Okay, so the point is that if you want to try out some pay per click advertising, this is the first web site you need to go to so you don't waste your money. www.KeywordSpy.co.uk.

Next time, we'll talk about what I think is the single most entertaining, and effective, guru on marketing. He's remarkable.

Ron Burdge

http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping lawyers make a living. Since 1978.

How Do I Improve My Business? Step One to Improving Your Business.

Okay. So the economy is tanked and your phone has stopped ringing. How do you improve your business?

How do you get the phones to start ringing again? How do you get your business back to normal? How do you survive the downturn so you can keep helping consumers solve their problems in the future? After all, Consumer Law attorneys depend on consumer clients for their livelihood.

When people find themselves in financial distress, it's common for them to "hunker down" and conserve everything they can. They don't take risks they can avoid. They don't spend money they don't have to. And they get afraid of anything that they even fear can cost them money too.

For many people, that means their fear takes over. That's when they decide to put up with harassment and aggravation that, at any other time, would cause them to get angry and call a lawyer for help. Instead, afraid of unknown legal costs they are afraid they can't handle, they don't ask for help. They put up with it because they feel like they don't have any other choice right now.

Until the economy gets better, "right now" turns into tomorrow. Then, next week. Then next month. Next thing you know, it's next year. And they still aren't sure. That's understandable. But it doesn't help you make payroll.

We've been working on some ideas for you to consider ... things that can help. The first one sounds corny but it is so very true. It is, simply, to have faith.

If you're like many Consumer Law practitioners, you are struggling right now. And so are most of your clients. As hard as times are right now, and they are hard, they will pass. These times will ease up, both for you and all of us. And for our clients too, both current clients and those who have yet to call us for help.

The work that Consumer Law attorneys do, doesn't go away. It goes up and down, but it doesn't go away. New clients will call for help. How do we know? Simple. Because the people who violate the laws never really stop doing what they do. Even when they clean up their act and violate the law less often, or even if not at all, others will take their place.

What changes, in keeping with the economy of the times, is the willingness of consumers to put up with it. When personal economic security is less at risk, then the insult of unfair and deceptive conduct by a merchant is more intensely felt --- and tolerated less.

In short, consumers are more willing to find out what their rights are and less tolerant of the abuse that is heaped upon them.

So as the economy picks up, your business will pick up too. And that is true no matter all the other peripheral issues you are dealing with.

So, in tough times the first thing for a Consumer Law attorney to keep mind is that no matter how hard each day may be, have faith that each day after that will get better. It's not just a corny thing our parents said when we were kids (although they did), it's something that is true.

Now, of course there are some not-so-corny things to be doing ... but that's for next time and the days that follow. We'll talk about that next time.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping Lawyers Understand the Economics of Practicing Law Since 1978.

Are you practicing law in a bad economy?

Think you practice in the state with the worst economy? Think again.

Everyone seems to know that California is in the biggest economic trouble, with an economy in the dumpster, high unemployment, and no easy way to fix any of it. That makes practicing law in California tougher than practically anywhere. What may surprise many attorneys is not California at all. It’s the other states that are so very close to their own economic abyss. And that abyss can kill a law office's bottom line.

After all, when people can't afford a lawyer, people don't hire a lawyer. When that happens, they lose, the lawyer loses --- and so does the legal system itself because it never has the chance to give people their day in court. The economy in general affects the economy of lawyers specifically.

There’s a new study out that has looked at the economy of all 50 states and ranked them.

The PEW Charitable Trusts has crunched state numbers for more than a decade, with a goal of making state governments stronger in order to improve the services we all get for our tax dollars. Part of that includes reporting on the bad times and, as we all know, we are now in a blockbuster bad time.

They looked at numerous factors to come up with a scorecard for each state: foreclosures, budget gaps, loss of revenue, unemployment, how easy or hard it is for each state to raise its taxes in order to cover shortfalls, etc. All of those things affect the ability of consumers to afford legal representation.

With a “30" score being the worst and a lower score being better, here’s the “top 10" of the worst state economies, in order: California, Arizona, Rhode Island, Michigan, Oregon, Nevada, Florida, New Jersey, Illinois, and Wisconsin.

Wyoming, Nebraska and Iowa scored the best. So if that's where you practice law, don't move your practice.

So where does your state fit? Ohio is almost the center of the list while Georgia’s budget gap put it just a hair behind the auto belt states of Michigan-Wisconsin-Illinois by one point.

The worst ten states account for nearly a third of the US population and economy, which is why those states in particular matter to all of us.

What the study shows is just how much farther the US economy has to go, although there are bright spots of how hard some states are trying. Wyoming, for instance, had a 19.7% drop in revenue but managed to come with 2% of balancing its budget.

Law firms will get through this as the economy starts to get better and better, but if history has shown anything, it’ll be a longer road than anyone wants it to be.

Burdge Law Office

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping people protect themselves everyday. Since 1978.

Google Legal Research is Here and Now

Google the noun has become google the verb. That's old news. How about Googling your legal research? And it's here right now. Beta, yeah. But it works.

Granted Westlaw and Lexis have no reason to lose sleep right now, but it's coming. After all, they offer a lot more than just court cases and their own methodology and search techniques have been honed to fit the lawyer's mind from decades of experimentation. But Google is free, and that's tempting to new young lawyers who don't have the resources to sign up for the paid services that offer a lot more bang for the buck.

Google Scholar is a database that Google has been quietly building and they've now added the ability to search court opinions from the US District Courts, the US Court of Appeals, the US Supreme Court and from all fifty states.

It's got the familiar Google interface and the only obvious thing that distinguishes it from the "home" Google search engine web site page is the smaller print under the "Google" that says "Scholar Beta." And the searching is easy, but a bit clumsy and it'll take some time to get used to.

But it's biggest advantage? Limit yourself to one state and a time frame of say the last 9 years and plug in a specific phrase or topic, like "lemon law" for instance, and in a flash you will get all the court decision there are. No waiting. No hourglass busy icon. No time to even lift your coffee cup up off the desk. It's that fast. Okay, I know you're thinking it ... it's "google fast."

You can use the "advanced" link to limit your search to one or more jurisdictions and you can search by date ranges. Like Google itself, it's slick and simple. Maybe too simple for lawyers to get used to, but the next generation of law students? It's right up their alley.

But there's lots of questions. After all, it is beta.

Who knows how deep the content is, how often will it be updated, where does the data come from, and just how strong is Google's committment to legal research --- or does beta mean maybe it'll be around next month, and maybe it won't? No one seems to know for sure, so for now take a spin and see what you think. Like it or hate it, let us know and we'll report back.

Ron Burdge

http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping lawyers help their clients since 1978.

Marketing Lessons from a PI Firm

Jim Reed, a personal injury attorney in Elmira, New York says his firm is thriving in this down economy and he has a few ideas posted to one of TechnoLawyer.com's listserves that are well worth passing on here (and if you don't subscribed to TechnoLawyer, you should; it's a great way to stay on top of the law office technology).

I am very pleased to report that my firm is kicking butt in 2009. Our #'s for the year are up more than 25%. This follows several years of good results so our current success is no short-term blip. With that said, continuing success is our daily mantra and we do not rest on our laurels …

Our success is a culmination of many factors that we have been working on for years:• Hire great employees (and fire the bad ones!).

• Focus on niche practices & create blogs for each niche (ie. NYInjuryLawBlog.com).
• Work with a savvy marketing firm (Mark Merenda from SmartMarketing) and make marketing part of your daily "work",
• Jettison underperforming practice areas and/or partners.
• Invest in the best technology and train your entire team how to use it.

Most important of all … just do one thing, every single day, to make your firm just one little bit better than the day before.

It never ceases to amaze me that success is the culmination of many little things, done day after day, rather than some huge "new" program or project.

Check out his firm site: www.zifflaw.com and his blog at: www.NYInjuryLawBlog.com

He's absolutely right that each day you need to do at least one thing that markets your firm and makes it better than the day before. That's a great tip on how to build (and keep building) a great practice.

Ron Burdge
www.TheLawCoach.com
Helping lawyers help people since 1978.

Is it identity theft or is it bank robbery --- and whose fault is it?

We've talked before about identity theft and its dangers and lots of people have. There's even a terrific British Youtube about it and the puzzling question of whether it is really identity theft at all (or is it just electronic bank robbery?). Well maybe we're about to find out.

Patco Construction Company, Inc. v People's United Bank dba Ocean Bank, no pending in state court in Maine, may tell us just whose fault it really is, besides the cyber criminal of course.

Patco was a long time customer of the bank but after losing hundreds of thousands of dollars from online theft and then getting a notice from the bank that they wanted Patco to pay it back, they decided they had enough. Patco sued the bank for the loss. 'bout time, some would say. So would I.

While the claims include negligence, breach of contract, breach of fiduciary duty, and more (what, not bailment?), fundamentally the theory is that the bank failed to live up to its most basic obligation, which is to protect its customers' funds from theft. Patco's case is one to watch. With the increasing rise of cyber theft, sooner or later a client may come to you and ask what they can do about it.

The Patco bank's claims of sophisticated "behind the scenes" security measures and computer programs didn't do much good to stop cyber thieves who dipped not only into Patco's accounts, but did so repeatedly, transferring money to accounts that Patco had never used before, and from internet addresses that Patco had never used before either. The thieves even managed to tap into Patco's line of credit for a hefty $200,000 transfer.

When you think about it, Patco's claims make sense. All banks are quick to point out, on their websites and in their paper brochures, how they have all these computer theft protection measures set up to protect your deposits from theft. Much of it is advertising directed at encouraging consumers to use the internet for electronic transfers and bill paying that are high-profit transactions for the banking industry. After all, there aren't many tellers working inside that big bank computer box. Heck, there's even fewer of them at the walk in windows nowadays.

A century or two ago people put their money under the mattress or buried it in the backyard because that was safe. Now when you put your money in the bank, it's because you think it's safe. Well, not quite as safe as it used to be.

Still, if you give a friend $50 to hold for you, it's only natural to expect that they'll have it on hand to give back to you when you ask for it later. Especially if that "friend" is a big bank that collects millions of dollars from thousands of people and then invests it and charges interest on loans and makes money off your money (which they keep). That's a simple idea that any juror can grasp.

You expect the bank to protect your money and when they don't, it doesn't really matter whether they had one computer program to stop cyber thieves or a hundred of those programs. When the money is gone, it's gone. But it ought to be the bank's fault.

So let's stop calling it identity theft and call it what it is. Bank robbery. That makes a difference because, you see, the bank is insured. Okay, so if the insurance pays off, then the bank's next insurance premium will go up. Sooner or later the bank will decide it needs to fix it so cyber theives can't get into your account. It's either that or facing rising insurance premiums or cover the loss themselves.

So when will that happen? When we all make it happen. Banks don't like losing money and they don't like paying out money either. When it starts costing them money, they'll do something about it. Until then, they will keep tellling you that it's "your" identity theft problem and that it was "your" money that was stolen and not theirs.

How Patco's case comes out will be very interesting. But, one thing is for sure, the rest of us will be watching. And you can bet that the banks will really be watching.

Ron Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping consumers and consumer law attorneys since 1978.

Court Warns of Attorney Trust Account Scam

If you haven't gotten one of those international emails from a foreign company asking for your help with a legal matter, you probably will. Be cautious. As with any email nowadays, it may just be a scam.

The Supreme Court of Ohio Office of Attorney Services issued a warning to lawyers about an internet scam affecting lawyer trust accounts. Multiple individual attorneys and law firms have contacted the Ohio Supreme Court about the scam.

Here’s how it works: An Ohio lawyer receives an e-mail purportedly from another lawyer for collection of a debt. A follow-up e-mail arrives from the supposed debtor (who is also the client), seemingly legitimate, who sends a bogus check (often drawn on an overseas account) for payment.

The Ohio lawyer is instructed to pay the debt by wiring some of the funds to the creditor and to keep a portion of the funds as payment for his/her attorney fees. The Ohio lawyer then deposits the check in his/her Interest on Lawyers Trust Account (IOLTA), wires funds to the creditor, and retains the agreed upon amount as attorney fees.

Meanwhile, the check goes through international banking channels until it’s eventually discovered that insufficient funds are available in the account to cover the amount. The bank debits the IOLTA for the amount of the returned check, while the lawyer has wired “good,” client funds to the purported creditor. The proposed client is often an actual Asian-based company so it sounds legitimate but the scammers have no real connection with the company at all.

To make it even more convincing, the scammers use real lawyers’ names in the initial e-mail. The moral of the story is clear: be careful.

If an unknown attorney asks you to become involved in a financial transaction involving a foreign company, be wary. Since your Trust Account funds are not your money, an attorney who disburses funds, before a deposited check actually clears the bank, is taking a very big risk. Don't do it until you can verify that in fact the international check has cleared and the funds are in your bank account.

You can report a suspected online crime by contacting the FBI at www.ic3.gov.

Ronald L. Burdge

www.TheLawCoach.com

Helping lawyers protect their clients, and themselves, since 1978.

A Trial Lawyer's Brain Scan

In a remarkably graphic way, the diagram above shows what the brain scan of a trial lawyer would look like if you could do it in the midst of trial. It also explains why trial work is challanging and exciting. Each of those balls represents one piece of evidence that has to fall into place in the course of the trial at just the right time, all of which are moving, and the orchestration of which is mind boggling.

Ronald L. Burdge

http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping lawyers win, one case at a time.

My hours were cut but I want to keep my job. What do I do now?

Economic times are tough for everyone. Employees and employers alike. But what do you do when your hours get cut and you want to keep your job?

A young attorney, out of law school only a few years, faced tough news and asked us how to deal with it. After working his first two years after passing the bar exam, all of it in the same mid-size law firm, he received news recently that his full time job was going part time. With student loans looking over his shoulder, he could only start calculating the hard economic reality of losing 40% of his income. His 5 day a week job was cut to 3 days, with no guarantee it won't get cut more in the coming weeks or months.

"I can't live on what I make now but I don't want to lose my job. I like what I do and where I do it but there's no guarantee it won't get worse. What do I do now?" His questions echo the fears of many young attorneys. Are you in that spot? Well, there's a few things to keep in mind.

First, keep in mind that most law firms don't like cutting associates or cutting their hours. The cost of replacing a trained associate, even one with only a few years of experience, is horrible for the law firm. The fear of losing a good young associate is as real for the law firm as is the fear of losing employment for the young associate. If cutting hours was avoidable, it would have been avoided. But the simple fact is that in an economic downturn, sooner or later the loss of business affects even the best broad-based, diversified law firm too. It may not be consoling, but consider yourself lucky you didn't get your hours cut sooner.

Second, get a grip on the present and move on. Okay, so you've got less income next week than you had last week. Figure out what you have to do to deal with it. Don't dwell on it and don't commiserate with others who are sulking and doing nothing about it. That won't help. Find a way to adjust your living expenses first. Don't just give up and start looking for another job. First, the job market is crowded with all those associates who lost their job, or got their hours cut, before you. It's tough. Second, even if you are only working part time, that's better than no time. Don't walk away from a job you like during tough times if you really want to keep it. Find a way to budget yourself by either reducing your costs of living or increasing your money to live with. In other words, look for a part time job to supplement your law work. That may be hard to find too, but it's likely better than walking away and hoping for the best.

Third, stand up. That's right. Stand up. The reason your hours were cut is probably because you were "sitting down" in the crowd. If you want to be the last person they cut, make yourself so valuable to the law firm that they can't afford to cut your hours and risk your departure. But if your hours were already cut, then turn the situation around. Show that you have a value they don't want to lose. So, how do you do that? What do you say? What do you do? Well, standing up is the starting point.

Okay, you've got a choice. You can start showing up 3 out of 5 days a week, just as you are scheduled now to do. Or, you can stand up and stand out.

If you want to keep that job, and get back to full time work sooner, make sure the law firm realizes that you can face adversity and overcome it. You need to prove you will not quit. You need to show the law firm that you value your work more than even the firm does. Don't take the loss lightly. You want a job? Fight for it.

Ask your employer if you can keep working your regular schedule and make it clear that they only have to pay you for the days the law firm can afford right now. If you understand that times are tough, then tell the firm that you understand but you value your work and don't want to abandon your clients or serve them less than what they need and that you're willing to do whatever it takes to support the firm. Note that we didn't say "you're willing to do whatever it takes to keep your job."

The reality is that you get to keep your job by supporting the firm.

The firm is concerned about tough times too and your willingness to help the firm get through tough times and still be successful is, itself, proof of your remarkable value to the law firm. Associate attorneys come and go. The ones the firm wants to keep are those who are dedicated as much to the firm as to the profession itself. Of course, all this assumes that you like where you work. If you don't, then take the cut in hours as an opportunity to move on and find a job that fits you better.

But if your hours were cut and you like your job, then start thinking about what you can do to get your employer back on its economic feet because that is what will get you back to full time work. More importantly, in the process of it you will prove to your law firm that there is no associate attorney who is willing to work as hard, work as long, work as loyally, to help the firm achieve its success.

And why should you want the law firm to succeed? Because, at the end of the day, if the firm doesn't succeed, neither do you. And if you help the law firm increase its success, then you will succeed too.

Ronald L. Burdge

http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping attorneys achieve success, every day, since 1978.

Reinventing Yourself: Where the Jobs Are Today

San Francisco is hiring computer game testers. The CIA is hiring "analysts" for its spy programs. California wineries are hiring workers. "Green" buildings are abounding so laborers are needed. In Florida, boat captains are needed for charter boats and in the oil fields.

Okay, none of this has anything to do with law. Or does it?

Many graduating seniors from the '09 class are still unemployed. Law students entering their final year and graduating in '10 may face the same dearth of opportunities. Heck, even well established law firms are struggling. So it's not surprising to see some graduates opting for non traditional work, both inside and outside the legal arena.

There's nothing "bad" to striking out on your own in such hard times. There's lots of great examples of others who left their traditional training and backgrounds to find new work during an economic downturn. Indeed a hugh chunk of the current Fortune 500 companies got their start during an economic downturn.

Thomas Edison did it. The man who founded Federal Express (Fedex) did it during an economic downturn. The stories are actually legion and great examples of creativitiy.

If your job prospects are suffering, now may be the perfect time to figure out what you love to do and go do it. In fact, it may be the very best time.

One place to get started could be the Alternative Lawyer Jobs web site here: http://www.alternativelawyerjobs.com/ .

There's also a great article written by Michelle Borchanian posted by the Michigan Bar, titled "Getting from Here to There: A Lawyer's Non-Traditional Legal or Non-Legal Job Search" here: http://www.michbar.org/journal/article.cfm?articleid=679&volumeid=53.

A little web surfing and you'll undoubtedly come up with more resources.

Ron Burdge

http://www.thelawcoach.com/

Helping attorneys do their best, at whatever they decide to do, since 1978.