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Lawsuit Financing:
An Exciting New Niche In The Cash Flow Industry (Part Four)

This is the fourth part of a series of articles on the specific field of Lawsuit Financing.

In this article, we will turn our attention to marketing. In particular, ways of marketing that will cost you little to no money; using the telephone, public speaking and networking. We will share with you proven tips and scripts so you will be able to find cases directly and through your referral base to build a residual income business.

Marketing vs. Advertising
So what is the difference between advertising and marketing? To me the big difference is money. Marketing by definition is identifying and communicating with potential clients about your services. If you do this right you may not have to spend any money at all. Your marketing plan can have a very small budget, as little as just the cost of your local telephone service, the cost of copies for hand outs, or the small fees to get into networking events and trades shows. However, if you use advertising, paying for public distribution of what your services are as part of your marketing plan, it will have to span months if not years to be affective, so you better have big bucks to back it up or you are wasting your time and money!

There is something that is in between these two and that is publicity. Publicity is getting widespread public notice. You can pay for this and make this part of your advertising budget, or you can do things to get free publicity. (Check out the “resources” at the end of this article.)

Are You As Cheap (I Mean Thrifty) As I Am?
I am working on the premise that you want to spend as little money on marketing as possible. The simplest way to accomplish this is to make the telephone your best friend. Along with your phone you will need a list of attorneys to call. Do you think you have to buy a list? No way! Attorneys seek attention! Just pick up a telephone directory and turn to the section titled either “lawyers” or “attorneys.” They will even be broken down into areas of practice to make your task even easier. If you forgot what you did with the last telephone directory you had, or just don’t like working with that big book, go online and do a search for attorneys or lawyers in the filed of practice such as personal injury, and then type in your city and state. Bingo!

I know how much you love to make phone calls. You don’t?! Sure you do! You are on the phone all the time. People tell me all the time they hate to make cold calls. One of the reasons they give me for this dislike is they hate to get calls from strangers interrupting their day and selling them services they do not want or need. Of course you don't want to be thought of in that way. That is why I want to do some “reframing” with you.

You are not making “cold calls.” You are making “information-gathering calls.” By talking slowly, asking questions and their permission as you go along, and showing respect for the person on the other end of the line, you'll build rapport and relationship. The person answering the phone is not the “gate keeper.” They are the “phone answerer,” (or "PA" for short). You want to make sure that you treat everybody with the same level of respect, rapport and permission along the way, no matter what their position in the company. The PA is often the person who controls who gets your message…and when! Do not try to go around or over them. Try to make them your ally.

In your business, whether you are talking to plaintiffs, attorneys, or other referral sources, you need to gather information. That is why you make “information gathering calls,” not cold calls. Here are a couple of pointers. Learn your material so you do not have to be reading it. If you have to read your script, hold it up in the air so you are not looking down. Speaking about scripts, what do you say when you call an attorney? Read on and I'll fill you in on exactly what to say.

"O Romeo, Romeo! Wherefore art thou Romeo?"

OK, so I am no Shakespeare. But Kendall and I have developed a script to use when making calls to attorneys. Just to get you started, I am going to excerpt from our Complete Lawsuit Marketing Kit, how to approach the PA and what to say if you get into voice messaging.
Phone Answerer (P.A.):
“Hello, Ms. Smith’s office.
You:
“Hello. My name is____________. My company is_______________. (Speak slowly.) Ask for attorney by full name.”

PA:
“Yes she is. What can I say this is regarding?”
Or
“No she isn’t. Can I take a message?”

You: (If the P.A. had introduced themselves, use their name to create rapport.) “Thank you for asking Mr. Jones. We provide cash directly to plaintiffs before their cases settle. I don't know if Ms. Smith would be interested in this service for her clients. Maybe all of her clients have all the money they need to wait their cases out.”
(Pause)
Wait for them to react and say something. You'll probably hear something like, “ I have no idea.” Or (laughing) “Yeah right! Do you know anybody who has all the money they need?”

“Do you think Ms. Smith would want to take a minute to answer a couple of questions to see if this service is of use to her for her clients?”If they take your name and number, ask, “I am sorry I do not have your fax number. May I have it so I can send a one page document with a little bit more information?”

It's also very helpful to ask if it would be all right to call them back if you do not hear back from the attorney in two or three days.

Be sure and thank the phone answerer.

“Thank you Mr. Jones. You have been most helpful.”

What To Say If You Get Voice Mail

If you are put into voice messaging, this works well:

(Speak slowly.)

“Hello. My name is____________. My company is_______________. Our phone number is_____________. We provide cash directly to plaintiffs before their cases settle. We also have money for funding other aspects of a suit such as attorney fees and expert witness fees. I know you are busy so I will only take a moment or two of your time. If you can call me back I would appreciate it. If I do not hear from you by__________ I will assume that it is OK for me to call you back. (Repeat your name, company and phone number.) Thank you in advance. I look forward to talking with you.”
When Is The Best Time To Call

Mondays and Fridays are not good days for calling attorneys. On Monday they are usually swamped with all the work that came in over the weekend. On Fridays they are trying to wrap up everything so they can get home for the weekend. You will have a lot of success if you call in the late afternoons and early in the morning. Very often the person staying late or arriving early is the attorney themselves.

Set aside blocks of time to make your calls. You should be able to make about 50 calls in three hours. It may sound like a lot but a great many of these calls will end up in voice mail. Be persistent and consistent!

When you get through to the attorney…

Always…know the details of the program so you can explain it in simple and clear terms.
Always…stress that you understand the attorney knows what is best for their client.
Always…tell them about the confidentiality of the process.
Always…close by thanking them for their time.
Always…ask, What is the next step?”

If the next step is an appointment to sit down face-to-face, great! Whether it is or not, you will usually be asked to send some written information. You can do this via fax or email or regular mail. Ask them what they would prefer. We include a series of flyers and brochures in the “Kit” that you'll want to get into the hands of the attorney. The key is not to send them everything at once. By sending them out a little at a time, you have a legitimate reason to contact them more than once.

Networking And Publicly Presenting Lawsuit Financing

Networking and doing public presentations are extremely efficient and inexpensive ways to market any Cash Flow business. Lawsuit Financing is no exception. As a matter of fact, I originally built my successful Cash Flow business using just these two techniques. I still use them today to continue to build it.

Kendall and I have done a number of presentations at the Cash Flow Conventions, and written entire articles that have been previously published in the American Cash Flow Journal that are devoted to these topics. You can do a search for the articles on the American Cash Flow Journal web site or ask us and we will send them to you.

In the next article we will continue talking about marketing, sharing some creative ways to find cases with very little expense, and some that will cost you money as well.

In the meantime…

Be good to yourselves, and fair with each other.

Richard Shapiro, CFS, DCFS, is a Master Broker, a member of the Million Dollar Club and a former visiting instructor for the Pino Training Organization. Richard is the owner of Condor International Financial Services, 3305 North Swan Road, Suite 109-148, Tucson, AZ 85712. He can be reached by phone at, (520) 529-4960, or through fax at (520) 299-3450. His E-mail address is, Condor@CondorFunding.com, and his website is www.CondorFunding.com.