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[00:00:07] Scott Benton: Hey everyone, Scott Benton here. I’m the host of the Classroom 2 Courtroom podcast. How are you? We’re here to help you easily transition from law school student into your professional career as an attorney and where we make the practice of law fun. And today, we’re going to answer the question of what is meant by continuous selling
[00:00:26] Scott Benton: what is meant by continuous selling?
[00:00:28] Scott Benton: [00:01:00] Now, continuous selling is a term that you’re going to get into when you’re talking about working with the clients who hire you to represent them. There’s this idea that once a client meets with you for an initial consultation that any selling skills or sales tactics that you may have used to assure the potential new client that your legal services are going to help them achieve their legal goals, that all of those sort of more sales tactics they often stop completely.
[00:01:47] Scott Benton: And they’re not used again once the client has engaged your firm. So you might want to say to yourself in that case I’ve got them on the hook. So I really need to work on their case now and I need to win their case for them. So [00:02:00] I don’t need to sell my client on our legal services any longer because They’re already paying us.
[00:02:05] Scott Benton: We’re already working for them. But if that were true, we wouldn’t be talking at all about continuous selling. So we want to know why this idea of continuous selling is so important and why we should engage in it, knowing it’s the key to making sure you’re not losing clients. If clients start to drop off and stop paying for services, for instance, chances are there’s been a failure somewhere along the line.
[00:02:30] Scott Benton: to continue to sell your firm’s legal services to them, which is going to keep your client returning all the way, hopefully to an end result of their case. Now we always want to remember that the best prospective client is going to be your current client. And the reason is because it’s much easier to keep a client than it is to go out and find new ones.
[00:02:51] Scott Benton: That’s exactly why you want to keep your focus on the idea of continuous selling. Continuous selling will maintain your current client [00:03:00] base. And that’s important because your clients are the lifeblood of the firm. But let’s run through what continuous selling is. So we’re all on the same page and let’s make sure that we keep the clients we have.
[00:03:11] Scott Benton: So we don’t leave them in a position where they can easily make a decision to stop using our services and walk away. That’s the last thing we want. Now, maybe you’ve seen that movie, Glen, Gary, Glen Ross, where the Alec Baldwin character has this big speech about the ABCs of selling, which stands for always be closing.
[00:03:31] Scott Benton: You should look up the scene. If you haven’t seen the movie, you’d find it on YouTube. It’s a great speech. Now in, in this speech about always be closing the ABCs of Selling that’s really the same idea as continuous selling
[00:03:44] Scott Benton: Now for the sake of your legal work when you send out a billing statement every two weeks, the time entries on that billing statement are really a form of continuous selling since ideally those time entries should spell out. the work that’s getting done [00:04:00] on the client’s case, and it should spell it out with extreme clarity. And when it does that’s selling. That’s continuous selling because it shows them where their money is advancing them towards the achievement of their legal goals. So if those time entries are vague or confusing or several time entries, they get lumped together into one time entry.
[00:04:24] Scott Benton: The client really won’t be able to understand what they’re getting for their money and they’re more likely to disengage from your services. That’s a lost opportunity as far as selling goes and really it negates the potential of the billing statement to keep the client interested in the outcome of the case and to serve as a marketing tool or a form of continuous selling.
[00:04:46] Scott Benton: Now another form of continuous selling takes place whenever you talk to your client on the phone Where you let them know what work has been done on the case, what work is going to be done in the more short term future, and also this [00:05:00] is always an opportunity to remind them of the value of the case that they have.
[00:05:05] Scott Benton: So you might recap that with, there’s an estate, a primary, let’s say it’s a primary residence, and let’s say this residence is worth 800, 000 that your client is in a position to receive 50 percent of, or 400, 000. So when you remind them of the value of the case, that 400, 000 every time you communicate, that’s continuous selling.
[00:05:29] Scott Benton: But continuous selling is also about providing excellent customer service. It’s consistently communicating with your clients. It’s sending them status updates that are clear and understandable. It’s selling out billing statements that they can understand the billing entries on. And not only making sure you’re drilling down into the story that your client comes in with, that they’ve hired you to help them navigate.
[00:05:52] Scott Benton: It’s getting to know your client in a person to person way. Human basis. You accomplish that when you talk [00:06:00] to them and ask them about their spouse, or their kids, or their cats, or maybe their upcoming vacation to Belize and their interest in scuba diving the Blue Hole, something that they might have mentioned when you first met them.
[00:06:12] Scott Benton: It’s taking a moment to reconnect on that personal level and essentially selling the idea that you and your firm are on top of their case. And it’s a step or two closer right now in this case. of your client walking away with 400, 000 in this example. Now, if you’ve been able to find out what your client wants to do with the money, that’s where the magic is.
[00:06:38] Scott Benton: Maybe they want to renovate their kitchen, or they want to build a second story on their home, and if you figure out that reason behind what they want to do with the money, then you can remind them. that they’re getting a step closer and closer to their ultimate desired goal of having the ultimate kitchen.
[00:06:56] Scott Benton: So I hope you can see how important it is to keep in mind that in [00:07:00] addition to working with your client that you layer on top of it a portion of sales all the way through the case And that sales is not just something that necessarily stops once a client hires you for your legal services. In many ways, that is just the beginning of the sales process.
[00:07:17] Scott Benton: It’s something that’s going to continue all the way to the end of the case. until you send that disengagement letter. So I hope that’s been informative. I hope it’s been helpful. My name is Scott Benton. I’m the host of the Classroom 2 Courtroom podcast. Thank you so much for listening to this episode.
[00:07:32] Scott Benton: Now, if you like the material that you’re hearing in this podcast, and you would like to get notified whenever we have a new episode that we’ve put out, you can go to our website. Our website is classroom2courtroom. com. That’s classroom, the number two, courtroom. com. You can leave us your contact information and you’ll receive an alert when we put out a new episode.
[00:07:52] Scott Benton: And if this is material that you’re enjoying, of course, don’t forget to share and subscribe. We hope you’ll join us on the next episode of the Classroom 2 Courtroom podcast. [00:08:00] And until then, we hope you’ll join us in making the world a better place, one client at a time. Thank you so much.
