#363: How To Distract The Hosts With Lasers Yet Remain Laser Focused w/ Scott Reib
SUMMARY KEYWORDS
business, contract, lawyer, people, legal, problem, pay, llc, questions, big pain point, clients, talking, sell, relationship, offer, cost, proactive, entrepreneurs, attorney, create
SPEAKERS
Speaker 2 (52%), Law (34%), Speaker 3 (9%), Speaker 1 (<1%), Speaker 4 (<1%)
0:00
What about my sweat equity? Sweat equity? Sweat equity. Sweat equity my sweat equity.
Law Smith
0:22
All right, Scott, what at the top? We'd like to have our guests throughout their plugs or what to promote? Because we just find it find it easier than me stumbling through what? A broker or someone who's sitting, because I can't read. I can't read out loud very well, it's, it's really embarrassing. So go ahead.
2
Speaker 2
0:46
Okay. Yeah, I've got a membership program for business owners, entrepreneurs, where we give them legal advice and information on demand, called access. And that's what, that's what I'm trying to sell. I've got a webpage set up or it's put out live today. That will be reblog.com forward slash sweat equity, where they can sign up for a laser coaching session with me and get a free download of my my ebook. Seven proven strategies to shatter proof your business.
1:17
Wow, okay. Well, I'm laser coaching.
1:21
These are legal coaching.
3
Speaker 3
1:24
Okay. How many lasers? Do we get to play with?
2
Speaker 2
1:27
Yeah, you have to be coached first. Okay, so that's
1:31
I guess that complaint
Law Smith
1:32
is coaching for like to be better with lasers? Or is it laser focused?
1:37
Its laser focused.
1:41
Kind of a bummer. But time?
Law Smith
1:43
Well, we got to embed the URL. And we do like those, you know, the shows it's going up in places. So what do you primarily you deal with? I'm guessing probably a small business owner that needs that guidance through everything. Like, I was talking to a comic the other day after a show and I bought out and there's three comics trying to talk about legal business stuff. And then they're like, you just talked to him and pointed at me and I was like, well, Dean, LLC, and then get escort filing for your CPA and like, in Florida, you can do it on sundays.org. You do it on your phone right now. 450 bucks, start there. And then when you get bigger, you probably need an attorney, or some legal guidance. Where where's the starting point for most people you're talking to?
2
Speaker 2
2:38
You know, most people we're talking to, you know, there's two, two different places, some people are coming to us with this great idea. They want to start a business and they you know, they're they have some capital, and they're like, help us do this. Right. And so we're going to son biz for them. We're forming the LLC, we're going to documents, right. And then there's other people coming in, hey, we've been in business three years, we probably screwed everything up at the beginning. Can you fix it for us? And then coach us along the way, so we can keep up here?
Law Smith
3:05
What I mean, let's talk sexy talk documents, like operating agreements,
2
Speaker 2
3:10
agreements, non compete agreements, employment agreements.
Law Smith
3:14
What are the employment agreements? I think Eric and I are both on the same page. Like, that is something a lot of small businesses skip over? Right? And they shouldn't even if there were a company that was around for like, 18 years, and they didn't really have that marked down. Yeah. Is that?
3:36
Yeah. Back to work.
Law Smith
3:39
Money. Like, what do you when people are coming to you? What's the biggest pain point you find? Or is it just then being overwhelmed and avoiding? Because that is probably a lot of
2
Speaker 2
3:51
it? Yeah, I think people just avoid it, period, because they just don't like it. And, and like you mentioned, there's so much that you can think you can do on your own. Now, with the amazing technology we have, that people just tend to either neglect it or just kind of do it. Take a shortcut. And then they, when they find out they've really got a business, then they're like, Okay, now what have I done, make sure that I've done this right. And then they're scared. But sometimes it's too late, right? They come to me, Hey, we just got sued. And we didn't do anything, right, the beginning. And so it's kind of those two things. And a big pain point they have is they'll they'll go to some business.org and they'll file their LLC certificate, right? But then they don't do an operating room. And they don't do organizational minutes. And then they come in and say, Hey, I've got a partner that's not doing what he's supposed to be doing. How do I get how do I get rid of? Well, it can be difficult when you have an agreement on how to do that. Yeah, no, I
Law Smith
4:50
know, I've been through all that. I had a business partner I that we did that exact scenario pretty much we had to make it well. Yeah, that we made an operating agreement, but it was still like to dissolve his partnership part. It was a pain in the ass. Because it wasn't. It wasn't as clear cut as when I got it formally done by my business attorney. But so you're saying like, the thing basically is be more proactive than reactive?
2
Speaker 2
5:23
Yes. Yeah. Basically, what we're asking visitors to do is make a paradigm shift to Hey, lawyers aren't emergency rooms, their primary care. So come in, get that get the well checks, make sure everything's good. So you avoid the cardiac arrest.
3
Speaker 3
5:41
So for people who are super lazy, can you explain how often you have to deal with these things? So you do it? All right, one time at the beginning? How often? Are you checking up on these? How long can you kind of put that on the backburner and not worry about it?
2
Speaker 2
5:57
You can't we talk with our clients monthly, so that we can keep our finger on the pulse of what's going on. Make sure we're asking really good questions to uncover things that they're doing that they haven't told us yet. Owners are really bad about doing things that are telling no one, and then those come up. And it's like, whoa, you can't do it that way. Stop it.
Law Smith
6:21
You have any examples that you can show me? I'm
6:23
getting juicy? Wow, really.
2
Speaker 2
6:24
I mean, it's yeah, it's not sexy, but easy. One is, I was talking to one of our remodeling contractor clients, and he was doing bids, and didn't have anywhere on his bid an expiration date. If you've noticed or not, but we're gonna we're gonna word economy where the cost of the supplies is doubling daily. If you don't have an expiration on that offer that you made, and they accept your offer, you're stuck, you're going to contract to supply those goods for that price. So you've got to have an expiration date on those things. And so he quickly cancelled those offers, redid his estimate form, and now he's covered where they're only good for 30 days.
3
Speaker 3
7:08
Then bringing that indoors at work order from 89.
Law Smith
7:15
What's the Yeah? Your competitors coupons still to apply? How
7:20
much do you charge for asbestos
Law Smith
7:22
is so let's let's hear about you personally. I assume you're an attorney that got into more of a coaching business area,
7:32
we should check up on the law and stuff, right?
Law Smith
7:36
Yes, they go certified. We got some of that. But what's your background? I guess? Yeah, we
2
Speaker 2
7:42
might story. I got a marketing degree back in 1991. And came out of college ready to go do some marketing. And everyone said, No, you got to go sell something. So they wanted me to sell phones and copiers and all that kind of stuff. And so I tried that and was a authorized agent had my own business selling for a major telecom company, and they breached my contract. And I'm like, Okay, I know, this isn't happening to me again, I'm gonna understand my deal what I'm doing. So I did what every normal American would do, I signed up for law school. So off to Norman, Oklahoma to you, Erin Brockovich. Put in three years, got my law degree. And then I started, firms, started litigating, and was litigating lots of corporate things, small things. I've litigated about everything, you can litigate really here in Texas, and had a problem that I had it, I didn't really know, I had it till 2012. My clients weren't calling me before they made the decisions. And so they would go make bad decisions, which would get them in a big trouble, then they come and say, Scott, pull us out of this. We would work on it, fix the problem, charge them a ton of money to fix it. And then they would be, I wouldn't say unhappy, but not happy because it costs too much money. So they go away, make more foolish mistakes, and then call us back and say, Scott, hey, will you put this fire out? Yeah, but why didn't you have me look at that contract first? Well, I didn't want to pay you by the hour. It's kind of what it ended up being. And so we had to create a new model. So in 2012, I started looking around at business coaching. I didn't really I didn't know any business coaches. I just kind of had heard that. That's the thing. And so I started interviewing business coaches went through two or three coaches finally found one that understood my vision for creating this subscription model. So entrepreneurs can have on demand access, and we created the access plan. And my practice started shifting to this proactive practice. From a litigation practice, we still occasionally litigate for clients, because it's just sometimes you have to, but our goal is to minimize those problems to what we call shatterproof in businesses, so you only have small dents in your windshield and not shatter glass.
Law Smith
10:00
Probably proactive practice as your as your tagline. But you've got a whole program around the shatterproof I can see it in the screens in which I liked that as you got that you got the branding going in the background subtly throughout this interview, if anybody's watching on video that's really savvy of you to see this model as a little something to disrupt in a way. Because I'll tell you from the invoicing standpoint, just a woman marketing agency side,
10:37
charging hourly is a
Law Smith
10:38
pain. Right? And I would get in and you argue over it, and now we've Yeah. And our friend of the program, Dean Akers told us recently, when you start arguing about the agreement, the relationships ruin these, like, personal or business and I was like, I wanted to challenge him. I was like, that's pretty much that's pretty good. Right to the core. And so when I had to, like, I would, I'd be like, Fine, I'll show you all open source. Everything. I'll show you how many hours was spent on everything. How many hours? Why did it take so long to do it? I didn't put it on there. And you know what, I'll throw everything in, never came out to a good eye. It was one of those things where you do it? I would do it. It'd be like, so if you do, I'll show you everything right? I'm a I'm a fourth rate human. I did. I did everything correctly. You know, like, all in marketing. I always have dug up my ass because a lot of people are full of shit, and don't actually do the work that they say. And so my thing was like, I'll show you all here you go. I'll just make it open to you. They've never ever, ever, ever moved the needle one bit, never made the relationship better. At best, they slogged out whatever contract we had, because I had a good business attorney, that people would look at it and be like Jesus Christ, this thing.
12:06
Pages? Well, you
Law Smith
12:08
know, I grew up around all attorneys. So I get like, you know, it's that thing of like, it's the four corners. Your contracts is only good as it is tight. It's specific, right? So it's like, you get screwed once and you're like, never get in kind of like your situation, right? You had a breach of the employment contract. And you're like, I want to dig into this. And not that I went to law school, but I felt like I would anytime I got with my business attorney, I just asked him all these questions. And I needed them once every three months, just to see if there's because I had to do this with my doctor. He hates it. I lay down I put an Evernote I put a bunch of random questions in and then when I do a checkup, I just asked him like 40 questions, right? And he never gives me a good answer because it never gets sued, but but I still do it anyway. Okay.
13:02
Escobar vaginas.
1
Speaker 1
13:03
Well, I work I'm curious how they work. And I've never had one though. I don't see a lot of them. So it's a makeup on
3
Speaker 3
13:10
we're addressing there are maybe some like yoga pants. Yeah, that distract them.
Law Smith
13:16
Whatever you say. You told me about Cornell Pornhub. In so yeah, of course. That's That's it. And so it's one of those things, we're, it's funny, you have an origin story for this, where you're kind of like, I got screwed. I'm not getting screwed again. Now I'm gonna help people not screw themselves. What? I'm trying to think so along the way of creating a program. What What were some of the kind of hurdles you had doing this? Because you said you started in 2012? We started developing this.
13:55
Yeah, a 10. Year overnight success.
Law Smith
13:59
What were some of those hurdles getting this going? Because I'm kind of interested in the business of the business coaching. Yeah,
2
Speaker 2
14:05
yeah. Well, what what do we what do you include in it? What, what, what features benefits did not actually need from their lawyer on a regular basis? What did they find his value? Right? Because I had to stack enough value in my plan. Like, there was 10 times more than they're paying. And then I had to figure out, Okay, what does it actually cost to deliver the service that we're putting in this list of things? And then I had to have my different versions of it, right? Because you can't just have one you have to have two or three versions of it. And so trying to come up with the right mix of things to include in the plan, and then the things what will we not do? What is what is excluded no matter what it's not included in this plan. And that's kind of a big problem for everyone that they kind of overlook is what am I not doing for you and putting that in the contract. So that was the pricing. So the Cost throughout the cost of it was a big deal. And then figuring out kind of the sweet point for pricing, it has been kind of the big deal. And it literally, it took a lot of trial and error, no one else was doing this. So I couldn't, I couldn't just go copy someone else. You know, the fastest way to success would have been to find someone else, reverse engineer it, and then do my own. And in 2012, it just really didn't exist. So we had to kind of trial and error it, but figuring out what entrepreneurs actually needed. And then I think my biggest challenge wasn't really building it. It was selling it. Because like you said, it's disruptive. No one's out there looking for, Hey, where's the lawyer, I can pay every month? There's no, I've looked at Google and no one's searching that. So it really became difficult to educate entrepreneurs that, hey, you need to have this regular relationship with a lawyer. So you can be asking the 40 questions. That was the that's been the biggest hurdle that we've had.
3
Speaker 3
16:03
Well, so for the praising, how did that go? I'm curious, because I feel like it definitely transfers over to a lot of people that wasn't. It's really not. I mean, law and I are very much in the digital services realm where it's similar in that you can't really it's not tangible, necessarily all the time, you know, what you're doing? Did you start with Well, I want to live this lifestyle. And that equates to this much per year. And if I get this many clients, I'm just I know, you don't want to necessarily give away
Law Smith
16:37
professional services, sauce, professional services, tough to rice. Again, ours is volatile. Wild, like, all right, yours could be considered the same, in a way, depending
16:52
on more of a history.
Law Smith
16:54
Yeah, there's definitely at least a model of retainer, right? That to go off of that. How did you kind of, you know, figure this out, because I used to this is another thing, I used to just go nuts, trying to figure out what I should do price?
2
Speaker 2
17:11
Well, like I said, the first thing I had to figure out was what was my cost to deliver the service? Right? So I knew because the number one formula you have to know in businesses, that to make money in business, you have to charge more for your product or service than it cost to make it. So I knew that rule. So I've got my cost down, then I started playing with the price to figure out what what would people pay? What, what price points gave me, because there's also you're not charging enough and no one took it seriously. So I had to find that mover. And it really was sometimes I would go in to the meeting and quote, a brand new price, just they had never done just to see how that would go in the sales process. And now we're now we've kind of got it pretty solidified. And so just for, for discussion, you know, we have three tiers, our first year starts at 599 a month. In the in that program, you cheat for companies. Exactly. Yeah. And I want I want it to be something that is affordable for someone that has legit business, right? If it's a hobby, now, you can't afford this. But if it's a legit business, you can afford it. And you know, you get all your LLC is formed. We do all the documentation, you just pay whatever state filing fee, we do all your contracts, we do your contract reviews, you're doing monthly checking calls with us, you have SOS calls, you get a collection system and employment system, an employee discipline system, all this stuff built into your, into your package. And the the that's the that's the price, though. And then as your company grows, you go up the ladder, the next ladder is 1099. And then it goes to 1599. And that's kind of where we max out.
Law Smith
18:52
Yeah, and you kind of arrived at what I was thinking, you figured out, you have a trial and error, but you the price is whatever the person's willing to pay.
19:03
So it's elastic to point. Yeah.
3
Speaker 3
19:07
So I've seen, I mean, there's like payroll companies that will do just about anything that your business needs to do. Like there's certain ones, you know, big ones that have branches, or that offer legal services. Is that something that is different than what I'm learning than what you're doing? Or is it something that you just kind of copied off to say, hey, we
2
Speaker 2
19:32
do this do? Well, I mean, there's there's some companies that offer legal
19:39
for HR, right as well.
3
Speaker 3
19:41
No, they offer straight up legal counsel, legal advice, I guess it is, yeah,
2
Speaker 2
19:45
there's legal packages available. A lot of a lot of a lot of employment employment packages come with them as a benefit. And there's a law firm contracted with that company in each state to provide that service. But and there's probably some value to it, the problem is you don't have any relationship with the lawyer or law firm that you're dealing with. And I like to say that we're, we're those plans on steroids, because we actually know you, we know your business, we spend time with you, and you're gonna know not just me, you know, my team. And so we're able to really help you do things and grow exponentially, where if you're just calling the lawyer that's on call, and having them do a demand letter or create a contract. Yeah, might be legally correct. But they're going missing a lot of context for how you're trying to do business, right? Because you the wrong contract, can hurt you. If your contract is to, to mean for lack of a better word, no one, no one wants to sign it, well, you're not gonna have any sales. So your contract has to be something that it's got all the things you want in it to make sure that you can collect on your you can collect, and if you're not agreeing to something you don't want to do. But it's got to be friendly enough that people want to do business with you, in a lot of lawyers, especially ones that don't care, because they're not getting paid very much. Don't will give you a document that yeah, it's legally correct. But it's not. Right.
Law Smith
21:13
It's mad libs. For a lot of it. It's a lot of templating. And then I would say the sell on that is, every time you have to call a lawyer, you don't have to start over.
3
Speaker 3
21:24
Yeah. Oh, that relationship brings foresight. You know, they're really they're knowledgeable about your business and the potential risks. And it's not just the guy on call, they can when they're doing the current contract, whatever can bring all of that into into play and, you know, formulate for that.
2
Speaker 2
21:44
Yeah, so it's much more of a holistic approach. And then, you know, we a lot of times with the client, their biggest problem that day isn't a legal issue, their biggest problem is, hey, we don't have any sales. And so then we're talking about, okay, well, what's going on with your funnel? Where, you know, what is a conversion problem? Or is it a lead problem? And so we'll work through those problems with them, too, because the more successful they are, the more successful I am.
3
Speaker 3
22:09
I did not realize you guys did that side of things. Also, that's a whole nother thing.
22:14
That's
Law Smith
22:17
we're talking to an official Zig Ziglar, small business lawyer zebrawood, Legacy certified trainer at, you know, so you're walking through that whole scenario, they use your cost per lead, here's your cost per acquisition. Here's how much you should probably standard, you're getting into everything. You bet. Interesting. So how do you? Do you have a team of people that? Is everybody just kind of overall on your team? Do they have an overall scope? On the business and legal side like you do? Or do you have a kind of specialized? Or is it by industry? Maybe?
2
Speaker 2
22:58
Yeah, most of my team is on the legal side. And when it gets to the business, what I would call the business coaching or consulting, that's going to be me. And then I do have some vendors that I have preferred relationships with if we need to, like solve, like, if they need a new landing page or a new website. I have people that can help put that stuff together. I can I'm very, but I'm good as bought into problems. And then getting getting them to the right fix.
23:24
Yeah, yeah. Vendor Let's go. So
23:29
up binder, I
Law Smith
23:30
got stuck. Okay, I'll be offended. Oh, I'm taking pick up always. Psychologically, so we have kind of a one of the themes on this show that we've talked about is entrepreneurship is secretly very isolating. It's very lonely. I'm guessing a lot of your call your monthly call it like you said, it's not about legal. And it's more about I need to vent about not having sales to someone that is intelligent that knows what's going on. Is that kind of one question. But
2
Speaker 2
24:11
it's even more than that. It's more about just connecting with someone that understands them and knows them and cares about them.
24:19
Yeah, fostering that relationship.
2
Speaker 2
24:22
Since about the hiking trip. They just went on with their kid. Sure. It sometimes we never talked about business. They need someone that they know like and trust and those that can that we care about them. And once we have that, then they know that everything else will be okay because they can bring it to it, bring it to us and we'll help them work through it. And so it's just us becoming that trusted adviser and friend, where before when I charged by the hour that there was a huge wall there. They subconsciously they were they thought I was taking longer to do their work than possible then And then it might be needed. And then if they call me I was gonna build them for everything, which wasn't right. I didn't. But, but now that that barriers gone, man, they call me and it's just two friends talking. And that's where you get really transparent. And I can learn things that can be more helpful. And then the deeper that relationship goes, the more I can help
3
Speaker 3
25:21
you to be proactive, then the proactive practice, then they reveal things, you know, that they might not reveal. Normally, in a personal,
2
Speaker 2
25:32
like, I'm getting I got a text, right, just a minute ago from one of our access members. It's like, he has an idea, and he needs a legal opinion on. It may be a bad idea. But he's not gonna spend any more money than he already has spent this month to run it pass on one that actually would know, from a legal perspective.
Law Smith
25:53
Yeah, so Okay. Yeah. It's interesting. The it's, it's an out of house in house kind of Council.
26:00
Council. Yes.
Law Smith
26:04
Council, yeah. Jory. rural Texas.
3
Speaker 3
26:09
I'm just curious if there was any situations where you're talking personal, and they didn't put they didn't connect the dots on how something they had maybe done recklessly, personal, might affect their business. You know, like, the bookstore,
2
Speaker 2
26:25
I care where someone had created some kind of personal liability. We do a lot of asset protection planning with our clients. And one of the things we do, we use some asset protection trusts. And sometimes they're, they'll do things in their personal life that will mess up some of that stuff. Like they'll divorce, yes, like a divorce. Or they'll write a deposit, they'll write a check for a personal account, put it in a trust account, and they can they'll mess things up. And so usually, that happens when they've taken some time off from calling us. They'll make those stupid mistakes, the more they're talking to us, if it's on a regular basis, you know, they're able to ask those questions before they do it. And that's, that's that power of that regular, those regular check ins. Three months is great. But if you can do that every month, even for just 15 minutes, your your questions are much more relevant because they're now we're answering questions in real time. I'd like to say that the difference, the difference between success and failure is often the timing of that information.
Law Smith
27:31
Yeah, for sure. In your Yeah, that's well said. It's one of those things where now I gotta let thoughts go in my head. But the psychology have, you had to kind of turn someone around. I'm trying to think more proactively, unless maybe impulsively. It sounds like some of these decisions can be impulsive, and not obviously not thought through ahead of time. And they may go home, and then they're like scrambling, which is a lot of entrepreneurs in general. Yeah,
2
Speaker 2
28:05
like, hey, yeah, like, I'll find out. I'll look on Instagram, and they just, they're in a new office. And I'm like, I don't remember seeing that lease agreement. And then you get the deer in the headlights look. Oh, yeah, I should have sent that to you. And so training
2
Speaker 2
28:29
you're paying me for this, you got to send everything through us so that you're not making any stupid mistakes. Because we can make enough mistakes. Just even I mean, things are still going to happen. Even if we're looking at everything you do. Everything is not going to ever be perfect. So let's let's minimize those problems, get everything run through us. And it's a learning curve. And the longer they're with us and we still have our very first access member from 2012 is still with us.
Law Smith
28:53
That's awesome. That yeah, you're an ER doctor of sorts, you're just trying to mitigate risk a lot of the time and you're trying to do whatever he can when they I'm sure when they come to you it's a bunch of problems. Yeah, that sounds very familiar. If I can
3
Speaker 3
29:15
be a business coach I'd say give that first guy just let him just freebie rest until you because once you if he leaves you or she I don't know I keep saying he could they leave you can't keep saying that they're still with you. Lock them ever get like huge discount. This is my opinion.
4
Speaker 4
29:32
In a Zig Ziglar certify when I'm just throwing out an idea, but if you don't pay for it.
29:38
There's no social contract.
29:41
Free is. Yeah,
29:43
the cost value theory value. Yeah.
29:46
The free zero was obvious.
Law Smith
29:49
Well, it's been interesting. We we close out every time I guess it's been on for the first time. This question, what advice would you give you A 13 year old sell,
2
Speaker 2
30:03
man. Do things faster? Don't over analyze them. Any examples? Well, I mean, the closest one, I wish I had started my own firm years sooner than I did. I was I was scared. I had opportunities where I could, I mean, I stepped over millions of dollars to pick up dollar bills, because I was scared.
Law Smith
30:34
Where it just the anxiety of failing,
2
Speaker 2
30:37
yeah, potentially responsibilities. I had a family and I was scared to go out and take a bet on me. I could that I could generate enough income to support my family without a law firm around me. And because I didn't do that I walked away from money.
30:55
Well, but now you have knowledge
30:56
and money and money.
Law Smith
31:01
Well, I appreciate you. Coming on. Yeah, hit us up if you ever need anything, and thanks for coming.
31:09
Hey, thanks for having me. It's fun, guys.
31:10
Thank you.
