Latest / Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast, Helping you create a profitable, sustainable law firm you love / 216: 3 Reasons I’m Raising My Rates and Why You Should, Too
Transcript
- 0:00Davina: Consider ways that you can increase the value of your services for your clients or ways you've already increased the value. For example, if you've been practicing at the same rate for years, you now probably are much more knowledgeable and efficient, and it's time to raise your rates. If you provide a higher level of service, personal service that other similar law firms don't provide, you might want to raise your rates. So if there's a lot of high touch contact with your clients, whether you are providing it or your team is providing it, whether it's wrapped into your systems, you may wanna take a look at that. Also look for gaps.
- 0:35What services beyond the services you're currently providing will the client need soon? And can you provide these services and close that gap? Can you create some sort of package that allows you to do that?
- 0:50Intro: Welcome to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast. What if you could hang out with successful women lawyers, ask them about growing their firms, managing resources like time, team, and systems, mastering money issues, and more? Then take an insight or two to help you build a wealth generating law firm. Each week, your host, Devina Frederick, takes an in-depth look at how to think like a CEO, attract clients who you love to serve and will pay you on time, and create a profitable, sustainable firm you love. Devina is founder and CEO of Wealthy Woman Lawyer, and her goal is to give you the information you need to scale your law firm business from 6 to 7 figures in gross annual revenue so you can fully fund and still have time to enjoy the lifestyle of your dreams.
- 1:36Now here's Devina.
- 1:40Davina: Hi. This is Devina. And before we jump into today's show, I'd like first to introduce you to some of our sponsors. When prospective clients are looking for an attorney, they usually turn to Google first. Optimize My Firm helps law firms grow their practices and attract more right fit clients through on page and back end search engine optimization.
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- 3:12Visit www.gavel.io and mention the Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast for a free fourteen day trial, or just click on the link in the show notes. Hi, everyone, and welcome back to the Wealthy Woman Lawyer Podcast. I'm your host, Devina Frederick, and today's topic is why I'm raising my fees and why you should too. Before we jump into this controversial topic though, I wanted to share some exciting news with you all. In October, the Wealthy Woman Lawyer League will be celebrating our three year anniversary.
- 3:43So as you can imagine, I am super excited. When I created the league way back in 2020, I did so because I witnessed a big gap in services available to women law firm owners who were in the earlier stages of their law firm business, scaling that 6 figure revenue ladder with the aspirations of one day crossing over the 7 figure mark. And while there are many individuals offering one on one coaching to law firm owners, including myself, And over the past few years, a lot of mega coaching companies for law firms have sprung up. Many of the women that I've met felt worried about investing in these programs because they felt like they simply couldn't bring in enough revenue to be able to afford them. And others didn't want the long term commitment coaching programs often require.
- 4:29So I wanted to create not only a more budget friendly option, but also an option that felt accessible and quite frankly, special, where women law firm owners can find an intimate community to support them as they grew their law firm business. And I found that the conversations are just different with only women in the room. And I wanted to create a space for conversations only when law firm owners would have. In the Wealthy Woman Lawyer League, I teach women law firm owners the exact framework you need to build a profitable, sustainable, wealth generating law firm in record time. Within thirty days of joining the league, you will have begun to cultivate the wealthy woman lawyer mindset, And you will have discovered the exact formula you need to attract better clients, once you love to serve and you pay you in full and on time.
- 5:17By the sixty day mark, you will have learned to leverage your resources instead of doing all the things yourself. You'll be better at prioritizing your time at delegating to top talent and in documenting your processes, procedures, and systems. In just ninety days in the Wealthy Woman Lawyer League, you will have learned all of the above plus how to measure your performance with key performance indicators. And finally, you'll feel comfortable answering any questions about your finances and discussing financial matters like the CEO you are becoming because you'll know how to read and analyze financial reports, which is so critical to owning and operating and scaling a high end law firm business. Throughout the program, I'll also walk you through the exact steps you need to implement the seven essential law firm systems every law firm business needs to operate effectively and efficiently.
- 6:11And I've even created a five day hiring challenge to help you implement and dramatically improve your entire hiring process in less than a week. If you feel like you are bad at hiring, you're gonna love this part of the program because you'll discover it's not just you. It's not you at all perhaps, it is your system. The best part is you still get weekly coaching and accountability, but without the high price tag. How am I able to provide this when it costs multiple thousands of dollars to work with me or with others one on one?
- 6:45It's because I'll work with you in small intimate group settings, which brings me to what the league members tell me they love the most about the league. And that is the supportive, encouraging community we've created with other women law firm owners on a similar growth journey, plus direct access to me for coaching through that group. In the last three years, we've been able to serve way more women law firm owners and scaling their law firm business because of the Wealthy Woman Lawyer League. And we've done it all for less than the value of one initial retainer most attorneys require when they start working with a new client. So basically, if you can just get one extra client as a result of working through our program, you've more than made your money back.
- 7:29Many league members have told me that they've 10x or even 100x their return on investment in the league in as little as six months to a year, which brings me to today's topic. If you were to join the league today, this is being published in September, your investment will be $2,997 That investment rate is good through the September 2023. And since this podcast is being published on September 28, that means you have three days to take advantage of this low rate to join the league and get access to everything I've discussed here. There are also three payment options, So there should be a good fit for almost any budget. After September 30 though, we will be increasing the investment to join the league.
- 8:18And there are three reasons why. Number one is that we have increased the value significantly. Over time, we've continued to increase the value of the lead by adding more and more resources to our membership. We started with just one powerful training, weekly coaching and community. Now we've added several additional trainings, bonuses, guides, resources, templates, and cheat sheets so that you have absolutely everything you need to double or even triple your gross annual revenue, hire a fully supportive team and easily implement all the systems you need to operate smoothly.
- 8:52For example, most recently, we've added another bonus training that focuses just on law firm leadership and management because we've discovered that as people implement our hiring systems and begin to hire better, more competent, more qualified employees, they've needed to elevate their leadership and management game. With this program, our goal is to eliminate every barrier we possibly can to your success and we think that we have done that. Now, how can you apply this concept to raising your fees, this increased value concept? Consider ways that you can increase the value of your services for your clients or ways you've already increased the value. For example, if you've been practicing at the same rate for years, you now probably are much more knowledgeable and efficient, and it's time to raise your rates.
- 9:40If you provide a higher level of service, personal service that other similar law firms don't provide, you might want to raise your rates. So if there's a lot of high touch contact with your clients, whether you are providing it or your team is providing it, whether it's wrapped into your systems, you may wanna take a look at that. Also look for gaps. What services beyond the services you're currently providing will the client need soon? And can you provide these services and close that gap?
- 10:09Can you create some sort of package that allows you to do that? All right, the second reason that we are increasing our fees and that you should too is increased cost. As with every other business in the world today, our costs in delivering this transformative experience and these hundreds of resources to you have increased. For us to continue delivering the kind of value that we know you expect and that we wanna provide, we must adjust our rate to cover the additional costs and still be profitable. So how can you apply this increased cost factor?
- 10:43Consider the increasing cost of doing business, the increased cost of merchant fees, legal or other automation software, the increased costs of hiring great employees. And instead of tacking on these additional fees, like punishing somebody for using a credit card instead of paying with a check, just wrap them into your fees. So you just make it a cost of living adjustment to your rate and your fees, right? You have to, as a business owner, think about the cost of goods sold, the cost requires you to deliver the services you provide and still be profitable. All right, the third reason we are increasing our rates and that we think you should too, is increased demand.
- 11:28Lastly, the demand for the league is through the roof. Our vision for the future is to help thousands, not just hundreds of women law firm owners create profitable, sustainable, wealth generating law firm businesses that provide not only personal wealth, but also complete time freedom. And we know that with more wealth and more power in the hands of women, our society will benefit. So we are on a mission to shift more wealth and power into the hands of educated, intelligent women who will put their resources to good use in their communities. To achieve our big audacious goals, we require more resources.
- 12:04So how can you apply this concept of increased demand in your law firm business? If you're getting so much business that you could hardly keep your head above water, then this is one way to control the workflow and the amount of work that you're doing. And that's by increasing your rates. You'll wind up making more revenue and profit and with fewer demands on your time. It's one of the quickest ways to increase revenue, work with better clients and manage your time.
- 12:32It's also going to help you get the capital you need to hire other team members to help you with this amount of work and this influx of work. And you're also going to get to be more selective about the clients that you work with. So for the all of the above reasons, we also recommend that you consider raising your fees. One of the biggest challenges for so many women law firm owners I meet is they don't dream big enough. They don't ask for what they need and want, nor do they take a significant enough risk to get it.
- 13:04Too often, we get caught up in other people's money stories and we forget about our commitments to our families, our teams and our current clients. And I remember back when I was a solo and someone would come into my office with a pressing legal need, but no money to pay for my services, I often felt that it was my obligation to help them. And a lot of that is the way that we are trained as women in our society and also the way we're trained in law school. But then one day I realized that if I continue to work for only pro bono or low bono or bar referral clients, not only would I starve to death, but so would my family. And I would never be able to provide jobs for people in my community and help them support their families.
- 13:46And also, I will be taking time, energy and resources away from people who were willing to do whatever was needed to come up with the money to invest in my services. So I stopped burying my head in other people's pockets, assuming I knew what they could and couldn't afford, when in fact, I did not know what resources they might have available to them. So to illustrate, let me share a story with you about a woman law firm owner client who shared this with me this last year. She's an immigration attorney who made the mistake of discounting and low balling her fees for many, many clients because she felt like her fees were expensive and they couldn't afford it. Until one day she discovered that one client to whom she provided a greatly reduced fee because she thought the client was a house cleaner and therefore could not afford her regular fees.
- 14:38That person actually owned a house cleaning business that employed several 100 workers in multiple locations. So they had way than enough money to afford her fees. The triggering event for me that caused me to stop negotiating my fees was when a client who said she did not have money to pay what she owed me popped up in my Facebook feed on a lavish vacation to France. So as I work with women law firm owners, usually one of the first tasks we tackle in evaluating their fees is to determine if they are charging enough. And nine times out of 10 women law firm owners are not charging what they should be charging because they have not done the math to calculate accurate fees.
- 15:21I see this especially with those who charge flat fees because they don't have the data, but instead they base their fees on what they think the market will bear or what they think others are charging. So if you are listening to me now, and it's been a while since you've adjusted your fees, I invite you to consider doing so for many reasons. Any of the reasons I've mentioned today or for no reason other than you've determined that your services are worth than what you are currently charging. And notice I said your services. This is not about your personal worth.
- 15:54Your personal worth is immeasurable, but we are talking about the value of the services you provide and specifically the value of the services your law firm provides. And that means everybody on your team in your law firm. I do hope you've enjoyed today's episode. And if you have, please leave us a review on Apple Podcast or Spotify. We so appreciate it.
- 16:17We read everyone. If you're beyond ready to transform your law firm into a profitable, sustainable, wealth generating machine so that you can fully fund the lifestyle of your dreams, but also have the time freedom to enjoy it, then I invite you to join the league today because our mission is to help you do just that. If you've been thinking about joining us for some time, but you have been hesitant, for all the reasons I've discussed today, now is the best time. Do not wait another day because effective October 1, we are raising our rates and we hope you are too. I hope to see you in the league and I'll be back next week with another episode of the only podcast created exclusively for ambitious women law firm owners.
- 16:58Intro: If you're ready to create more of what you truly desire in your business and your life, then you'll want to visit us at womanlawyer.com to learn more about how we help our clients create wealth generating law firms with ease.