Many lawyers are uncomfortable discussing money with clients or prospects. Yet without a discussion about fees, it is unlikely you will get the business.

In nearly seven years of building and leading a company that provides practice management solutions for the legal profession, you hear a lot about the pains and joys of being a lawyer. I’ve engaged with hundreds (if not thousands) of lawyers and legal professionals in that time and all of them have their stories to share. Among those who have experienced the benefits of cloud computing, one thing is evident: They love what the cloud has to offer. Here are five things that stand out. ... READ THE REST

What’s not to like about a large, highly targeted B2B market with low competition? Not much. That’s why SlideShare has become the Internet’s largest platform for sharing presentations. With 60 million unique visitors every month, it receives five times more traffic from business owners than any other platform of its kind. What’s more, built-in sharing tools let you easily post to your social media accounts. But tapping into the SlideShare audience requires more than simply posting your live presentation deck. ... READ THE REST

Ask any parent of a small child, and they’ll tell you: Caillou is a whiny little puke. On the scale of fears for parents, seeing that a "Caillou" episode is coming on the television, and knowing that you won’t have the dexterity to swiftly change the channel, lies somewhere between being eaten by a hippopotamus and feeling the Earth approach the Sun. ... But, the thing is, little kids love Caillou. ... So, from the perspective of the creators of the Caillou universe, they don’t care whether kids’ parents like it, because the parents aren’t the target audience. There is, of course, a lesson to be learned here. An Audience of One. Lawyers have a long-standing problem when it comes to developing marketing content, which should be their bread and butter. Even if you can’t directly say so, in some cases, you’re selling your expertise. The problem is that lawyers write for themselves, not for an audience. ... READ THE REST

A decade from now, consumers of legal services will use the Internet and mobile technology to do it all: research legal issues, find and engage an attorney, even have legal services delivered to them. But when answering the question “Where do clients come from?,” today’s reality lies somewhere between that future world and one where numerous lawyers still resist the Internet. I like to call that in-between place “Word-of-Mouth, Plus.” Today, most people seeking an attorney still get the attorney’s name from a trusted acquaintance during a face-to-face, phone or possibly email conversation. But what they will do next is key. They’ll type the attorney’s name, or the name of the firm, or some combination of the names — possibly with a geographic location — into an Internet search engine. What do they want to know? Perhaps the attorney’s background, or the firm size. Perhaps how long and where the attorney has been practicing, or whether there’s a history of disciplinary action. This is the “plus” part of Word-of-Mouth, Plus. To test this out, I did Internet searches for lawyers whose business cards I’ve collected over the past few months. It was interesting. I limited my focus to the first page of results, because between 75 and 90 percent of searchers never move past the first page. And here’s what I found when I searched for their names. ... READ THE REST

One of the first things we do at the start of a new year is open up our calendar and plug in the dates for conferences most likely to deliver the big ideas. We've poured over the sessions and speaker bios and asked for recommendations for 2015's most-promising events for lawyers. So why not share? Here are links to old favorites and a few newcomers that promise to keep you up to date and on the edge of your seat. Now all you have to do is get up and go! ... READ THE REST

Business plans. Marketing plans. Professional development plans. The hard drives and filing cabinets of lawyers are littered with them. For some, developing a plan is a worthwhile exercise and a means to a desired end: business development and marketing success. But for many others, the planning process becomes an end in itself. The essential next step — action — is never taken.

The staff evaluation form lands on your desk, with instructions to return it within a week. It’s time for the dreaded annual performance review. And it's dreaded not just by those being reviewed. If you are giving the review, it raises anxiety because you don't want to “be mean” (well, maybe some people do, but that’s a different subject), or you may be convinced this whole exercise is pointless because in previous years your feedback has fallen on deaf ears. For some law firms, though, the annual review may be the only time people talk about work performance, goals or how the office is functioning on a daily basis — the only opportunity to give and receive feedback. ... READ THE REST

A basic rule of good writing is to make every word count. “There is,” “there are” and “it is” are the weakest ways to start a sentence. Used this way, “there” and “it” are placeholders for the real subject of the sentence. They are particularly off-putting at the start of a paragraph. When you write, “There are three reasons this Court should reconsider its ruling,” you mean, “Three reasons this Court should reconsider its ruling exist.” Of course, you wouldn’t use this unnatural sentence format. Rather, think of the subject of the sentence (here, the three reasons) as half of a sentence.

As part of your law firm's strategy, you want (ideally) to align your pricing methods, metrics and communications with your clients' value proposition.