Tom Rich: [00:00:00] And this is, I think, where most attorneys and, you know, I do the same thing I did with a dentist chiropractors. I've got a client that does it with shop owners. Like, it's everybody kind of does this, but the main problem that most business owners have, and I'm just going to, I know that a lot of attorneys hate being referred to as a business owner, but let's, I'm going to clump you in there, but most business owners fall into the commodity on the other side of that, right?

It's a commonplace thing. They assume all lawyers are created equal. So any lawyer is just as good as the next lawyer. And when that is the driving force behind the perception, right? The only point of competition can be price. So you have to find something that is a sustainable competitive advantage other than price because you will always find someone who can out cheap your cheapness.

Price is not a sustainable competitive advantage, at least on a discount side. [00:01:00] And so you have to do something that allows you to charge a premium price and justify it to the world so that everybody coming in goes. Oh, I went to that attorney. Right. And you'll see that it's a lot of the, you know, on the PI stuff, you'll see it on the billboards all the time.

Like the one person like, Hey, I got a million dollars from my auto accident or whatever else. Like, there's stuff like that where now they're saying, okay, this person got that result. Therefore I will also. So you got some social proof going on in there, but it helps set them apart from the collective masses.

​

MPS: Law Firm owners. Welcome to the Your Practice Mastered podcast. We're your hosts. I'm MPS.

MPS

Richard James: Hey, and I'm Richard James. Excited to be here, MPS. Michael, we've got a pretty cool guest today, somebody we both know really well and has been part of our world, part of our family, [00:02:00] and we consider friends for a while. You want to introduce him?

MPS: Yeah. Today we're joined by Tom Rich and I'm super excited to have you on Tom. Both everybody in our community and both ourselves just. gravitates towards you. You're a great guy. You've got great lessons and you provide a lot of value. So we're super excited to have you on today. So

welcome

Tom Rich: I

MPS: on

Tom Rich: am, I'm super stoked as well. This has been when I got the invite, I was absolutely willing to jump on. Love you guys. So this is going to be a fun conversation today.

Richard James: Yeah, you know, real quick for those of you that are listening, right? So you're the attorney who owns a law firm and you're listening to this, or maybe you're an attorney who's trying to own a law firm or thinking about on a law firm, whatever, wherever you are, you should know that, you know, in our program, we've been around for 15 ish years.

And Tom has come into the picture pretty early on in that story. And he regularly whenever he comes and presents, he regularly gets the highest remarks from our family, our members about the usefulness of his information. Because here's the thing. [00:03:00] He's not a teacher like a professor who's wearing a sweater and has never done it like a sweater wearing professor sitting in the room and doesn't know how to get it out of the rain.

He lives this stuff each and every day in his own businesses and he owns local. Brick and mortar like business that he can draw this information from as well as other investments that he has too. So I just hang on, like this is a power packed session. We're going to have today. We're going to hear about his journey and I'm sure we're going to draw out some nuggets along the way.

Michael, I'll pass it back to you. I

MPS: Yeah. And I just want to give the heads up that although Tom is not a law firm owner, man, is he well practiced in versed in the world of business. And so today the law firm owners that are listening, watch it. We're going to draw some lessons and pull them together to law, but we want you to take. This stuff open minded with business, right?

This is business. You're running a business and you're selling legal services. So that's what the preface of today's episode is going to be. [00:04:00] But Tom, why don't you start with maybe something that not everybody knows about you.

Tom Rich: Oh man. Not everybody knows about me. From about the ages of let's see uh, 1 to 25. I spent most of my nights in improv comedy.

I

Richard James: didn't know that

MPS: I didn't know that.

Tom Rich: Yeah.

Richard James: that's great.

Tom Rich: It didn't play very well, but it was fun.

Richard James: Oh, you know, it's funny. I've always thought about never to pull the trigger. Always thought about doing improv comedy to improve my presentations

Tom Rich: You have to absolutely. I will tell you hands down. It is the single greatest. Gift in terms of being able to think on the fly and able to react to whatever the notion of, and there's a big rule in improv comedy that says everything is yes. And you can't say no on stage. [00:05:00] And so you've got to embrace everything that comes across.

You can't ever play direct to the joke. It's a situations that are funny. It's spectacular. And so, you know, When you're looking to be in front of an audience, improv comedy training is absolutely, if anybody has a chance to do it, strongly recommend it just because of how comfortable it makes you.

MPS: Yeah,

Richard James: it makes you very uncomfortable in the moment you're there.

MPS: it

Tom Rich: Well, the people who are most successful in life do that, which is uncomfortable until it becomes comfortable.

Richard James: Ain't that the truth?

MPS: a good point. I see where the quick wits come now, Tom. I mean, that's it makes sense now. The improv.

Richard James: We

Yeah. We

just

thought you were raised on the East Coast like we were.

Tom Rich: Ah no, no. Some of us need to be trained.

Richard James: It's just beaten into us.

Tom Rich: Yeah it's, yeah, I get it.

MPS: Oh, that's good. Oh, that, that is that's definitely something that probably not everyone knows. I certainly didn't know. So thank you for sharing that. That's a [00:06:00] really cool. Why don't you give them the broad strokes, talk a little bit about your entrepreneurial journey.

Tom Rich: So, my dad was in marketing. He was started off in Procter and Gamble, went to Polaroid, FritoLay just kept getting better and better jobs, moving us from all over the country. I, Moved, I think, throughout my life about 26 times. It was like, every couple years, we'd pack up and we'd go. It was like we were running from the law.

But it's hey kids, come on, let's go. No, leave the stuff, let's go. But no, it was a, I'm sorry about the background noise, I've got some construction going on, so I don't

Richard James: No that's noise of success, my friend. That's the noise of success. That's

Tom Rich: Well, I think it's just successful I got them here today. So that's a good thing.

Richard James: right.

Tom Rich: So, anyway I, so I've always kind of been drawn to marketing, drawn to sales and have been paying attention throughout my life as to why people do certain things.

I've always been fascinated with how do you convince people to do [00:07:00] something, anything to persuasion, manipulation, whatever, however it exists on that spectrum. It's always been a point of fascination for me. So as I went through undergrad I started off at university, of Wisconsin transferred to the university of Utah because I'd had a better Chinese program.

I obviously don't do an awful lot in Chinese anymore. Sadly. I wish I did went after, after that went to Work for American Express as a financial analyst was a crazy stint. I decided that was as much fun as that was, I needed to go on to grad school, went to Thunderbird. When I went to Thunderbird, you entered either entered bilingual or left bilingual.

I was able to test out of all of my class, all of my Chinese language requirements, which was awesome. Then fast forward, we get to. The, my, my introduction into, you know, the real world. I, after American Express, there was a good business, but then I jumped into a startup called Love [00:08:00] Sack.

We made giant beanbags. Now they see their ads everywhere, sectionals. And I was there during the invention of the sectional. And that was a kind of a really fun time. To, to be there. I helped take 'em from about a dozen stores to 85 stores plus five international. And then I got recruited away and I've just been focusing more and more on my life on sales and business growth, business development.

And it's been a phenomenal time. I started as a consultant. jUst after 2010. And then it's just, it's been remarkable. Right before that I was with Russell Brunson. A lot of people know who Russell is with ClickFunnels and whatnot. I was his vice president of marketing for a number of years.

And just, you know, I really I have been blessed to have a crazy, exciting life. I just.

Richard James: Yeah, so, I mean, you've had obviously, well, I mean, Thunderbird School of Management is no joke, right? I mean, anybody who [00:09:00] doesn't understand it or hasn't heard about it or seen the curriculum, it's no joke. So that's that formal education, but it's very. Practical. I've got a friend who's going through a similar course right now at our age because he wants to raise up in his career corporately.

And the courses he's taking, I thought we're going to be kind of BS, but they're not, they're extremely practical courses on management and international business structures and mind boggling the things he's learning. So that's one side of your learning. And then you talk about Russell Brunson, who is, a direct response marketer 101 I mean, he learned at the feet of Kennedy as you did as well. And so juxtapose those two educational processes, the formal one in college versus the direct response one that you learn

Tom Rich: So let me reverse it. I think one that was far more theoretical and the other was far more practical, right? Cause in, in business school, you'll, you can create and run through as many simulations as you'd [00:10:00] like, but until that actually hits the real world, it doesn't matter.

And that was one of those things that, yeah, I was, I went through Thunderbird during the time where everybody. Wanted to be a brand manager and I was like, what in the world, you know, and there was this one class off to the side called direct response marketing. And when I saw

Richard James: They taught that at

Tom Rich: Yeah, I had a direct response marketing class and I took to it like a moth to the flame.

Like it was I was hooked. Got into with love Sack and there wasn't a lot of opportunity in direct response through retail channel like that. It was, you know, yeah, we could do some couponing. We could do some other things like that, but it wasn't nearly the funnel type of, you bring them in, you qualify him.

Like, once, once I discovered that and that one the group I went to after that was I was Robert Allen's Vice president of marketing well [00:11:00] as well. So I left Love Sack went there and that was that direct response class on steroids. Oh my gosh. We were putting people in a room. We were selling them a preview.

We were selling them a product. Then the, then we would sell them a three day and then the three day would sell it like the personal development sale has. Easily become my favorite and it's one that I've really sort of dialed into. It's kind of how you and I got connected. It was, you look at how there, you know, there's, there are people who.

Especially in the professional space, look, they could be a phenomenal attorney, but if they're not good at business, it's not going to matter the best attorney in the world. If they don't have that front end, they don't have that word of mouth. They don't have the people. It's not like it's a, if you build it, they will come type of component.

Like they just people don't show up.

Richard James: But they all think that it is.

Tom Rich: Yeah,

Richard James: And I, and somebody said today earlier we [00:12:00] interviewed one other person today and they said it used to be that way.

So that's part of

the

problem

Tom Rich: well, sure. But I mean, it used to be where specialization was seen as a way and slash convenience. Like Walmart put all the mom and pop shops out of business, right? They come in with a lower price. They shut them all down and then they raise price. Like, it's just constant. And they're constantly accused of dumping and trying to do whatever, you know, unfair business practices.

But the simple fact is that, you know, you go to Europe, right? I lived in France for about six months. Fantastic experience. Oh, my gosh, that was great. But the they were fighting the hyper marks coming in the Carrefours the, and they had one called hypermart. But because it's, For them the experience of shopping was, well, I go to the bakery and the man at the bakery asked me how my day is.

He knows me, he gives me my bread and then I go to the next store. I go to the cheese monger, right? The fish monger. And I just, I make this, it's [00:13:00] an all day excursion because it's not just, I'm going to buy goods. I'm having a social experience and they didn't want to give that up and same thing.

So you go to You know, back in the day, you used to have in a particular town of a particular size, you had the dentist, you had the lawyer, you had the, you know, undertaker, you had the, and there was that one person that could fill that role. Well, unfortunately, because we've grown and mass marketing has become more and more, there is, there are more people trying to fill the positioning mentally in people's heads.

And so. You used to be able to get away with that because there you were the lawyer and now you're not the lawyer anymore. You're a lawyer. And that's the real driver in, in the change of that business model.

Richard James: way, I don't know if I would have done so well in France because I prefer Instacart. So I don't want to see another human being. As a matter of fact, my wife [00:14:00] has a rule when she goes to the grocery store, her rule is don't make eye contact with anybody. And get through the aisle as quickly as you can, and you must go in a very specific order, and you only get to use one of these three aisles to check out because they're the fastest.

So we have a system to go to the grocery store so we don't speak to another human in, in the entire time we're there, and I think that comes on the back end of We were the undertaker in town, right? So we own funeral homes. And when we used to go to the grocery store, you had to actually dress up like you wore a suit and she wore a nice pantsuit because you knew everybody in the store and it was going to take you three hours to go grocery shopping because everybody knew you.

So we so fried and crispy from that. We, both of us hate grocery shortstopping, so I don't know how well we would do in France.

Tom Rich: it's I'll tell you I really. I liked that, but you can see the inefficiency of it. You can see why it drags and why things have [00:15:00] changed, right? You want people to

Richard James: Well,

Tom Rich: you as

an

Richard James: I

have become their commodity, right? It's how much time has become their most valuable resource, right? So everybody wants more to get more juice out of 24 hours we have. And honestly, in many ways, and I say it tongue in cheek, like I'm serious. We don't love girls that go in the grocery store but I don't think it's actually, I don't see it as a win.

By the way, I see it negative yet. Yes, we gain more time, but we lose what is really in many cases important in this world. And that's connection with other human beings and making

relationships

Tom Rich: absolutely. So when you look at and this I hate to belabor this point, but it's the, when you look at. Like you say, time has become the commodity and it's one of those where it's the most precious commodity, right? Everybody says time is money. No time is precious. And it's the one thing that God gives everybody an equal amount of every day.

Your day has 24 hours. My day has 24 hours. And what we got at the end of that is based in solely on our decisions, whether they were made that [00:16:00] day or the repercussions of decisions or benefits from decisions from prior decisions. But our hour is spent. Yes. Or our 24 are spent, however, we've chosen to spend them and the similar situation.

And this is, I think, where most attorneys and, you know, I do the same thing I did with a dentist chiropractors. I've got a client that does it with shop owners. Like, it's everybody kind of does this, but the, Main problem that most business owners have, and I'm just going to, I know that a lot of attorneys hate being referred to as a business owner, but let's, I'm going to clump you in there, but most business owners fall into the commodity on the other side of that, right?

It's a commonplace thing. They assume all lawyers are created equal. So any lawyer is just as good as the next lawyer. And when that's the, when that is the driving force behind the perception, right? The only point of competition can be [00:17:00] price. Okay. So you have to find something that is a sustainable competitive advantage other than price because it's, you will always find someone who can out cheap.

Your cheapness price is not a sustainable competitive advantage, at least on a discount side. And so you have to do something that allows you to charge a premium price and justify it to the world so that everybody coming in goes. Oh, I went to that attorney. Okay. Right. And you'll see that it's a lot of the, you know, on the, on the PI stuff, you'll see it on the billboards all the time.

Like the one person like, Hey, I got a million dollars from my auto accident or whatever else. Like there was there's stuff like that where now they're saying, okay, this person got that result. Therefore I will also. So you got some social proof going on in there, but it helps set them apart.

Right. From the collective masses.

Richard James: Yeah. So Michael, when [00:18:00] you, it's a great astute observation and Michael, I think you see it when you're working with attorneys in the closing room, you see that they struggle with getting their prices right. I know you want to get back to Tom's questions, but just real quick, as an aside, you do see, they struggle with that in the closing room.

Is that right?

MPS: Yeah. I mean, look, they they struggle because they believe that if they raise their fees they will either not get as many people to retain the firm and, or they think that they'll all disappear and nobody's going to retain the firm. And I would tell you it has mainly everything to do with the sales process you have in place and the ability to convey the value and what you need to convey.

And so to Tom's point, yeah. I mean, in a commodity based market, you're racing to the bottom on price and that's not going to do anybody any good. And so for the law firm owners listening, you got to make sure you price, right. And there are opportunities to absolutely raise your fees, depending on your market practice area, the whole nine.

But Tom,

Tom Rich: Hold on. Hold on. [00:19:00] Before we jump off a price, because price is one of those things that I don't think a lot of people recognize that the general value that is communicated in price.

Let me just quickly compare, right? If I were to say, I got a 10 bottle, 10 bottle of wine and 1, 000 bottle of wine, which is better.

1,

Richard James: Thousand dollar wine

Tom Rich: $1,000 bottle of wine, right? If I got a 100 an hour attorney or a 1, 000 an hour attorney, which is better?

Richard James: thousand dollar an hour.

Tom Rich: Presumably, right? They could be equal in terms of their success rate in court, but one charges a much, much higher rate. And so just by virtue of communicating the price, you put yourself in a performance expectation or that echelon.

You raise the bar. Now, the other thing is, and this is where I think that most. Attorneys that I've spoken with throughout the years with your retreats and they are fantastic. It's, [00:20:00] it is such a good thing. If you have an opportunity, you need to be there, but I will absolutely

Richard James: for the plug.

Tom Rich: absolutely.

Hey, no, listen, it. It happens once every 13 weeks. It's like clockwork. Just get there. So, but the thing that I'll point out, though is that most of them are still in this. Well, I want to be average with everybody else. I want to be the same as everybody else or maybe a little bit cheaper. But so let's talk about what price communicates.

Right, Rich I know you're very much into To clothes and whatnot, like you, you like nice things. If I told you.

Richard James: You've turned me onto them. I learned from you brother.

Tom Rich: Well, if I told you that, Hey, listen, I'm going to get you I'm going to hook you up Holland and Sherry, you know, fabric, beautiful. So like we, we get you a custom made suit. That's going to be a 3, 500 suit. I tell you, it can be yours for a hundred bucks. What is your question? There's only one thing that comes to mind.

Richard James: How

Tom Rich: [00:21:00] How what's wrong with it? What's going on? Like, did it fall off a truck? And so we're immediately interjecting objections. shouldn't have to be there. But if you're such a good lawyer, why are you charging so little when everybody else is charging this? Or if you're such a good lawyer, why are you charging the same as everybody else?

If you are differentiating yourself with better service, better product, better results. Shouldn't that also spell out or come out in the price that you're charging?

MPS: Absolutely 100%. Yep. Well said. Very well said.

Tom Rich: I didn't want to, I didn't want to get off price until I had that opportunity for that

Richard James: No. That's

MPS: No, it's a good point to belabor. It's a good point to spend time on because it's something that so many of them get wrong. And so, it literally has the difference to make an instant impact to the practice if you change it and make it right.

Richard James: But

MPS: I'm...

Richard James: for me, it was like, for me, it was like, dad always says it. So I'm dad. So I always [00:22:00] say this right. So having, you know, when dad always says something, the kid doesn't always do it. Then the neighbor tells him to do it and he does it right. So for me, in this particular instance, you're the neighbor you got to tell them to do this, so hopefully they listen to you.

Cause a lot of times they don't listen to me about price. So I'm grateful that you did that. Thank you so

much

Tom Rich: Well here's the funny thing is with price, you have full control over what you charge.

MPS: Yep,

Tom Rich: choice.

Richard James: your choice.

Tom Rich: You want to pick a low number. Congratulations. It usually, by the way, and this is. It happens on most business owners subconsciously, especially in the service industry that they subconsciously communicate what they think they're worth and so listen, we have to charge for the problem that we're solving in somebody's life and if we're charging too little, it were either communicating that we're not really worth what we're asking.

And so now again, it introduced a whole bunch of questions and objections and problems. And the other thing is if that you're, [00:23:00] if you're if you're looking for trophy fish and you keep showing up with bottom feeders, it ain't the boat. It ain't the technique. Well, it's probably the technique, but it's also the lure, right?

You're pulling. If you're getting catfish and you're going for sailfish, you got problems.

Richard James: That's correct.

MPS: Yeah, you're spot

Tom Rich: And so now, but also if you charge more, you can serve better because you don't need to get so many. And now I will tell you, hands down, listen, if I had to choose between 10, 5,000 buyers. Right. Or one 50, 000 buyer. I'll take the 50, 000 buyer every time. They complain less. They do what you they, there's a certain level of expectation.

Like I, I talked to a lot of your attorneys. It's like, I can't get people to give me their paperwork. Well, that's because of the people you're picking up. If you know, if they've seen no individual responsibility. [00:24:00] For what they're bringing to the table, right? Well, you're just going to pull off a miracle and get me out of jail.

Well, yes, I can do that, but you got to do your part. Well, I didn't know I had needed to do anything. It's I'll tell you, it is easier to take somebody from good to great than it is from bad to good.

MPS: That's, yes. That is a very true statement. That is a very true statement. Heh,

Tom, obviously you got a lot of fun and good and excellent stories on this journey of yours. Have you had one pivotal down moment? And if so, what'd you take from it?

Tom Rich: So great question. I I remember probably the low point of my career was ironically enough at Love Sack. And it was one of those. Moments where I look, I speak Chinese. The owner also spoke Chinese. He Sean Nelson really smart guy. You know, we were constantly fighting constantly.

It was like, well, why don't you [00:25:00] understand what I'm telling you? I like, I kind of have the education, I kind of have the training. You gotta just trust me from time to time and just feeling beyond frustrated. And I, at this time, like I said, we were setting up I took 'em from a dozen stores to 85 plus five, and then.

I was on the road nonstop almost all the time. And I remember walking by a uh, you know, one of the Hudson or Hudson news kind of thing, like it's the bookstores and they had this book QBQ in the front. And it was the question beyond the question or behind the question. I can't remember what the B stands for.

It doesn't matter. The book is QBQ. And. It's such a short little book. Like you can finish it on a flight. It's, but it's that book transformed the trajectory of my career. I remember pulling that up and going, Oh my gosh. Cause it was one of those where it was just focused on taking responsibility.

Don't ask defeating questions. Defeating questions usually start off with [00:26:00] who, why, how. You know, whose responsibility is it to train me? Well, it's nobody's responsibility. Why does this keep happening to me? Well, it's like, it's the, what do I need to do and how, or how can I fix the situation right now?

Like it's empowering questions. And as soon as you start asking that. You start, your brain starts proactively identifying levers, you can move buttons, you can push that if you continue to assist in a victim based mentality, then, you know, they won't let me do my job. All the woes that go on, it's, I think if I had to look at one pivotal moment, it was that, and then secondarily deciding to.

Start a consulting company.

Richard James: That's interesting. I, it's funny. I never read that. QBQ. I just looked it up. It's a John Miller. Yeah.

Tom Rich: Great book.

Richard James: yeah I will, that's on my list. It's happening. And strangely enough, prime is offering it for 0. So I got it. But yeah, [00:27:00] so I, I find it interesting that in every many entrepreneurial journey, entrepreneurial journeys there, there usually are pivotal moments like that, right.

And there is a book or a mentor or something that you heard. And I love that. I didn't know that about you and I love that you shared that. Thank you.

Tom Rich: No, thank you. Like I, this is the getting to know Tom hour. I love it.

Richard James: yeah,

what it's

well, that's all about.

Tom Rich: This is confession that I'm willing to share. I love

Richard James: That's

right. Confessions are willing to share.

MPS: Should be the new name.

name

Richard James: yeAh. See secret yet. No, nobody will listen. No, we'll have to get so, okay. So you pivoted into coaching and. So I'm curious, you've been around our world. So we obviously identified price. We identified maybe finding the wrong client.

You work in a lot of industries, as you said, Chiro's dentists, mechanics, you know, shop owners. You [00:28:00] personally own home health care hospice based. Hospice unit or hospital mobile hospice. Is that what it's home to home hospice, correct?

Tom Rich: Yeah. It's home hospice. We go to where the patient is.

Richard James: Right. And so you, my point is you have very diverse background and then I drop you in the middle of working with lawyers over the last, you know, 10 years ish.

And so my question to you is now that you've been around them and observe them, what do you think is the biggest difference between the way they view their businesses and maybe everybody else use theirs? Is the answer, there is none. Everybody's the same. Is there a major difference in you see, as you work with lawyers and talk to lawyers, what's the one thing you could give them as an observation that you can go, you know, this is what I notice.

And you know, if you could just you may be able to make a little paradigm shift. Is there anything like that?

Tom Rich: So the other, I mean, there are a couple of things. So first off, I think a lot of the attorneys have Succumb to the idea or they've basically capitulated the [00:29:00] point that they are in the commodity business and I think as a result of that, you look at the points of differentiation, they make, well, we're better at customer service.

Well, every freaking law firm can make the same stupid claim, even if they're terrible at customer service. And so the points of differentiation don't necessarily align with the more important value props of the customer. So I, you, I don't think there's a lot of, Deep understanding of who the customer is.

And so, and then once you have that, now, you know how to go and differentiate yourself from everybody else in the space and that differentiation by itself will help justify a higher price. Like it's all of this thing that you. You keep staying in this cage that you've built and it's almost like I say, you know, why don't they listen to me?

I'm so much smarter. I'm such a good attorney. Well, get outside of the, like you built the damn thing. You know where the lock is, you know where the key is, open it up and get out make, you got to stop living in the box. [00:30:00] Everything else, everything awesome is outside of the box. And when you look at how you've.

How many people have just unnaturally confined themselves to this is the type of law that I practice and that's great, right? You do have to have some degree of specialization, but then there's the question. Okay, so you're a bankruptcy attorney What makes you different from every other bankruptcy attorney and if you can't answer that well, I help you file the papers Well, if all you're doing is filing papers, you're not doing a great job to do something that clearly demonstrates the value that you're bringing to the table.

And I think that is where, if I had to pin it down, like it, a lot of attorneys go, well, you know, my marketing doesn't work and my sales process doesn't work. And my other the practice isn't as profitable as I think it could be, should be. I want it to be whatever it is. And it's largely because they don't have that point of differentiation. Right. They just and if they do, [00:31:00] they've picked one that is entirely indefensible.

Richard James: Yeah, no, I think that's spot on. You know, there's still surprisingly enough a number of attorneys who practice what we call threshold law. So they still have 34567 practice areas that they'll accept. And they wonder why it's so hard to build any systems to recognize and optimize the efficiency in the office.

And so that's step 1. And then step 2. So, so those, they have almost an impossible time differentiating at all. And then those who do specialize they do struggle with understanding how to differentiate. And I agree with you not all of them, obviously the ones that we have in our world are, you know, they're.

They've learned some of these things, so they're better at it. But as they come through our doors, we recognize they haven't figured out how to differentiate themselves and create, you know, a unique competitive advantage and elevator pitch, whatever we want to call it, whatever name you want to slap on, it's something you can answer that question.

What makes you different than everybody else? But the way that they do that is not [00:32:00] by just coming up with a great marketing slogan, to your point, it's by clearly understanding. Who their client is and the pain points they're going through and being able to build a pitch that communicates clearly how you serve their needs.

And so that's a, and that ties into copywriting and sales script writing and all that stuff that. That they were never taught and they were never you know, they were never taught. And so, so we know they're in our world and they're listening, but let's take them outside of our world for a second.

And if you were going to give one of them advice as to where to start to learn this stuff, where would you point them besides us? I appreciate that you might say us but besides us, where was, would

you point

us

Tom Rich: absolutely you. I mean, and I know you put the qualifier beside you, but I don't, there aren't many people in this world that look at the practice of law the same way you do. Like there's the simple fact of it. The other thing is, I think that most people, the reason they never get there, [00:33:00] it's that old Ross Perot quote, right?

That where everybody gives up one yard away from success one foot away from scoring the winning touchdown. They just give up and it's, they don't have the fundamental. Data to help them make the decision. And so they just say, ah, it doesn't work and it's too hard or whatever else. And they are right freaking there.

And then they still leave that. And they give up too early in the process. So, in terms of where to learn stuff like this. To me, I think the best determinant of future customers are going to be interviewing your existing customers. Why'd you pick me? How'd you find me? Where do we, you know, what were you looking for?

What are the things that you want? And I would sit down and every prospect that ever sits in front of you in that closing room, What are you looking for an attorney? Why does it matter? And the more that you can take that massage, it feed it back to them in exactly the same way, the order, the preference, you can now [00:34:00] justify a higher price because you have now just given them exactly what they're looking

Richard James: That point, a, such a great point, such a great point. Leverage the relationship you already have with your existing prospects and clients and find out the answers directly from them. What a great point, Michael. I know we're coming to the end. I w I don't want to derail you any longer here.

MPS: No I'm just curious, Tom what are some of the things that you do on a daily basis, habit wise, that contribute to your continued and sustained success?

Tom Rich: So I hate wasting time. Now that says, you know, it's not that I don't enjoy the quiet moments or whatever else. I'm terrible at vacation. My wife hates when we vacation because I'll calm down for a day or two and then I just get bored. And so we always have to be doing something. But every morning I wake up early.

You know, and I don't quite follow the Ben Franklin advice, but you know, early to rise, certainly, but [00:35:00] early to bed, I can't figure that one out. So I'm late to bed and early to rise, which is not a super helpful thing. But you, I've also learned you don't make a lot of money sleeping. So, I'll usually be up by about five every morning.

I'll go to the gym every morning. Sundays I take off, but I still managed to get 10, 000 steps every day and 10, 000 on Sunday just to keep something going because it's really easy. Especially the older I get. I've noticed that if I don't move it, it doesn't keep moving and it starts to hurt when you move it later.

So, but while I'm at the gym, I'm constantly. Podcasts, books. It's one of those things that I'm typically at three, three and a half times speed have found that if I go any faster than that, I'd start losing words. But it's fascinating how much you can consume as that's going on and how much dead time, like you [00:36:00] look at how.

Most people, they'll sit and go to the gym and listen to music and that's great, right? Get you pumped up or whatever else. But I would sacrifice if that gets, if that's what's required to get me to 100%, I'm still working out. I'm still getting maybe a 90 percent workout. I'll sacrifice the 10 percent to multitask.

I, you know, the idea of multitasking is often hard for a lot of people. And it's. Very seldom does it work out well, right? And if you don't believe me, you know, take a sleeping pill and a laxative at the same time and just see what but, but the bigger point is that,

Richard James: I got nothing HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAH

MPS: There's nothing to combat that. I mean,

Richard James: The whole new meaning to wet dream. Sorry, am I allowed to

Tom Rich: Oh wow. So, but anyway, like you [00:37:00] look at how most people they, they're. There's so much missing capacity, so much missing opportunity. And if all you do is every day, look around and go, how do I pick up? A half of a percent more do a little bit better in this thing. it's that, that the concept of constant never ending improvement, right?

It's always investing and always looking at yourself because at the end of the day, yeah, you're, you've got competitors, but your biggest competitor is yourself. And if you can't look at yourself from a year ago and go, I'm better, I'm stronger, I'm smarter, I'm better, you know, more well off, whatever it is.

You got to start making different decisions.

Richard James: Yeah, you can move forward. You can move backward, but you can't stand still. That's just the way the good Lord made this world we live in. There's no such thing.

Tom Rich: Well

Richard James: I, it's been such an honor to have you on today. I know we're coming to the end of Michael's time for the show, but I

Tom Rich: we're just getting started.

Richard James: I know we could.

We could do it. We could do it [00:38:00] a double session. I'm sure. And maybe we should. We'll have you back. We'll talk about some more concepts in the future. I'm excited to see you at our event in November while Michael is off on his honeymoon. I appreciate you filling in for him.

MPS: You,

Tom Rich: my, my, my pleasure, Michael. I just, it's not like you didn't know when the event was

MPS: There we go.

Richard James: Yeah, Tom's like, well, he should just delay his honeymoon. I go, I don't disagree. I just don't know that his wife does or his future wife agrees with

MPS: we, yeah. I don't know how much or how well that one would've went over,

Tom Rich: Ah

Richard James: we got you, Michael. That's all good. We got you.

MPS: dad, Tom's stepping in and he is gonna rock it.

Richard James: He's going to rock it for

sure.

Tom Rich: Well, I'll, I will do my best to fill your shoes

Richard James: Well, I tell him, I do really do appreciate you. Appreciate your friendship. Appreciate your counsel. Appreciate, appreciate who, what you are to our members. And so thank you for coming on today. Michael, anything you want to tell the folks before we get off today?

MPS: [00:39:00] No, I mean, this was super, super valuable and Tom, seriously, thank you. And to the law firm owners listening I hope you got a unique, different perspective this time just with a business owner and someone that's really had a lot of experience in a lot of different realms. And if you enjoyed, make sure to drop a like down below, comment, just give Tom some love, and then depending on where you're watching or listening, hit that subscribe or follow button, turn those bell notifications on.

So that way you don't miss any of these, right? Because we love doing it and we want to make sure you guys are getting value. And as long as you are, we're going to continue doing this, but thank you for listening. And Tom, yes, very much appreciate you popping on today.

Tom Rich: anytime, guys. Thank you so much.

Richard James: Thanks, my friend.