Everything else is just a lot of wording and re-wording some politically correct language. The reality is: if you are not from an upper middle-class family, just don't go to law school. There is just no room for you in that part of American society. That's why law schools are so much less diverse than business schools, medical schools or other graduate schools.

Kimberly, thank you for being in my class and for commenting and congratulations on going out on your own!

It's exciting, scary times but you will do well if you make up your mind to do well. I hope my class played some small part in giving you the confidence you will need to succeed.

Keep me posted!

it is a shame that they canceled a class that actually provided hands on learning and information, especially now when many graduates will be forced to hang their own shingle because of the limited jobs available in this economy. I enjoyed your class, learned a lot and am in the process of opening my own practice. Quinnipiac is a nice school but it lacks hands on learning. When I first graduated I was mortified at what they never taught me (ex. how to write a motion!). Your class and Sandy Lax's Family Law were the only two classes where I actually learned more than theory. Good luck with everything you do.

Kimberly

P.S. Your advice about starting a blog is a magnificent piece of advice.

I started blogging about bankruptcy topics a few months ago, and now it's a primary source of clients; and the clients themselves are better educated about the way I practice bankruptcy law and the way the process works, just because of the blog itself!

Susan,

I love your blog, and I notice that I come back here frequently to read the great advice.

And I'm absolutely, completely certain that I want to subscribe to your RSS, as you suggest at the end of the post.

I only have two questions.

What's an RSS?

How do I subscribe to yours?

Thanks,

Paleolithic Joe

This was a great post. I'm a solo so I often feel like a part-time lawyer, especially when I'm "on the line" slopping food in my son's school cafeteria.

My biggest work/life balance challenge? Not cross-examining the poor teacher.

Congratulations to you and to all those that are teaching at Solo U. I look forward to hearing the great reviews as well as the invaluable impact your program will have on the success' of solos across the country.

Thank you for your compassion towards my generation (I'm 58 going on 59). The process of getting into blogging is remarkably intimidating at first, and I'm slowly working away at it. And putting a toe into linkedin and facebook. But I still have no clue how to use twitter in the practice, so I'll be surfing the internet over the weekend trying to get it. "Getting it" gets harder over time, so I appreciate it that you're working to help educate those of us who are still working at it. Still, the harder I work, the luckier I get!

That's a thoughtful, intelligent article. Unless you work really, really hard to learn your area of law as a lawyer, you can't rise to the top of the profession. I have noticed that the harder I work, the luckier I get. And I laugh when I think about how hard I thought I was working back in law school!

Your site is such a great thing right now since so many big law firms are laying off!

@Joseph - Thank you so much. Our goal is to do that...make a difference to solos. I want this to be a place they call home for a long time to come!

Wow, congrats on the opening, it's been a long time in the making, and is sure to make an impact on Solos across the land!

Truly pioneer stuff here.

I am glad to see that I am not the only lawyer working from home. I have worked from home, from coffee shops, bookstores and hotel rooms. If there is a need for a face to face client meeting, I use conference space. I use *FREE* software for everything from virus prevention to word processing. Glad I started this before the Second Great Depression (The 2GD).

Great post!

I'm not an attorney, but I am curious as to what will happen with legal fees once more solo practitioners enter the market. One advantage I see of going solo is that your overhead costs will be very low, as compared to BigLaw. Question here is, if you are a solo attorney, how should you price your services so that 1) you don't leave any money on the table, and 2) you can effectively market your services without the scale of BigLaw.

Another fantastic post Susan. My husband and I really feel that while it might be tough now (let me tell you, it is!) when this economic downturn gets better, we will be there, and be READY TO GO full steam ahead. Very motivational!

@Kim - you of all people with your nomadtoes should be 'sherpa'-ing away!

@James - couldn't agree more that we should help others to catch up if our goal is to bring clients into the environment where we work with such comfort. It would make our lives easier as we progress

@Chris - Hey, how can I stop educating, that would be like not breathing! :-)

@Joseph - You can lead a horse to water, right?

@Daphne - yes, you will lead your people of the North Country..or at least lead your firm :-)

@Leanna - hands on is the best way to show them 'the light.' You are a great sherpa!

I think rather than telling people to come join us at this great party, we might be more helpful if we say "why don't we meet for coffee with our laptops and we can get you set up on Facebook, Twitter, Avvo, etc."

Love the post. I am that one who is trying and plan to usher in a new day in the North Country. It may take a bit of time but I'm committed to the cause. Then one day I'll be blogging about those vacant stares.

I just started my blogging, and twitter, and facebook. Resisted myspace because of its unprofessional nature, and that spilled over to Facebook. Well now that I am on FB, I've already gotten two prospects, one of which followed through to the blog and then emailed me from there. That client didn't pan out but hey, I have another one this weekend.

What you say is the truth. I know of two more solos who don't even have a website, and one who had a law.com page but no more. I told him he needs to do something (he's busy as hell he says, but barely making ends meet). After I showed him my blog, he said, "Awesome! I want one. Who has to update it, me? No way."

I left it at that.

I kid. It really is imperative that solos and small practices understand the business aspect of law in a way not required in larger firms, and that includes the technology that clients are using. If your client is on LinkedIn, you should be on LinkedIn, &tc.

I am consistently reminded that I am amongst the elite who knows the Internet and its world well. Most people in the area I live have as much knowledge as the group you met in your post - and I am always met with blank looks when I mention my life, my job and what I do.

And yes, dialup is still very common where I live, which is by no means an impoverished location.

We of the web world truly are egotistical to think everyone is just like us, and I thank you for reminding those who have forgotten that we need to help lead, not move beyond.

I totally know what you mean! As a favor to a fellow solo, I took a look at her first newsletter. She's not particularly tech-enabled, so she's sending this one out print. Well, it's a start. The articles were like law journal articles, boring and just synopses of statutory or case law developments. I told she needed to give her readers information they can *use*. You know, "How to Protect Your Business From Whatever" or "How the New EPA Changes Affect YOUR Company"? Nothing, Venusian. Deaf ears.

Even if attorneys aren't going to get on the e-train, there are so many basic business principles to be learned online that can be extrapolated to "real life" practice. Its going to be difficult to drag these people into the new millenia. And, until we do, we're going to keep getting boring newsletters and confused comments about that "fad" that is Facebook.

Doesn't hurt to try, though!

Way to go David. Good idea to focus on two areas. We did the same thing. I have lots of friends in Seattle who are struggling to find firm work--I encourage them to follow your lead (so far they're not interested). Best of luck to you!

Welcome Aboard!!!

Its not bad once you get used to the Water!!!

Thank you all for your comments and compliments!

@Adrian - as a new solo myself, I looked into the Yellow Pages. While they may work for some attorneys (and many I know use them exclusively), what can you really put in there? A phone number, the obligatory picture in front of a bookshelf and maybe the nature of your practice? With a website - particularly a blog - you give potential clients a flavor of yourself and information they need & want. They're more apt to call if they "get to know you" on your site.

Then the bonus - it pays for itself and continues on. With Yellow Pages ads, you constantly have to feed that beast stacks of cash to keep it happy.

Good luck in your future practice.

I stopped using the yellow pages in my practice when I was still actively practicing family law. I did that as soon as I started my family law blog. It did not hurt my business. In fact it increased my income and new cases a great deal. I also know other lawyers who don't even bother with the yellow pages any more too.

A presence on the internet is even more important now than ever before.

Jeena - thanks for reading my post! I was really excited when Susan told me I could write a guest post on her blog. It was totally fun writing it.

Lisa - I'm glad you found my post interesting. Not many lawyers are as lucky as we are, but we're proof that it's possible!

Very inspiring and funny article Adrianos! You had me guessing about the title for weeks.
You are proof that it CAN be done.

What an engaging story, Adrianos.

I started my practice with my own "anchor client," the Boston law firm where I worked as a paralegal during college. I had been out of law school for about three years when the firm asked if I wanted to work for them remotely (I live in New York), doing legal research and writing for insurance coverage opinions. Though I've since vastly broadened the substantive scope my practice beyond insurance coverage, I still concentrate on providing legal research and writing services to other lawyers.

And, although it's been years since I've done any work for the Boston firm, I'll always be grateful for the opportunity to get my practice off the ground with a steady income from day 1.

Really great post. Your take on Big Law is dead on. Great inspiration.

People are attracted to lists or bulletin points (Think Letterman's Top 10 or others.)

But providing lists or delineating points is not the same. It does, however, offer clarity and lets people know what to expect in the body of the article or post. And based upon this expectation it is known draw readers in.

But it's not the wording I object to in the headline as much as the idea there ARE 'secrets' only a few are privy to when in fact there are no secrets period.

If a headline read "5 steps to a healthy law practice" - that's not snake oil to me as much as "5 secrets to a million dollars solo practice". The first is providing a list based upon opinion. The second promises a key to the magic kingdom...for a price.

I hope this clarifies my point.

What about using a similar lure in one's own marketing? Does it tend to mark one as a snake oil salesman?

The reason I ask is that most advice I see about online article marketing (that is submitting articles to articlemarketer.com and similar sites, as opposed to blogging) is to title articles with "top 5" or "top 10" to attract readers. While that is different than promising a secret, it still seems uncomfortably close to the snake-oil approach. If this technique in fact has the effect of repelling potential readers, maybe lawyers should stay away from it.

Thoughts?

I completely agree with you. It appears to me that the "family" lawyer role has faded away in recent years. It doesn't seem like families and individuals "have" a lawyer anymore. What I mean is that people used to have one lawyer for themselves or their family who they considered to be a counselor for anything that might be legally related (selling a home, wills, someone to help when their son or daughter kicks a soccer ball through the cranky neighbors window). But today it seems like people often encounter a problem and go searching for a specific lawyer to fix that problem.

The role or "niche" I envision for my future solo practice is to be a community or family lawyer. To have clients that entrust me with their day-to-day legal encounters. Just as you said, a small community lawyer, someone that clients automatically call when they have a legal need. Typical mainstreet families rarely encounter complex legal problems such as intricate tax issues, bankruptcy, or even uncommon criminal matters, because of this I am confident that I or any other solo can build a practice as a community general practitioner

Now, there may be times when I might not be able to handle a certain matter due to its special complexity, maybe a tax problem. But I still would envision that the client call me for a consult and a referral to a specialist attorney.

All in all, I agree that you can "specialize" as a general practitioner

Like you, my email box is full of offers on a daily basis. Do I check out people who solicit my business? YES.

Secrets? There are none.

Magic pills? There are none.

Be good to people, become an expert in your field, and don't give up your practice when times get hard. (yes, all in that order)

First, I actually didn't bother opening this up from Twitter because I'm bored of the 10/100/etc secrets types of posts. Thank goodness you're in my reader and I actually read the post!! I'm definitely a proponent of hard work is the best path to success. I wish more people quit believing the hype of easy money (online or otherwise), it just adds up to a lot of spam/junk mail!

True, there are no secrets - except one. Hard work. In order to be a good lawyer, one must put in hard work to get to the necessary level of expertise.

In order to be a good entrepreneur, one must put in the hard work involved in learning the skills of business.

To be a good marketer, there's a secret - you need to learn how successful marketers do it.

And on and on.

Sure, there's a load of crap out there. Gurus, geniuses, gobblydegook and all that rot.

Problem is that lawyers want the easy fix. They want it spoonfed to them, and they want to flip a switch to make it all work. Then they want to go home and count the money.

Doesn't work that way, and we know it at a gut level.

But that's why those gurus make so much money. It's the promise of the benefit.

I can learn SEO techniques and spend a bunch of time doing it, or I can pay a bazillion bucks to some know-it-all.

Doesn't work that way, does it?

Yet we as Americans keep opening up our wallets and trying to substitute hard work for money.

"Rather than thinking of myself as an employee, who would have to submit resumes to potential employers, I thought and acted as if I were going to embark on a solo career, free to answer to myself and my clients."

Excellent point! This is one of the things that most people who want to start a solo just don't do. When I knew my job was in danger, I refused to send out any resumes, even though everyone around me was sending out resumes and contacting employment agencies. I knew that I couldn't work for anyone else again and that it was time to start venturing out on my own. Accepting employment elsewhere would have defeated that goal. I am so happy now that I am a solo. It's not easy, but it's definitely not impossible!

Now I'm prompted to do a riff on Tyler Durden's monologue:
"You are not your law school diploma... You are not your corner office... You are not your blackberry... "
Great post!

Loved the post Kimberly!