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How One Attorney Began Charging 11.66 Times His Previous Rate

An attorney who recently joined as a Practice Alchemy member had been practicing for a number of years. He’s an excellent attorney, but he just fell into the same trap most lawyers do.

He looked left, looked right, and decided, “Well, these people are charging low rates out of the gate before working their way up to the market rate, so I’ll do the same thing.”

 He was getting some pretty good clients, but there was a major discrepancy between what he was charging and the value he was delivering.

What did we do? We changed how he presented his service offering. Instead of speaking in terms of hours or a checklist of things he was doing, we made sure he was conveying the overall value of his services. And now? He’s reaping the rewards.

Clients don’t hire you for the checklist. They hire you for achieving an objective. They hire you for the end result.

Convey Value. Increase Fees.

When we changed how he presented himself - in a way that illustrated his true value in concrete terms, he was able to start increasing his fees.

And not just the small incremental increases that don’t amount to anything, but substantial increases.

He was no longer reciting a checklist and being viewed as a commodity who could complete every task on that list (what I used to not so affectionately call a “contract monkey”). He was recognized as someone who could create an outcome that would improve the life of the client in a concrete way.

No longer just “papering” something. A partner in achieving his clients’ life goals. I’d say it’s immeasurably different, but in a minute you’ll see how very, very nicely measurable it was.

So we make these changes – and all of a sudden, he gained a huge amount of pricing elasticity because he realized that if you give people what they want, they’ll be willing to pay for it. Nobody wants a list or a contract with a bunch of legal gibberish. Nobody gets up in the morning and says “Hey, what I really want to do today is hire a lawyer. That would be awesome!”

They want the result.

To-Do Lists Have Low Value. Results Have High Value.

If you’re selling your services based on “here’s what we’re going to do”, you’re probably showing the same list as every other attorney.

How is a client supposed to make a choice?

We reworked this attorney’s presentation so he was providing potential clients with a complete solution. In fact, we offered multiple solutions – basic, intermediate and advanced packages – so the client would be more inclined to compare packages rather than different attorneys.

This Practice Alchemy member’s fees for his premium-positioned packages are now 11.66 times his average fees before.

That’s not a typo.

Your perception of what your price should be is all in your head, especially if it’s based on what other attorneys are charging. I mean really, who’s in charge of setting your price – you or your competition.

Regardless of where you are across the country, there are people who will pay far more than what you’re charging. If you feel like a commodity and present yourself that way, the rate you receive has nothing to do with your practice area, and it has nothing to do with geography.

It has everything to do with whether you’re presenting and positioning yourself properly.

It’s actually straightforward, if you go step by step, in the right order, with the right packaging, presentation, and positioning - just like this Member did. He took our advice and is now reaping the rewards. There’s no reason why you can’t do the exact same thing.

Raj Jha