Why Does Better Intake Change Everything? | Hunter Garnett

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And know they want to hire you.
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That's how I think about attracting talent is I want to have a brand affinity that attracts like-minded people that believe in the mission and they come there and it's not.
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I mean, part of it is yes, I'm interviewing is this the right person, but you know, the second stage of an interview is oh, I found the right person.
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Now how do I convince them that I'm the right place for them to work?
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The best candidates have options.
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And I want them to know before they ever meet me, like to be nervous, like I'm getting to meet this guy that I've been following on LinkedIn for two years that like takes great care of his team.
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Hey friends, welcome to another episode of Life Beyond the Briefs, the podcast that helps you run a law firm without it running your life.
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Here's the promise.
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By the end of this conversation, you'll know how to tighten the first five minutes of a client journey, build pods that actually own outcomes, and turn your scoreboard into profit.
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We'll break down intake roles and scripts that convert without sounding robotic.
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We'll show you the difference between an intake specialist and an intake manager, and when to hire each.
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You'll hear how to onboard brand new assistants and experienced staff so they hit numbers fast.
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We'll talk SOPs that move cases forward instead of gathering dust.
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We also get real about spend, PPC, LSAs, and SEO.
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What to track, what to pause, how to buy back your time, and fuel the pods you already have.
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Plus a few levers most firms ignore.
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Community involvement that brings better cases, simple nurture that turns past clients into super fans, incentives that keep the team aligned.
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Our guest is Hunter Garnett, operator, builder, straight shooter.
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Grab a notebook.
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You're about to get a practical playbook you can use this week.
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Let's dive in.
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Welcome into the show.
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Today's guest, another repeat guest.
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Hunter uh Garnett and I recorded an episode like must have been two, two and a half years ago, early, very early days of this podcast, and actually back when it had a different name.
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Hunter is a an injury lawyer in Alabama at Garnett Patterson Injury Lawyers.
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He's well, I mean, you tell me.
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Tell me how how many years you are into the practice, into your practice, and then kind of size and scope of your firm.
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Eight and a half as a PI lawyer, open my whole legal career.
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Then four, almost four, basically on my own.
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I have a I have an older law partner.
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So four and four and a half or so years working for somebody else, and then busted the doors and went on.
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Yeah, I had a residency with like the two best trial lawyers in Huntsville, where I wrote all the briefs, tried secondary on all the cases, big stuff, took a bunch of depots, tried a bunch of stuff on my own, started to acquire cases on my own, and then And one of the things that impresses me about you is that you you seem to be one of these people that you do all of the things, right?
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You'll go in and you'll try a five, ten thousand dollar case, you'll settle a million dollar death case, you're also doing all the marketing, you're also writing the SOPs and doing the recruiting of these folks who were overseas by some some pretty interesting gorilla like LinkedIn marketing.
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So we'll talk about all of that today.
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But but you make it all look pretty easy.
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And by the way, you're also like investing in real estate, playing basketball and raising a young son.
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So how are you splitting your time with all of these things?
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I'll tell you one, I think I like Tim Ferris' mindset on like kind of working in seasons.
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So I try to pick one thing every quarter to crush, whether it be fitness, whether it be marketing at the law firm, operations at the law firm.
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Sometimes I can pick two things to crush, uh, and I try to pick things that like I enjoy.
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Like right now, it's fitness is not it for me.
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Like I can't make myself go to the gym for an hour a day, six days a week.
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But second quarter of this year, fitness was my thing.
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Like I went every day and enjoyed being there.
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Um, so I tend to work in seasons, pick like two or three things I want to crush, pick two or three things I want to improve on.
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And then the rest I'm maintaining or maybe leveling up percent or whatever it is.
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Do you have a hard time moving from that season of crush to the le the season of either maintenance or I mean, if I think we're being honest, like most of us, when you get past the crushing season, you're letting something slip because you can only spin so many plates at a time.
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Yeah, I mean, that's having a good team helps a lot, right?
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Like my team kind of know like my my firm, I've built a foundation where it can do all the table stake stuff and keep us alive and we can grow 10% a year just organically and we can move cases along without it being super taxing.
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And so I just kind of pick one of these pillars that my whole life is founded on to really build up.
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The rest of it does a pretty good job of staying stable and then you just you just never slip.
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So like I don't have really bad periods of life where I have a terrible diet.
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For example, like if I go, we went to Disney last week, bad diet for a week.
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I'm not gonna do that for a month or two months or three.
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Same thing with fitness.
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Like I haven't been to the gym in a month.
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I'm not gonna do that too much in a row.
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I'm gonna at least do the bare minimum once a week to maintain what I've got.
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My law firm's the same way.
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You know, like I'm gonna still touch, I'm gonna still touch every case every 30 days.
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I'm gonna still meet with my people as often as I need to.
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I'm gonna still grow the firm just kind of organically, but I might not have my foot on the gas from knocking on chiropractory doors or mailing cold letters or every client up personally for a Google review.
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You know, you just gotta kind of got a VIC.
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What is your operational rhythm with your team?
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So you told me about 350 cases.
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I know you got people in-house, you have a new lawyer, you have people overseas.
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We could talk about that.
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You're hitting every one of those cases every 30 days.
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Is there a a system or is a case management system that's pinging you?
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Like how does that work?
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We're implementing some technology that's gonna be pretty cool, but right now it's just old-fashioned hard work touching them, right?
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And so we have every other month, every other week, I have case management meetings where I meet with the case managers one-on-one and we go through the things that they want to go through.
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Okay.
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And and they have their they have their priority cases that we go through every other week.
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And then once a month, we go through and touch every single case and they tell me every detail.
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I know a lot of these cases kind of front to back, have a high capacity for remembering.
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I mean, there's a lot of information about cases, and that's a blessing.
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So, like my Monday last Monday, it was that day.
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It was my first day at Disney.
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My wife went to like Disney Springs or something with the in-laws, and I just crushed through 380 cases in a day, touched them all.
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Are these one-on-one meetings with the case managers?
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Yes.
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They're one-on-one with my EA in the room and with usually the newest case manager.
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If we've got somebody that's kind of training just for her to learn throsmosis, yes.
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Are you still doing the intake and the sales, or do you have somebody handling that for you?
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I'm doing the intake and sales.
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I'm trying to get that off my plate.
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ASAP, that's my first quarter main project, is having a legitimate intake department.
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So here's here's what I will tell you, having done that about a year ago, is it really will challenge your ability to remember all of the cases by name, right?
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So about a year ago, I got almost all the way out of intake and said, I'll I'll still hop on if there's a you know, seven-figure case on the line.
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I'm like, just transfer it to me right now.
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But everything under that is being handled by our intake manager now.
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And we have cases in our system, not necessarily that I'm working on, but I could not go through and pick up and easily look at every single case because I just don't know these people's names.
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And it's a weird, it's a weird place to be in because, you know, this this is what we talk about, right?
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We want to grow to the place where your people have the ability to operate on the cases and you can make money while you're not uh doing it.
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But I think for somebody like me, and and I suspect for somebody like you who actually gets a lot of value out of doing the work in the cases and enjoys going and trying the$5,000 case where no money was offered and winning it, right?
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There's um there's kind of this next level challenge that comes with not actually knowing the name of everybody who's a client of your firm.
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So that's that's the thing that you need to mentally prepare for as you shift intake and sales off of your plate to somebody else.
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Yeah, it makes sense.
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I found though when I hit like 250 cases, they started running together regardless.
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You know, I can remember 100 of the really good ones, right?
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But I still want to, because I enjoy it, I still want to do, I think, a lot of the in-person.
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Somebody wants to come to the office and meet me, like I'm gonna meet them.
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Like I'll make time.
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Well, what in in Huntsville, like, what is that metropolitan area like?
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Is it in other words, like, are most of your clients within easy driving distance, or is somebody driving 45 minutes in to come and meet with you?
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Sometimes they are coming 30, 45 minutes in.
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I have two offices.
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I have one that's like centrally located to the Tennessee Valley, cut to the state of Alabama in thirds north to south.
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It's right in the middle of the top third.
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That's where I've just recently moved.
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It's kind of my home community.
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So I meet over there a lot.
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And then Huntsville's kind of in the corner.
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And yes, it's not unusual.
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You drive 30, 45 minutes, uh, you know, 15 to 45 is kind of the radius until people drive.
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And I meet almost nobody, right?
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You know, this is a uh COVID fallout thing.
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It's like we stopped inviting people into the office and we offered Zoom for a while, but nobody actually really wanted to do Zoom, especially not in Northern Virginia.
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And so almost everybody's just phone only.
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It's not that I don't want you to come in, it's just I I my bias is I would not want to go into the office if I didn't have to.
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And so I just assume nobody else is.
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But that yeah, that also is a disconnect.
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Like it makes it challenging to remember much about the file if you can't even picture the person's face.
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Really challenging.
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And you know, handsome young lawyers like us, like we're more memorable too when the client comes in.
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Like, like seriously.
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So I tell people whenever I get on the phone with them, I say, hey, you got a good case.
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I can get started on it today.
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I can send you paperwork over the phone, you sign with your finger, and you know, but I'm a little old-fashioned.
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I would like to meet you.
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You know, I'm gonna be working, I've got a newborn at home.
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There's gonna be a night where I'm working on your case and it's late and I'd rather be home with you.
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And if I have a face with a name, you're not just a name on a piece of paper, it's gonna make it a little easier to stay till seven or eight o'clock to work on your case.
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And then but we're close to all the doctors' offices.
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I just tell them like, hey, next time we hit the doctor, like, call us when you get done, see my men, like pop in.
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We'll chop it up for five minutes, be glad to meet you.
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I like that.
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Maybe we'll maybe we'll start implementing that.
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Although I am out of the office most days by four o'clock to go coach something.
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You're you'll you'll hit that stage now.
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You're in the no sleeping at night stage.
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Uh, there is another stage where it's like, man, where did all my time go?
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Let's talk about finding finding people overseas.
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So you shared before we hopped on here that you've got like this portfolio of future employees of your firm who are what'd you what did you say, in Columbia?
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A lot of Colombian attorneys, yeah.
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A lot of Colombian.
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So tell tell tell everybody else that story.
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Okay, so I'll back up a little bit.
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I don't know if you've heard this whole story.
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So I hired my first VA through Ethan Allstroff's entity.
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Okay.
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I can't remember what it's called.
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Now it's attorney assistant.
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Attorney Assistant, yeah.
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Yeah.
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She was in the Philippines.
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She cleared our medical records bottleneck, and it was sweet.
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Yeah, we were growing fast.
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She was a big help.
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And then I hired my senior paralegal's first cousin.
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It was in Mexico.
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He was driving a cab at the time and to work through a bunch of leads that I had, mass swart leads.
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And he did a great job.
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He did a better job than I can find somebody here in my city.
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Started to pay him good money, like life-changing money, and he's very appreciative.
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So that was kind of the full circle for me of like I can hire cheaper, better, and I can change people's lives.
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I decided then I wanted to really dig into it.
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I found that Columbian attorneys were the best fit for the eye, just because the laws are similar, their English is good, their infrastructure is good down there internet-wise.
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So I started to post on LinkedIn.
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Well, I added a bunch of Colombian attorneys on LinkedIn, like hundreds.
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Then I started to add, I added them, I started to post just my values.
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Like just telling, like, here's my mission, here's what motivates me, here's the type of person I am, here's how I treat people that work for me for the purpose of attracting candidates.
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And it worked.
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And so now we have really good people that work for us who um, and then now we're working on the next stage.
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I'm talking about this on LinkedIn a bit, training.
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I've supported this mission in Guatemala for like forever.
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And those kids are starting to graduate, and I'm starting to train them to be legal assistants.
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They're not case managers yet.
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I mean, they're 19, 20 years old.
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And so, you know, it's working for us.
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That's kind of what that's how I see us grow in the next couple of years in terms of staff.
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Yeah.
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Pipeline of high school to legal assistant to maybe case manager.
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Is the uh technol technology and the internet infrastructure as good in Guatemala as it is in Colombia?
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It's it's pretty good.
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Um, I haven't had any issues yet at all.
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I mean, my Colombian attorneys, like they never are down for internet issues.
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Guatemala I haven't had any issues yet, but it's pretty new.
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I had an EA briefly in he was either Colombian and living in Venezuela or the other way around.
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The other way around.
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But it seemed like every other week he was having to go down to Walmart and hook up to Walmart's Wi-Fi to lock in because the power was going out at his apartment.
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That's unusual.
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That's something we test though.
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It's part of the hiring process.
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It's like I want to know what you're in that.
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How do you test that?
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Well, they have those like you know, speed tests.
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Oh, speed tests, yeah.
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Yeah, speed tests usually.
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Now, power.
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I mean, I've got a guy in Mexico that like finally, if he got a raise, I was like, go buy a generator because I gotta have you.
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Like when your power goes out for four hours a week, like cut this thing on my phone.
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But I just want to hit just come back to that re recruiting pipeline that you've set up.
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Because I think most lawyers, and I I wouldn't even have really thought to go and reverse engineer it in this way, like you grabbing the LinkedIn Premium account and just adding lawyers, young lawyers, I assume, from the top schools in a in a country where there's a pay rate arbitrage, but where the culture is in the system is similar.
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Where did you get that idea?
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I don't know.
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I mean, it just made sense to me.
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Like that's what I mean, if I was gonna hire an attorney here at a law school, I would go to the three law schools in my state and I would add I mean, I'm doing that right now.
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Like I'm trying to attract lawyers, U.S.
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lawyers now, and I'm adding first, second, third year lawyers all the time.
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Yeah, I want them to know me because it's just like this.
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Like, it's just like when somebody walks in your office, if they found you on Google and you're a commodity, I can sell them.
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Like I can sell people face to face.
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But when they walk in and they have an affinity with you and they've seen you at the ball games and they've seen your hometown billboards, whatever it is, like there's no selling.
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Like they walk in, they know they want to hire you.
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That's how I think about attracting talent, is I want to have a brand affinity that attracts like-minded people that believe in the mission, and they come there and it's not-I mean, part of it is yes, I'm interviewing is this the right person, but you know, the second stage of an interview is I found the right person.
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Now how do I convince them that I'm the right place for them to work?
00:14:33.919 --> 00:14:35.600
The best candidates have options.
00:14:35.840 --> 00:14:44.480
And I want them to know before they even meet me, like to be nervous, like I get to meet this guy that I've been following on LinkedIn for two years that like takes great care of his team.
00:14:44.720 --> 00:14:48.159
This is one of the things that we candidly did poorly over the last few years.
00:14:48.320 --> 00:14:49.519
So I just hired a lawyer.
00:14:49.679 --> 00:14:54.240
It took forever, and it took way longer than I felt like it should have taken.
00:14:54.480 --> 00:15:02.000
But I think that the reason it took so long was uh we've done a poor job in our own community of keeping our brand in front of young lawyers.
00:15:02.159 --> 00:15:14.080
Um, because I haven't been going to like the lower level court and I haven't been hanging out in the hallways where the young lawyers are, and I haven't done any kind of recruiting events at uh at law schools locally.
00:15:14.240 --> 00:15:28.559
And so in the back of my, like when we got to the end of this hiring cycle, I'm like, I gotta make sure we don't end up in a position where we don't have that roster again the next time we need to hire because I can't wait nine months from like, okay, I need somebody to finally have a button a seat.
00:15:28.639 --> 00:15:28.879
Right.
00:15:28.960 --> 00:15:29.519
Yeah, I agree.
00:15:29.679 --> 00:15:30.559
I'm doing the same thing.
00:15:30.720 --> 00:15:34.960
I mean, I'm I would love to have an I think that's the biggest advantage of an internship program, right?
00:15:35.039 --> 00:15:49.759
Is to build your brand, not just with that one intern that you hire for the summer, but the 10 that you interview with and the 10 more that you didn't select for the interview and the 50 more that didn't even apply because they've already got something or whatever it is, but they see it come across.
00:15:50.000 --> 00:16:04.000
And and the trial ad professor at the law school, the going again, going upstream of the people who are actually, you know, your your target market to the people who are advising your target market about where they should they should take a take a job.
00:16:04.320 --> 00:16:05.759
And it goes this is something too.
00:16:05.840 --> 00:16:10.240
Like I sponsor our local paralegals chapter for whatever I don't even know the acronyms.
00:16:10.320 --> 00:16:11.440
I think there's like two or three.
00:16:11.519 --> 00:16:11.679
Yeah.
00:16:12.000 --> 00:16:14.080
They meet once each, I don't know how often they meet.
00:16:14.240 --> 00:16:18.720
We were gonna have a cookout at my farm, actually, but my little boy kind of took his birth to mess that up a bit.
00:16:18.799 --> 00:16:22.399
But like, hey, then they want 500 or a thousand bucks to go to Top Golf.
00:16:22.480 --> 00:16:23.840
I'm like, I'm glad to give it to them.
00:16:23.919 --> 00:16:26.879
And I just will go over there and chop it up with them for 10 minutes.
00:16:26.960 --> 00:16:31.200
And I know that I mean I had a paralegal here yesterday interviewing that just reached out.
00:16:31.279 --> 00:16:32.799
I'm not hiring, but she wanted to meet.
00:16:32.960 --> 00:16:33.519
And guess what?
00:16:33.600 --> 00:16:40.399
Like, if I post a job, those 20 ladies that I've been buying golf top golf tickets for every quarter, like it's gonna pay for itself a hundred times over.
00:16:40.480 --> 00:16:40.960
That's interesting.
00:16:41.120 --> 00:16:41.440
That's right.
00:16:41.600 --> 00:16:42.799
We yeah, we do the same thing.
00:16:42.879 --> 00:16:45.840
We host uh the Northern Virginia Paralegal Association.
00:16:46.000 --> 00:16:48.720
Like we let them use our our training center for meetings.
00:16:48.799 --> 00:16:52.639
We make sure the stacks are the stacks are fully stocked anytime they're in the office.
00:16:52.799 --> 00:17:02.480
You know, whatever, whatever drinks um they've requested before are like there, so that when we need to hire another paralegal, we have that warm pipeline.
00:17:02.559 --> 00:17:07.279
And where I always tell my team, like, be on the lookout for somebody who's good at their job and hates their boss, right?
00:17:07.440 --> 00:17:09.359
Because that's that's your next teammate.
00:17:09.599 --> 00:17:16.240
I tell I tell my team, like, hey, every time you deal with a lawyer that's an ass, like like let's remember him.
00:17:16.319 --> 00:17:20.240
Like it'd probably be pretty easy to steal his paralegal one day when you really need somebody.
00:17:20.640 --> 00:17:23.440
All right, so that's the employee attraction formula.
00:17:23.599 --> 00:17:25.440
What are you doing to attract clients now?
00:17:26.640 --> 00:17:27.279
Same kind of thing?
00:17:27.519 --> 00:17:35.759
It's the same formula, it's just it's even really similar tactics, but it's you know, the formula for attracting employees or cases is about the same.
00:17:35.839 --> 00:17:43.599
It's you're a good person and you get comfortable with self-promotion, and then you learn some tactics to leverage that and get as much generate as much attention as possible.
00:17:43.839 --> 00:17:44.960
Like that's the formula.
00:17:45.279 --> 00:17:48.079
What is the the Huntsville, Alabama self-promotion?
00:17:48.319 --> 00:17:52.240
Well, so I do we do I I think I think you got I'm 33, right?
00:17:52.319 --> 00:17:55.119
I'm not even from Huntsville, Regional, I'm from a rural community.
00:17:55.359 --> 00:17:56.559
Can't bull the ocean.
00:17:56.640 --> 00:17:58.960
I think you pick as small of a viable market as possible.
00:17:59.119 --> 00:18:00.640
And so my first one was my home county.
00:18:00.720 --> 00:18:04.640
It's like 120, 130,000 people, you know, candidly.
00:18:04.799 --> 00:18:06.240
I think we own that county now.
00:18:06.319 --> 00:18:09.200
I think we get all the good, not all, but we get most of the good cases.
00:18:09.839 --> 00:18:13.680
We're gonna continue to grow market share, but we're gonna go from 50 to 75.
00:18:13.759 --> 00:18:16.480
And so now we're looking for other little niche markets.
00:18:16.640 --> 00:18:18.240
Spanish speakers in the Huntsville area.
00:18:18.400 --> 00:18:23.279
Huntsville attracts a lot of people moving from out of state, a lot of people from Northern Virginia, actually.
00:18:23.519 --> 00:18:27.599
So tr transplants, like that's somebody that I'm interested in on a brand with.
00:18:27.759 --> 00:18:33.759
So I like to pick as small of a niche as possible and then just try to put myself in front of them.
00:18:34.000 --> 00:18:38.880
Then um, are you doing PPC, LSA, SEO spend, anything like that?
00:18:39.119 --> 00:18:39.759
That's pretty new.
00:18:39.920 --> 00:18:43.920
So I've been doing just super bare bones SEO, just basically paying a web developer.
00:18:44.079 --> 00:18:47.839
Maps have been king the last five years, you know, and so maps.
00:18:47.920 --> 00:18:51.039
You don't I don't think you need to pay tens of thousands of dollars a month.
00:18:51.119 --> 00:18:59.200
You just get reviews, make your profile set up right, and answer your phone calls, like, and you're gonna get some some cases in my market anyway.
00:18:59.359 --> 00:19:00.240
That's changing some.
00:19:00.319 --> 00:19:04.640
Huntsville is now we're one of the testing grounds for AIO, like AIO.
00:19:04.799 --> 00:19:06.319
It's our maps are totally gone.
00:19:06.400 --> 00:19:07.519
So I've seen a dip in that.
00:19:07.759 --> 00:19:08.240
Interesting.
00:19:08.400 --> 00:19:09.680
Yeah, we're yeah, it's new.
00:19:09.759 --> 00:19:12.240
Like all the surrounding communities still look the same.
00:19:12.480 --> 00:19:14.160
Huntsville uh is different.
00:19:14.319 --> 00:19:18.079
And actually, if you Huntsville, if you do personal jewelry near me, it looks like it used to.
00:19:18.240 --> 00:19:21.680
If you do just personal lawyer and you're here in Huntsville, it looks normal.
00:19:21.839 --> 00:19:24.000
But you add in Huntsville, it looks different.
00:19:24.240 --> 00:19:28.799
So adjusting to that uh somehow, but I am running some PPC now.
00:19:28.880 --> 00:19:30.400
I'm running some LSAs for the first time.
00:19:30.480 --> 00:19:32.240
I have a really good fractional CMO.
00:19:32.319 --> 00:19:34.720
It's a good media buyer, so I trust him.
00:19:34.799 --> 00:19:38.160
I'm gonna turn him loose for six months, and I'm not looking at the numbers.
00:19:38.319 --> 00:19:39.680
The calls are way up though.
00:19:39.759 --> 00:19:44.160
I don't know what our average cost per case is right now, but we're getting a bunch of phone calls.
00:19:44.319 --> 00:19:47.599
And I want to spig it that I can kind of turn on and off.
00:19:47.759 --> 00:19:52.480
You know, SEO is a snowball, like you just kind of keep rolling, can't really pick a lot.
00:19:52.640 --> 00:19:58.480
I want to spick it where like if I find the right lawyer and I want to hire him, just turn that spigot wide open every year, you know?
00:19:58.720 --> 00:19:59.440
Yeah, right.
00:19:59.759 --> 00:20:00.960
What are man?
00:20:01.359 --> 00:20:04.160
The question just the question just left me.
00:20:04.319 --> 00:20:14.000
Yeah, what so when you're talking to your your PPC and your LSA person, and you say you don't know currently like what it's costing you to acquire a case, but you're gonna wait six months and see what happens.
00:20:14.160 --> 00:20:22.000
How have you either with him or in your own mind defined what success is gonna look like in six months when you're looking back?
00:20:22.240 --> 00:20:27.680
Well, we talk a lot about he comes, he originally came from a big marketing firm.
00:20:28.400 --> 00:20:33.200
And their goal was to maximize impressions um and maximize the number of cases.
00:20:33.359 --> 00:20:34.559
That's not my goal.
00:20:34.720 --> 00:20:38.319
My goal is to maximize ROI, you know, whatever I feel comfortable.
00:20:38.720 --> 00:20:41.200
Basically maximize ROI compared to my capacity.
00:20:41.359 --> 00:20:44.880
Two months ago, he had a hard job because I was like at capacity.
00:20:44.960 --> 00:20:49.440
I didn't want more cases, but I wanted to know if I could get more cases.
00:20:49.759 --> 00:20:52.400
Uh so we tested and it was not easy.
00:20:52.480 --> 00:20:55.519
We didn't really have enough of a budget to have good reliable data.
00:20:55.680 --> 00:20:57.519
But I went with my gut, it seemed to be working.
00:20:57.680 --> 00:20:59.200
We hired a lawyer, bumped it up.
00:20:59.359 --> 00:21:03.279
We're spending like$12,000 a month, 10, 11, 12 a month on PPC mostly.
00:21:03.440 --> 00:21:05.599
Feels like cases, I know cases are coming in.
00:21:05.680 --> 00:21:10.720
I just don't know if they're$1,500 cases or$3,000 cases.
00:21:10.960 --> 00:21:15.440
I know my numbers on the operation side, and so I know that they're profitable regardless.
00:21:15.599 --> 00:21:16.400
So that's where we're at.
00:21:16.640 --> 00:21:17.200
That's interesting.
00:21:17.279 --> 00:21:25.200
And and one of the problems that you have down in Alabama is you you relatively low or really low um minimum liability limits.
00:21:25.440 --> 00:21:28.960
So you could ten thousand dollar for liability, is that what it is?
00:21:29.200 --> 00:21:30.480
No, we're 2515.
00:21:30.640 --> 00:21:31.119
Oh, you are?
00:21:31.279 --> 00:21:31.519
Okay.
00:21:31.839 --> 00:21:33.119
We have good stacking too.
00:21:33.359 --> 00:21:39.599
The trouble actually is in the quality of I got spooled with like really, really, really good clients.
00:21:39.759 --> 00:21:43.599
And so my average case value, like for litigation, for example, is$38,000.
00:21:44.160 --> 00:21:46.240
And for pre fee or case value?
00:21:46.480 --> 00:21:46.720
Fee.
00:21:47.039 --> 00:21:47.279
Yeah.
00:21:47.440 --> 00:21:48.559
And that's healthy.
00:21:48.640 --> 00:21:48.880
Yeah.
00:21:49.039 --> 00:21:49.279
Yeah.
00:21:49.359 --> 00:21:52.559
And and even across the board, we're at like 18,000.
00:21:52.799 --> 00:21:54.079
Prelid's about eleven.
00:21:54.240 --> 00:21:54.559
Yeah.
00:21:54.720 --> 00:21:59.680
And so that's a product of having really the when you have a spread from eleven to thirty eight.
00:22:00.160 --> 00:22:03.839
That tells me I got a client that like insurance lawyers are sitting in the ring with them.
00:22:04.000 --> 00:22:04.559
They believe them.
00:22:04.720 --> 00:22:06.160
They know a jury's going to believe them.
00:22:06.319 --> 00:22:07.680
My case values are increasing.
00:22:07.839 --> 00:22:10.640
My client, my ideal client's not a typically a very litigious person.
00:22:11.119 --> 00:22:13.039
Yeah, so that's so Oh yeah.
00:22:13.119 --> 00:22:13.920
Finish finish that thought.
00:22:14.000 --> 00:22:14.400
And then I would.
00:22:14.559 --> 00:22:17.039
Well, and then just Google leads, it's not like that.
00:22:17.200 --> 00:22:23.039
Like people that don't do research typically they don't have, you know, word of mouth type stuff going on.
00:22:23.119 --> 00:22:24.880
You know, they call the cruise lawyer that pops up.
00:22:25.039 --> 00:22:25.839
This is anecdotal.
00:22:25.920 --> 00:22:27.039
I don't have empirical data for that.
00:22:27.200 --> 00:22:27.920
Well, I do actually.
00:22:28.000 --> 00:22:37.200
Our average prelit, I have some empirical data, but I think it's going to be really strong where it's like probably half of the average case value digital leads versus word of mouth.
00:22:37.680 --> 00:22:39.599
Well, that's that's been exactly my experience.
00:22:39.839 --> 00:22:41.279
Slightly less anecdotal.
00:22:41.440 --> 00:22:48.960
But for instance, like we ran a non-branded lead gen campaign, and the average fee that that thing produced was$4,000.
00:22:49.279 --> 00:22:53.200
Now, it only costs us$1,000 to acquire a case under that campaign.
00:22:53.359 --> 00:22:56.640
And so when I told the guy to turn it off, he's like, We were getting a 4X ROI.
00:22:56.720 --> 00:23:02.480
I'm like, well, yeah, but my average case value, if it comes through any of my other channels, is$18,000 fee.
00:23:02.559 --> 00:23:08.160
And so when I'm working on your cases, we're making less than a quarter of the money, even though it didn't cost me that much money to acquire.
00:23:08.319 --> 00:23:17.759
And there probably is a way, if I thought about it, probably is a way to, you know, offshore those cases where it costs less to produce it.
00:23:17.839 --> 00:23:32.480
But even that is like it's hard to make that profitable and interesting enough problem to solve when the average fee is 4,000 because the people that respond to those digital ads tend to be like I was in a crash 48 hours ago and I haven't seen a doctor yet.
00:23:32.559 --> 00:23:33.200
What already you know?
00:23:33.440 --> 00:23:35.200
Well, and I'll tell you, I got my spreadsheet right here.
00:23:35.359 --> 00:23:39.839
And this is my soft tissue case manager, you know, offshore completely.
00:23:40.000 --> 00:23:42.000
And this is before attorney time.
00:23:42.240 --> 00:23:51.839
It's about, it's about 3,000 bucks to run my pre-led offshore team to settle a soft tissue, you know, like at the minute that's the average home in these small cases.
00:23:52.079 --> 00:23:54.880
This is per per case, is your cost of production per case?
00:23:55.039 --> 00:23:55.200
Yeah.
00:23:55.359 --> 00:24:00.640
And then you pay a lawyer a thousand dollars to do it and you've eaten up the full 4,000, and you're really in the hole.
00:24:00.720 --> 00:24:02.160
You know, your ROI is negative.
00:24:02.559 --> 00:24:03.279
No, exactly.
00:24:03.440 --> 00:24:03.839
Exactly.
00:24:04.000 --> 00:24:04.240
Yeah.
00:24:04.480 --> 00:24:14.960
Um, and so the the thought that occurred to me is like if your average fee in litigation is 38 and your average prelid is I think you said eight, either 18 or 11, why not just toss everything into litigation?
00:24:15.759 --> 00:24:17.440
What what do you think causes that disconnect?
00:24:17.680 --> 00:24:18.960
Well, I litigate my big cases.
00:24:19.200 --> 00:24:28.319
So I'm cherry picking a bit because like a case comes in and I got a million dollars in coverage and a surgery, like hey, I mean I know my prelid offer is gonna be 100, 150, 200.
00:24:28.400 --> 00:24:29.440
I just file them.
00:24:29.680 --> 00:24:30.720
Go ahead and get mine in line.
00:24:30.960 --> 00:24:35.680
Takes me about a year to get a case ready for trial in my in Madison County, which is where Huntsville is.
00:24:36.000 --> 00:24:38.799
Takes like two years in my home county.
00:24:39.039 --> 00:24:40.720
So that's part of it.
00:24:40.799 --> 00:24:52.000
But also, you know, we look at it some some of that$11,000 legal fee is like cutting our fee a little bit to like make it work for the clients where we got a case that it's worth, you know, say it's worth$30,000, the offer is$25.
00:24:52.240 --> 00:24:54.799
I'd rather reduce my fee a little than litigate it for.
00:24:55.039 --> 00:24:55.680
And the client would too.
00:24:55.920 --> 00:24:57.839
The rest of your team understand all those economics.
00:24:58.160 --> 00:24:59.039
Do you explain that to them?
00:24:59.200 --> 00:25:00.400
You try to teach that?
00:25:00.720 --> 00:25:02.960
That's go we're going through that.
00:25:03.200 --> 00:25:07.599
I use my soft my soft tissue case manager is like my low, that's my training ground.
00:25:07.680 --> 00:25:07.839
Okay.
00:25:07.920 --> 00:25:09.839
So that's where I t that's where my testing ground.
00:25:10.000 --> 00:25:14.880
So he's really good, so I can throw stuff at him and do different things and he adjusts well.
00:25:15.039 --> 00:25:20.160
And so he's seeing the numbers now, and he knows exactly how it's being measured.
00:25:20.319 --> 00:25:22.240
And if it works for him, we're gonna expand it to everybody.
00:25:22.319 --> 00:25:23.119
And I think it's gonna work.
00:25:23.200 --> 00:25:30.559
I think Q3 of next year, everybody on my team has a spreadsheet and they see the exact numbers that their pod is doing.
00:25:30.720 --> 00:25:42.480
And that's from that's from big heavy litigation stuff, you know, the 10, 20 cases that me and my senior peerly were working on, that's our pod, down to the pre-lit chiropractor, ERT cases and everything in between.
00:25:42.960 --> 00:25:44.319
Probably about five or six pods.
00:25:44.559 --> 00:25:45.519
So what wouldn't have happened.
00:25:45.680 --> 00:25:46.000
Yeah.
00:25:46.559 --> 00:25:59.599
And um, have you thought about the like how somebody moves up or across a pod from a soft tissue pod to like the next, you know, whatever the next level of case might be for you?
00:25:59.839 --> 00:26:01.440
I mean, to be candid with you, you know.
00:26:01.839 --> 00:26:05.519
Because everybody because everybody always wants to I would I want to work on the litigation.
00:26:05.680 --> 00:26:11.039
Like, well, you're not that good at soft tissue pre prelit, so I'm not gonna put you on litigation, right?
00:26:11.599 --> 00:26:15.119
I I am I'm a very open-minded dictator at my law firm.
00:26:15.200 --> 00:26:20.559
Okay, so I listen to concerns, I listen to everybody, but it's ultimately it's like, hey, you're the soft, you're the slip and fall guy now.
00:26:20.640 --> 00:26:21.920
Like, you're the slip and fall guy.
00:26:22.000 --> 00:26:24.000
And I'm gonna set you up to succeed and we're gonna try it.
00:26:24.079 --> 00:26:26.000
And I've moved people, I moved people around all the time.
00:26:26.160 --> 00:26:31.200
Sometimes they fail because it's on them, sometimes it's on me, sometimes it's on both of us.
00:26:31.359 --> 00:26:32.640
A lot of people succeed.
00:26:32.880 --> 00:26:34.400
And so that's part of it.
00:26:34.559 --> 00:26:36.640
But then also the incentives matter.
00:26:36.799 --> 00:26:42.160
So my soft tissue guy, he has more, he adds more value to a case than my Paul.
00:26:42.400 --> 00:26:44.559
I got a guy that all he does is pause and lens cases.
00:26:44.640 --> 00:26:44.799
Okay.
00:26:44.960 --> 00:26:47.279
Most of his job is reducing medical bills.
00:26:47.440 --> 00:26:51.680
We go like above and beyond to reduce sobro and lens as much as possible, fight tooth and nail.
00:26:51.839 --> 00:26:53.920
So he's got a different job, he's got different incentives.
00:26:54.000 --> 00:27:08.799
My soft tissue guy, because those are marginal cases, he's got more upside than anybody, to be candid with you, because he can I mean, if he if he turns a$12,000 case into a$13,500 case and he does that a hundred times, he's made the firm a bunch of money.
00:27:09.039 --> 00:27:14.559
It's a really sophisticated system that you've mapped out in your your short time running this firm.
00:27:14.799 --> 00:27:17.279
Where do you see the firm going in five years?
00:27:17.599 --> 00:27:23.279
So I have a 12-year kind of that's my big EOS you set like a long term.
00:27:23.440 --> 00:27:23.680
Sure.
00:27:23.920 --> 00:27:29.759
My my 12 years to be in a position where my little boy is big enough to like help on the farm that we have like a working farm.
00:27:29.839 --> 00:27:30.000
Okay.
00:27:30.160 --> 00:27:35.759
20, 30 hours a week of like farm work, 20 or 30 hours a week in the office.
00:27:35.839 --> 00:27:38.000
You know, we're doing some kind of type of work at most.
00:27:38.160 --> 00:27:38.480
Okay.
00:27:38.640 --> 00:27:40.240
So that's what we're working towards.
00:27:40.400 --> 00:27:43.200
And everything from here to there is super fluid.
00:27:43.279 --> 00:27:45.839
Like, I'm just having fun right now, growing them is fun.
00:27:45.920 --> 00:27:52.240
I think if I had to guess five years from now, we're at a dozen lawyers, that may be too many.
00:27:52.480 --> 00:27:55.519
Is there capacity in your local market for half a dozen lawyers?
00:27:55.759 --> 00:27:57.839
Is that a larger Alabama firm now?
00:27:58.000 --> 00:27:58.240
Yeah.
00:27:58.319 --> 00:28:02.000
I mean, well, listen, I am doing the work of like four lawyers right now.
00:28:02.240 --> 00:28:06.079
So, like, yeah, we just if I just replace myself, we're at six lawyers.
00:28:06.240 --> 00:28:11.680
Yeah, I mean, there is a ceiling, you know, you don't really see plaintiff's firms bigger than about that here in North Alabama, but it's changing.
00:28:11.759 --> 00:28:13.759
We're the fastest growing city like in the country.
00:28:13.839 --> 00:28:21.519
And the traditional partnership model, right, is like, and so I think that if you understand incentives, I think a couple things.
00:28:21.599 --> 00:28:33.759
If you are like a good person that that people want to work for, and then you understand how to incentivize people and make sure that y'all's goals align, I think you can have as big a firm as you want, and you just attract like this guy.
00:28:33.920 --> 00:28:38.480
Maybe he's got a time and a half as many cases as he can work by himself and he's making good money.
00:28:38.640 --> 00:28:45.599
Well, I'll pay him really, really good money, plug him into my systems that I've been refining that'll make him way more profitable.
00:28:45.759 --> 00:28:48.000
He gets to not deal with any of the headaches of operations.
00:28:48.079 --> 00:28:53.839
He gets to just he's got his personal brand, he's getting half of the legal fee on the cases that he brings in, whatever it looks like.
00:28:54.000 --> 00:28:58.799
And then on the other end of spectrum, we got a guy that doesn't have many cases, he gets his stuff handed off to him.
00:28:58.880 --> 00:29:08.079
And obviously the percentages are drastically different, but you could be fluid everywhere in between and you can have formulas that make sense for whatever it is.
00:29:08.240 --> 00:29:12.480
Now, the tricky thing's gonna be building a firm where people don't view each other as competitors.
00:29:12.640 --> 00:29:17.920
Like my mindset from the top down, though, is like, I mean, I don't even view my real competitors as competitors.
00:29:18.079 --> 00:29:19.759
Like Bart Senior and I are pretty cool.
00:29:19.839 --> 00:29:20.000
Yeah.
00:29:20.160 --> 00:29:22.000
Start our firms about the same time.
00:29:22.160 --> 00:29:28.720
Like, you know, if Bart crushes it and doubles his firm the next two years, like I don't view that as, oh man, he's taking market share from me.
00:29:28.799 --> 00:29:30.400
I'm like, dude, my friend just is crushing it.
00:29:30.480 --> 00:29:30.960
Good for him.
00:29:31.200 --> 00:29:35.680
You know, maybe it hit me one or two percent of my top-line revenue or whatever.
00:29:35.759 --> 00:29:38.319
And so I'm hoping to have that mindset with everybody that's on my team.
00:29:38.400 --> 00:29:42.079
Like, let's build our personal brands, go acquire cases, pick your niche.
00:29:42.160 --> 00:29:50.160
You know, like, hey, you're probably not gonna be successful if you pick, if you want to market yourself to blue-collar workers in Morgan County, like pretty saturated market.
00:29:50.240 --> 00:29:51.440
Like, I own that.
00:29:51.680 --> 00:30:01.519
But you want to go to, I don't know, the other side of the Tennessee Valley and go after doctors and their family members as your ideal clients, great.
00:30:01.680 --> 00:30:03.359
Like, we're not competing for those cases.
00:30:03.599 --> 00:30:03.839
Yeah.
00:30:03.920 --> 00:30:16.640
And and the hard part, you know, will be like uh when I used to work in a restaurant, you there was always this feeling that um on a Thursday night I got all the two tops and somebody else got the sixes, right?
00:30:16.799 --> 00:30:20.799
That all the good cases are going to our to somebody else who's not me, right?
00:30:20.960 --> 00:30:28.160
And there's there's never really any recognition that like, well shit, maybe it's because I'm a B minus lawyer and the other lawyer is an A plus lawyer.
00:30:28.319 --> 00:30:34.160
But managing those egos as as you grow the firm is is the challenge of like why are they getting all the good cases?
00:30:34.319 --> 00:30:35.440
Why is it all going over here?
00:30:35.759 --> 00:30:44.799
You know, the Richie Law From and Jason Krims, the COO there, and and they've got like some type of fluoride, like I this is what I'll do where like, hey, here's the it's transparency.
00:30:44.880 --> 00:30:46.000
Here's how you climb the ladder.
00:30:46.160 --> 00:30:51.680
How you want to step to figure cases, like it takes 10 years to get there, and here's each step of the way.
00:30:51.839 --> 00:30:52.079
Okay.
00:30:52.240 --> 00:30:53.680
I think something like that makes sense.
00:30:54.400 --> 00:30:58.799
Yeah, although that is it inspires exactly the competition between your team, right?
00:30:59.039 --> 00:31:11.359
Because when you describe it as a ladder, if I if I'm gonna move up a rung and there's somebody on that rung, like either Hunter's gotta double the amount of cases that are coming through the door, or I gotta like knock this person off the rung.
00:31:11.440 --> 00:31:17.359
So that's that's the mentality, because you you have the abundance mentality, but not all your employees are going to.
00:31:17.920 --> 00:31:25.440
Well, and my law partner doesn't actually like so he's got a son in law school, it's halfway through law school, and like I'm ready to hire another lawyer.
00:31:25.599 --> 00:31:27.920
First hire is working out great, let's hire another one.
00:31:28.079 --> 00:31:32.720
And he's, I know he's like, Well, what do we don't have enough cases for my son in a year and a half?
00:31:32.880 --> 00:31:34.160
And it like never crosses my mind.
00:31:34.240 --> 00:31:42.079
I told him today, I was like, listen, like we will have twice as many cases two years from now when he's ready, he might clerk for a federal judge, so three years from now.
00:31:42.400 --> 00:31:43.599
There will be plenty of cases.
00:31:43.680 --> 00:31:57.359
That's but that's my mindset, and you're right, and I appreciate you identifying that's not yeah, and and you know, our practice the thing about our practice area is there probably are not going to be more car crashes in three years than there are today.
00:31:57.440 --> 00:31:59.200
There probably will be less.
00:31:59.440 --> 00:32:08.559
And we can't create additional um, you know, in in any many businesses, you can create a larger market or drive the market larger.
00:32:09.039 --> 00:32:14.079
In in ours, it really is like it's taking more of the pie that already exists.
00:32:14.160 --> 00:32:20.559
And it's probably a a pie that's decreasing in size if we're being honest about self-driving cars and where that's going.
00:32:20.799 --> 00:32:25.039
Although Virginia has more fatal crashes this year than it has had in like five years.
00:32:25.119 --> 00:32:27.039
So who knows where where all that is going.
00:32:27.200 --> 00:32:30.880
I am supposed to ask you about a legless uh Elvis impersonator.
00:32:31.200 --> 00:32:33.279
That's my favorite former client story.
00:32:33.599 --> 00:32:37.200
I don't think it's appropriate to tell detail.
00:32:37.440 --> 00:32:42.880
But like my favorite client ever, he actually texted me like two nights ago, and I just remembered I forgot to text him back, so I'll do that today.
00:32:43.119 --> 00:32:45.759
Last time I talked to him, he was not comfortable with me.
00:32:45.839 --> 00:32:50.480
I was like wanting to make a video of it because it's such a funny story.
00:32:50.640 --> 00:32:54.000
So I'll follow up with you if I I'll get that one.
00:32:55.119 --> 00:32:55.680
All right, man.
00:32:55.759 --> 00:32:57.599
Well, listen, I've enjoyed catching up with you.
00:32:57.759 --> 00:33:02.319
Hunter is uh one of the newest members of our mastermind group in great legal marketing.
00:33:02.480 --> 00:33:10.960
So if you enjoyed this conversation, if you enjoyed being around guys that think like Hunter is a group maybe you should check out, you can send me an email at Brian at greatlegalmarketing.com.
00:33:11.039 --> 00:33:13.519
Hunter, where can people find out more about you?
00:33:13.599 --> 00:33:17.920
And if you have a case in Huntsville and they don't want to refer it to Bart, how can they find you?
00:33:18.079 --> 00:33:19.839
I mean, LinkedIn, Facebook, you know.
00:33:20.400 --> 00:33:23.839
One of the secrets to success is making myself easy, easily findable.
00:33:24.000 --> 00:33:24.400
You know?
00:33:24.640 --> 00:33:25.200
All right, man.
00:33:25.279 --> 00:33:26.000
Thanks for hanging out.
00:33:26.160 --> 00:33:26.400
Okay.
00:33:26.480 --> 00:33:27.440
Thanks for having me.