ParalegalGateway's Weblog

4 Ways That Paralegals Can Get Involved In Marketing The Law Firm

We are very honored to have Guest Blogger, Jay Fleischman prepare the following article focusing on how Paralegals can assist in marketing their law firm.  Not only will this promote your willingness to be a team player, it can also make you an invaluable member of your firm.

Paralegals and other non-lawyer staffers are a great untapped resource when it comes to marketing a law firm.  After all, these are the people on the front lines every day, dealing with clients and doing most of the heavy lifting when it comes to the office.

Here are 4 ways non-lawyers can get involved in marketing the law firm:

1.  Business Cards: The lawyer isn't the only one who meets people who might be interested in learning more about the firm.  Give every staffer business cards with their name, title and area of law in which they work.  Add in the law firm website URL.  As an added benefit, giving staffers their own business cards tells them that their contributions are valued and they are a part of the team.

2.  Social Media: Encourage non-lawyers to get on Twitter and Facebook for their professional as well as personal needs.  Given the tools to communicate about the firm and the work they do in an unfiltered way, they will begin to show the world exactly how your firm can help.

3.  Blogging: Who says the law firm blog should be reserved for the lawyers?  After all, the paralegals and other staffers have a finger on the pulse of the client's needs and concerns.  Train your staffers on how to blog, and the limits on what they can and cannot say in public.  Exposing them to the world will give them a chance to help build their own personalities online, enabling clients and prospects to bond more fully with them.

4.  Education and Industry Events:  Don't keep your staffers holed up in the office, staring longingly out the window as you go from event to event.  When your staffers are given the chance to learn more about the area of law in which you practice, they'll be better prepared to handle the issues that arise in the office.

I encourage every paralegal and non-lawyer staffer to print this article and hand it to the boss.  Get involved in your firm's marketing efforts and see your value to the boss skyrocket!

Jay S. Fleischman is a New York bankruptcy lawyer as well as a legal marketing consultant.  Visit Legal Practice Pro for tips and insights on how to market, manage and grow a profitable law firm.

Keys to a Positive Attitude

Keys to a Positive Attitude !!

By Nancy Friedman

Why do some people have such a great attitude and others a negative one? Well, we wondered the same thing and through our research we found seven keys that those with a positive mental attitude all share. How do you rate?

Choose Your Attitude in Advance: When you wake up, you have a choice. You can be in a good mood or a bad mood. You also choose your attitude. You can wake up and mutter to yourself, “This is gonna be a cruddy day,” or you can tell yourself, “This is gonna be a great day!” This choice is the start of a great attitude.

Visualize Success: Runners in the Boston Marathon picture themselves crossing the finish line. Picture yourself having a successful day. Self-visualization is a key factor in having a positive mental attitude. Will it work 100% of the time? I wish it would. However, by visualizing your success, you’ll be able to have a better handle on what does happen, and having a better chance of making it happen.

Demonstrate Humor, Energy, and Enthusiasm: We call these three items the magic ingredients. Without them, creating a positive mental attitude will be difficult. There is normally humor in every situation. Finding it is key. Sometimes you’ll need to stretch and dig a little deeper to find the humor in a situation. But once you do, you’ll feel so much better. Energy is important because without some energy in your attitude, you’ll be dragging behind everyone. Energy is closely related to the third ingredient, enthusiasm. Enthusiasm is contagious; let’s start an epidemic!

Resist Negative Influences: It’s a fact. When we have a negative experience with a company, we’ll tell more people about it than if we have a good experience with the same company. Many times, when you hear that someplace wasn’t very good, you’ll believe the person who told you and choose not to do business with that company. However, you may only be hearing half the story. Check things out for yourself. Especially if the negativity involves a person you work with or know. We’ve all heard negative things about someone we didn’t know and then when we had the opportunity to meet them ourselves, we find that they’re not as bad as someone had alluded to. In fact they might be nice, but you need to be the judge. Take negativity out of your life. Steer clear of those who drag you down and say negative things. Being around other positive people is a good start.

Be a Whatever-it-Takes Person: This means, be a problem solver. Life is going to put obstacles in front of all of us. How we go around those obstacles is key. There’s normally a good answer to every problem put in front of us. Dale Carnegie said it best. Ask yourself, “What is the worst thing that can happen here?” Then move up from that.

Embrace Change; Expect it and Accept it: Some people are very good at handling change and some resist it. The major key to handling change is to accept it; deal with it. In most cases there’s little we can do to stop it anyway.

Be Grateful for What You Have: Many people have so much and yet those same people are often the ones that constantly complain. Why wait for some life-altering experience to be grateful? Be grateful, now.

These are the seven keys to having a positive mental attitude. Put them into practice and you will be amazed at the difference they can make.

Zerop Medical

Zerop Medical is not a copy service...they take your requests for medical records and manage them for you, making the task of obtaining medical records a whole lot simpler by providing an online account for you to place your requests, track them as they respresent you in requesting and continually following up with medical providers.  They then produce the medical records to you via email and regular mail.  This is a fee based service however, if you're swamped in medical records requests, it is well worth the expense.  Plus, you can pass the expense on to the client if they are agreeable to the same. Vist their site>>>