Gratitude is a Gift You Give Yourself

The holidays are upon us and it’s a time when everyone takes actions to show their gratitude. But why confine it to only one or two months out of twelve? Whether you have existing clients or someone nibbling on the postcard hook, or you are out there stone cold calling, take some donuts, or some candy, or a nice basket with cookies.  I do this quite often with my existing clients; yes, existing.  This simple gesture does two things;  it builds customer loyalty, and it lets anyone else in that law firm who isn’t a client want to be your client so they can be the recipient of those goodies.  When following up with those who are not yet a client, but who have shown some interest by responding to some of your other marketing, follow up on the call by making a visit with a sweet offering. 

Most of the people you are going to be dealing with on a day-to-day basis are legal assistants; secretaries, paralegals and legal assistants who are predominantly female.  What wonderful lady doesn’t like chocolate?  Or scented candles?  Or cookies?   Bubble bath soap?  If they weren’t a client yet, by the time you leave the law firm, they will be if not for the simple reason that you made them feel special with your nice gift.  Holidays are the perfect time to focus on gift giving, Halloween, Christmas or even Valentine’s Day, but so is any other day of the year.

Here’s a perfect example of how it can work.  A particular legal assistant at a law firm where I did not have clients had contacted me about obtaining a copy of a court document. She knew I had retrieved a copy of this document for a client of mine who happened to be on the other side of the lawsuit her law firm was working on.  She just wanted to get a copy of the document and knew I could provide it as I had a copy already.  Her firm was going to (naturally) pay for the copy, but that didn’t mean at this point she was going to start using me to obtain court documents or serve legal process or conduct investigations for her on a regular basis.  I saw this one contact as an opportunity and used it to my advantage.

I provided what she needed and sent it to her along with my invoice.  A month went by and the invoice came up in my accounting system as having not been paid.  I wasn’t worried that I wouldn’t get paid.  Someone else might have, but I was familiar with the type of law firm she worked at and had a good feeling that it was merely an oversight by accounting department folks (which it was).  I contacted her, and gently reminded her that the invoice had come up past due.  I also made some small-talk with her, and was generally friendly in tone, then hung up and went about my day.  A week later the invoice was paid.  But that isn’t the end of the story. 

Since I had had some interaction with this legal assistant, I put her on my list for a goody basket for Christmas.  I went to the firm in person and delivered a basket filled with the candy and cookies.  Instead of being confronted by the receptionist as just another solicitor (with a scowl), I was instead welcomed (with a glowing smile).  I introduced myself, said I had a basket for the legal assistant, and asked if she could come and get it so I could meet her. 

As it turned out, the legal assistant wasn’t in that day, but that was fine.  I left the basket for her with her name on it and my business cards in it.  Then six weeks later, Valentine’s Day came up.  I did the same thing.  I delivered a nicely boxed Valentine chocolate from a very high-end chocolatier.  The legal assistant was out to lunch, so again I couldn’t meet her (honestly, my timing was simply off with this one).

On St. Patrick’s Day, I went with a bag of goodies to help celebrate that holiday.  This time, I figured, I haven’t received any work from her, or a thank you, or a phone call, and had not been able to meet with her, so I just left the bag of goodies, and figured this would probably be the last shot at it. 

A week went by and I received a handwritten note from her on the law firm’s stationery.  She told me how sorry she was for not having written sooner, or having called to say thank you, but she was so happy for the goodies she had received over the last few months.  In fact, she was most appreciative of the Valentine’s Day gift as she was single and had been feeling gloomy on Valentine’s Day until my gift showed up.  I still have the letter to this day even though it was written years ago. 

Subsequently, she called me to serve a subpoena for her attorney.  Then another assignment came in -- and then another and another.  Then another legal assistant in her law firm contacted me.  She said she had been referred by the first and needed a citation served, and then she called again a few weeks later, and then called again, and again, etc.  This went on throughout that law firm, which was a sizable office with a couple dozen attorneys.

 To this day, I still receive a substantial number of assignments from various legal assistants and attorneys in that law firm, and some of them have become good friends beyond being merely just clients.  From that one opportunity and a little persistence combined with sweet bribery of the chocolate type, I was able to obtain a repeat client and a large stream of continuous income.  That first legal assistant eventually left that law firm and went to another.  She recommended me around the office of her new law firm.  Then she moved on to another law firm and did the same thing there.  I didn’t even need to sell to these other law firms.  She did the selling for me and all because I made her day … one day …Valentine’s Day.

But, you might ask, why do this for existing clients?  I already have their business. Why would I want to spend the time and the money?  Two reasons: loyalty, and because I personally enjoy giving.  It feels good to give.

Look, your clients are, and will always be, the only reason you are in business.  Without them, you have no business.  You have no income. You have no house, car, computer, phone, vacation money, groceries, or electricity.  Take care of each one of them as if their assignments were the only ones you have in your hand.  If you show them appreciation (i.e., a little love, a little friendship), along with a competent service, they will be a customer for life.  What’s more, you will have such a good feeling in your heart when you see the look in their eyes once they get a nice gift for the holidays.  You’re giving back, you’re saying thank you for the business they have given you which has allowed you to feed your family or make your mortgage payment.  Show a little love and be grateful.

I am so thankful for the opportunity my friends (clients) have provided me by being of service to them. If they hadn’t let me serve their papers, or retrieve their court documents, or investigate the matters involved in their lawsuits, I would be homeless … or worse yet, working in a dead-end job for somebody else.  They have given me everything and I rejoice in that. 

Even if it is just a basket of cookies, it is the very least I can do to bring them a little something to show my appreciation that they do business with me.  And you should do the same with your existing clients.  It is an expression of gratitude which can nurture the continuance of a relationship with your customer. And, being nice is a gift you give yourself.

As a final thought, if you know of someone who is just starting out their process server business, consider gifting them with a copy of my book The Business End of Process Service, Running a Process Service Company from the Ground Up or CounterSpy, The Industrial Counter-Surveillance Manual, both available on Amazon.com

http://www.amazon.com/Business-End-Process-Service-ebook/dp/B008E8RBHK/ref=sr_1_8?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407774550&sr=1-8&keywords=bob+hill and http://www.amazon.com/CounterSpy-Bob-Hill-ebook/dp/B00BTJYU1Q/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407774644&sr=1-3&keywords=counterspy/  

Introduce, Involve, Increase (Upgrade)

Are you ready to grow sideways through your client base?  Once you have a client or two, a good way to get more business is to do a great job for them and then keep them in the loop and engaged in the process (no pun intended). 

Educate them a little on what benefits they are receiving from doing business with you and finally, increase the amount of work you do for them simply by introducing them to new, additional services.  It’s the same client; you have just offered a different service that will benefit them.  It’s what McDonald’s does every day.

It works like this at McDonald’s.  You come in and ask for a hamburger.  The attendant asks if you want cheese on it.  You say, yes.  Then the attendant asks if you want fries.  You say, yes.  Then the attendant asks if you want a large order of fries.  You say, yes.  Then the attendant asks if you want something to drink.  And once again you say, yes.  In fact, the whole process with them has become so routine, that most people now walk into their restaurants and before the attendant can even ask if you want a hamburger with cheese and a large order of fries with a drink, the customer already knows what they are going to be asked, and they just spew it all out at once.

You can do the same thing in process service.  How do you upsell when all you are doing is serving a paper?  Here’s an easy example.  Your client contacts you to serve a subpoena.  And you respond by telling them that you can do that, and then you ask, do you want us to place a rush on that?  And they say, yes.  Or, you ask them, do you want me to prepare the subpoena for you (which under certain circumstances you can legally do), and they say, yes. Two add-on services, just like that.

Here’s another example.  Your client may already know that you serve court documents, but do they also know that you know how to locate people who need to be served?  This is called skip tracing.  This is an additional service you can provide.  Or perhaps you can offer to do courier service for the client, or act as a notary public for sworn documents.  If you are qualified and licensed, you can also offer private investigations for your client.  Plenty of attorneys have a need for investigative services.  If you are already working on their process service, doesn’t it make sense that it is easier to give you the investigations, seeing as they already know you, than for them to locate an investigator, get quotes, vet them, retain them, etc.? 

So, in that way you introduce the client to a new service. You involve them in the new service by providing quality customer service (so they know, like and trust you) then educate them into process, and increase the level of services they want from you by introducing yet another new or additional service.  It could become an endless cycle if you could find an endless number of services to provide.  You could start out with the basic service of serving court documents for one client. Using the process above, before too long, you could be serving the court documents, running investigations, locating witnesses, notarizing documents, completing courier deliveries, retrieving court records, researching court files, preparing subpoenas, and on and on and on.

Looking for a great holiday gift for your favorite process service businessperson? Try The Business End of Process Service (Running a Process Service Company from the Ground Up).  You might also enjoy CounterSpy, The Industrial Espionage Counter-Surveillance Manual; my other book. Both may be found on Amazon.com.

Marketing Objectives

As a small process service business, I find it helpful to set marketing objectives. One of the most important objectives I have is to make and/or keep my target market aware of my services. After all, if they don’t know about my business, the likelihood of them using my service is pretty much nonexistent. I know I’ve discussed this before, but I can’t emphasize enough the importance of getting your name out there.

Most of us have limited marketing budgets, making it essential to focus those dollars on marketing that will cost-effectively deliver the intended results. When you set up your marketing projects, think of them in terms of marketing campaigns.  A marketing campaign is a well thought out plan, with a focus on the “what”, the “who” and the “how”. What being the goal, who being your target market, and how being the action or execution of your plan. 

Your marketing campaign should include a solid understanding of who your target market is, where you reside in the market, and where you want to be. It should also be detailed enough to include what you want your message to convey, including specific wording.

For instance, in my business, Record Time Retrieval and Investigations, I always want my market to understand that I place importance on the timeliness of my service. But I also want them to understand that I do it correctly, not just fast.

Further, I need to keep in mind that I while I have one market for process service – the legal community – I have two sub-markets; existing clients and potential clients. This may create a need for separate marketing campaigns; one to attract new clients and one to maintain current clients. Fortunately, in our business most of the time I can utilize the same marketing plan for either type. Review your market to determine if the same will work for you.

Here are a few ideas to include in a good marketing campaign for process service: 

• Advertise in your local bar association newsletter – key here is being industry specific and targeting one demographic – law firms.
• Advertise in the local business pages (delivered and on-line yellow pages, on-line business directories, etc.)  Even a small one line ad is better than nothing.
• Business cards – place these in the hands of every court clerk you meet. Often an attorney or private individual is at the courthouse filing their lawsuit and they don’t know a process server. If they ask the court clerk, who just happens to have your business card on hand, bam! You’ve just received a referral. A word of caution here, don’t just drop your card and expect to receive referrals. Strive to develop a friendly, business relationship. Offer a smile, a friendly word or even an occasional cookie or donut.
• Using a copy of the local bar association membership listing or directory, identify those attorneys who practice litigation. Once you identify them, whether they are in family law, personal injury, commercial litigation, debt collection, etc., develop a mail marketing campaign that targets this specific market. Your mailing might start out as a postcard that provides your contact information (company name, phone number and state) as well as the specific services you offer them. Then consider a second mailing; again it could be a postcard, or a full greeting card, that would send them a friendly greeting. You may have to send out several mailing before you receive a response. However, once you do and you complete the assignment with excellent customer service, you most likely will have a client for life.

When planning your mail marketing campaign, remember the Rule of Five. What is the Rule of Five you ask? The Rule of Five states that a potential customer may have to see your message five times before they actually consider hiring you, using your service or purchasing your product. It helps if your five messages aren’t always asking for something from them (such as business from them), but rather a message that is giving. Can you think of a helpful hint to send that would make their business life easier? How about a postcard just saying, “Have a nice day”? The goal is not to shove your business down their throat, but instead to keep you at the top of their mind so when they have a need for your services, your business number is the one they dial.

These are just a few ideas for a marketing campaign. If you have something different that works for you, I’d appreciate you sharing your comments below.

If you haven’t checked it out, more pertinent information on running your process service business can be found in my book The Business End of Process Service (Running a Process Service Company from the Ground Up).  You might also enjoy CounterSpy, The Industrial Espionage Counter-Surveillance Manual; my other book. Both may be found on Amazon.com.

Micromanaging Your Process Service Business - or not

“Hold on, just a little bit tighter now…”

While those might be great lyrics for a song, they’re not the best way to run your process service business, or most any other business. Sure there are things you have to hold on to tightly, things like control of your finances, adherence to your mission statement, working “on” your business and so on. But there are also areas where you have to learn to let go. Primarily those areas are focused in the area of working “in” your business.

Last posting I spoke of the advantages of outsourcing. Whether you outsource to a 1099 contract employee or you bite the bullet and hire (another form of outsourcing – as you are not doing the work) a W-2 employee there are distinct advantages, the primary one being the freeing up of your time to focus on other than the day-to-day functions. Without the day-to-day stuff holding your hostage you can set up additional prospect meetings, work on customer retention and service or add balance in your life with a short or long vacation, or just an evening off.

So now you’ve taken the big entrepreneurial step and found help for you and your business. You provided the training they would need to do the work you have delegated to them. Awesome! How are you doing with that? Are you letting them do their job, or are you holding on, just a little bit tighter, afraid to let go?

When I finally realized I’d have to suck it up and just delegate the work, I had to overcome that psychological barrier that I think many small business owners deal with as their companies expand – micromanaging helps no one. The reality of it was that other people that I had gathered around me could actually do the job just as good as I could. In some instances, they could even do it better than me; heck, that’s why they were hired. And whenever someone other than me made a mistake, the mistakes were so few and far between, that it was manageable from a customer service perspective. It took a bit of doing, but eventually I overcame me fear of letting go and let others do the work. To be completely honest, this probably saved the company because it allowed me to rest, breathe, and think while others handled the nuts and bolts of day-to-day field operations.

So delegate / outsource where you can and then let go and watch your business grow.

What are your feelings toward delegation? Please share if you are so inclined. As always, I appreciate any feedback.

If you enjoy these tips, you'll find more like them in my book "The Business End of Process Service, Running a Process Service Company from the Ground Up". You might also like my other book "CounterSpy, The Industrial Counter-Surveillance Manual", both available on Amazon.com
http://www.amazon.com/Business-End-Process-Service-ebook/dp/B008E8RBHK/ref=sr_1_8?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407774550&sr=1-8&keywords=bob+hill and http://www.amazon.com/CounterSpy-Bob-Hill-ebook/dp/B00BTJYU1Q/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407774644&sr=1-3&keywords=counterspy/  

Growing Your Process Service Business Through Delegation

The goal of every start-up business, including process service, should be to reach a point where you have so much work you cannot reasonably handle it by yourself. Ideally you have already decided how big you want to grow and how to handle the growth.  What makes this tricky is that growth all too often has a mind of its own and doesn’t always follow plan.  Hopefully, you have written at least a simple, basic business plan (nothing fancy required) and have set out the action(s) to take when your business outgrows your personal capacity. Just be flexible and go with the flow when you have your growth spurts, but be realistic in what you can reasonably handle without affecting customer service and your health, both physically and mentally.

What I’m talking about is expanding your business through delegation. But, you say, it’s just me and I don’t have any employees to delegate to. Neither did I when it happened to me many years ago. But after considerable reflection on where my business was and where I wanted it to go, I realized that I would need to bring on additional servers or a partner.

At the time I was working 80 hours a week and the annual gross revenue of the company was only $69,000. The following year, I brought on servers to help out and an admin person in the office. Our gross revenue shot up to $105,000 and my work hours dropped to 55 per week. Even with the additional expense of servers and an admin, I worked fewer hours and made more in net profit. Now that’s what I’m talking about!

You don’t have to hire employees. You can contract process servers and even admin help. With the convenience and flexibility of the “Cloud” so much can be accomplished today between work colleagues without ever meeting face to face. If you can handle the mandatory on-site paperwork (think filing) a virtual assistant can often take care of all the other admin work.

So if you've reached that plateau in your process service business where all you do is work in the business with no time to work on the business, consider delegating. If you're like me, you'll be glad you did.

Process Service Marketing – Reviewing Ten Basic Steps

Sometimes it just makes sense to revisit the basics. Life is not static, neither is your business. What may have worked for you once upon a time, may not work as well for you today. That being said, let’s revisit my ten basic marketing steps that a process server should take to become successful. 

Your primary job is to get jobs. You can't serve court documents if you don't have them in your hand.  To that end, one of the first rules of business a process server has to learn is this.  If you don't have a job, then your job becomes finding a job.  Even when you have jobs, you should always be actively looking for the next one. More succinctly, you need to market your services.

Here are some very basic steps to take to get you moving, some of which require some capital while others require just a little of your time.

1.  Advertise in the classified section of the local bar association newsletter.

2.  Order quality business cards and place them in the hands of every court clerk that will take them.  When someone comes into the courthouse to file a lawsuit, they may not already have a process server in mind, and if they ask the court clerk, your card will be right there at their fingertips.

3.  Obtain the member mailing list from your local bar association.  This could or could not be a little pricey, but now you have the names and addresses of all the attorneys in town that belong to the association.  Begin by mailing postcards to those addresses by the hundreds.  Be patient with this, though.  On average it might take sending your postcard to the same attorneys up to five times before they finally contact you.  Find a way to make your mailing stand out from others they may be getting. For instance, instead of asking them for the job – send a series of cards (a marketing campaign) with different messages – from an introduction, to a “have a nice day” to “give me a call when you need service”. There are programs and services available to make this a smooth, affordable process.

4.  You need a website.  Even if it is nothing more than a very basic online brochure of your services, an online presence is critical in the 21st century.

5.  Social Media Networking.  This falls in line with your website.  You may not have a large budget for setting up and driving traffic to your website.  So, a good way to establish a web presence that may also drive traffic toward your website is through the various social media networks such as Facebook, Linked-In, MerchantCircle, and several others.  Make friends and connections anywhere and everywhere you can, but most especially with fellow process servers, private investigators, and attorneys.

6.  Become a member of an industry association.  Membership fees are generally inexpensive, but the networking possibilities for B2B exchange of work with other servers in other locations throughout the state and the nation are golden.

7.  Become a corporate member of a legal secretaries or paralegal's association.  These associations exist throughout the United States and are a perfect opportunity for you to interact one on one with your key client demographic - legal assistants/paralegals. They may even be a better “target market” for your post card mailings than the attorney list.

8.  Sponsor an event with the local bar association.  You'll get exposure as a vendor and you will be amazed at how inexpensive it is to be a sponsor of an event.

9.  If you already have a client or two (or three), nothing works better than word of mouth.  So, first thing, do a superior job for those clients.  Second, take your clients some goodies -- chocolate works very well with legal secretaries -- or take them to lunch.  Show a genuine interest in them, not just as a client, but as a friend.  Be grateful. Remember, you are building a relationship here that could, over the course of many years, develop into a sizable stream of income, as well as the many, many referrals to other potential clients that these one or two clients will provide where they tout your services for you.

10.  Door to door.  Difficult and sometimes daunting, this one does work, but it is truly a numbers game.  The key here is to know that most likely the law firm you are cold-calling or visiting probably already has a process server to whom they are quite loyal.  You're not there to attempt to take the business away from that process server, but to offer to be the "back-up" in case their guy is too busy, sick, or on vacation.  

Consider what worked for you before. Is it still working? Does the process need modification, updating? What efforts have provided the best ROI? Keep evaluating and refining these ten steps to fit with the current market trends.

I appreciate your following. If you or someone you know would like more tips like these check out my book “The Business End of Process Service, Running a Process Service Company from the Group Up” or for a change of pace check out “CounterSpy, The Industrial Counter-Surveillance Manual”. They are both available on Amazon.com. http://www.amazon.com/Business-End-Process-Service-ebook/dp/B008E8RBHK/ref=sr_1_8?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407774550&sr=1-8&keywords=bob+hill and http://www.amazon.com/CounterSpy-Bob-Hill-ebook/dp/B00BTJYU1Q/ref=sr_1_3?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1407774644&sr=1-3&keywords=counterspy/  I think you’ll find the both useful in your process service business. As always, I welcome your comments. 

Name Branding for Process Service

Record Time Retrieval & Investigations evolved from Record Time Retrieval. Record Time Retrieval was descriptive of the initial service offered of being a business that served subpoenas to obtain business and medical records. It was simple; we retrieved records in record time. Our name aptly described what we did while giving us an identity that our target market could identify with. It was important; however, to be sure we backed our branding by actually providing record time service.

Over time I realized that I was more inclined to work on process service befitting my previous law enforcement background; so the quick turnaround on assignment completions that process service entails was a much better fit for me as owner/employee of the company. As the business evolved we changed the type of service we wanted to provide from records retrieval to process service, eventually adding private investigations. Although we occasionally still do records retrieval, we predominately provide the services of process service and private investigations. Changing the type of service to coincide with my passions and my personality meant that Record Time was no longer as appropriate as it once was. It meant making an adjustment in the name of the company that was more befitting of the services offered.

Here is where we became somewhat stuck. We already had clients, business cards, a website, stationary, etc.  Changing all of that would have confused existing clients and cost the company money.  It was decided that we would change the name of the company from Record Time Retrieval to Record Time Retrieval & Investigations. As you can see, just from my own experience (or lack thereof) the importance of a company name, especially if you change out your services. We actually lucked out in being able to just lengthen the name.

So think carefully when coming up with a name for your business. If your focus is to be a process serving company that is very professional, then a name like Professional Process might work.  If it is important to have your family name on your “shingle”, then by all means, call it Thompson’s Civil Process.  Just remember, the name says it all, and it gives your company a distinct identity as well as (especially, if it has a recognizable, catchy name) a marketable slant that perhaps gives you an edge over your competition.  Think hard and long on it, and what you want the company to represent because you do not want to go through the contortions my company went through when we changed services, but then struggled with how we wanted to represent that change later on down the road.

Like what you've read? Check out my books; available on Amazon.com "The Business End of Process Service, Running a Process Service Company From the Ground Up". or “CounterSpy”. As always, I appreciate your feedback. 

Process Service Online

Is an online presence really necessary? That depends. Do you have all the clients you want? Do you know that in performing a simple search of the internet for “Texas Process Servers” using Google, one of the primary search engines, there were more than 2,000,000 (that’s two million) results. Not all of those are going to be exclusive of one another, but if you expect to get even a small portion of the business, the need for an online presence is pretty much a given.

So, what do you need for an online presence? For starters consider social media. But I’m a process server, not a techie, you moan. What do I know about social media? Do you have opinions about your industry? Do you have helpful advice to offer? Do you have fun or interesting information to share? Then you can do social media. There are many different avenues for social media; some are geared more toward business than others, so you will need to do some research to figure out which will work best for you, your style and your business.  The most important thing to remember for social media is to be consistent. You don’t have to post something every day. But, whether you post daily, a few times a week or a few times a month, be consistent so that your followers will know when to look for your next helpful, fun, or educational share.

Next, you want to consider the importance of a website for process servers. What do you need in a website? Websites can range from relatively inexpensive and simple, self-produced, generally template based, one page informational, no interaction-type of sites to an expensive, custom-designed multi-page, interactive site with all the bells-and-whistles.   So how do you choose which is right for you?  First let me say, not all template sites are inexpensive, nor are all custom-designed websites expensive; but the wrong type of site without proper SEO (search engine optimization – which helps you to be located in the sea of internet information) can be very costly. The other thing you need regardless of how simple or extensive your website may be is that it is “responsive”.  Responsive means that it can be viewed on any mobile device. If it can’t, you might as well not even have one.

www/rtr-i.com

To begin with, the type of website you select will probably come down to what your budget can afford at the time. Like all business tools, the budget should look at not just the initial cash outlay but cost over time and ROI.  Remember, as your business grows your “tools” can always be updated in line with the growth of your business. Feel free to take a look at my site. www.rtr-i.com.

You may think that the first step to building your website is to purchase a domain name (generally your business name or some variation thereof) aligning with your branding, followed by a hosting service. A hosting service is the business that stores the data for you. In reality, the first steps are to know your target market and then develop a plan as to what message you are trying to convey to that market. Classes are held all the time to help small businesses with website planning and design. Once you know who your target market is and what message you are trying to get across, determine your domain name and then get your hosting service. Now you are ready to begin building a site.

If you are just starting out, a basic website set up by yourself or others might not draw in a lot of work without any “search engine optimization” or all that fancy computer “stuff” (as I call it), but get it started. You won't be found as easily without the optimization, but you will at least be online.  Over time, as your company begins to bring in steady revenue, you can always get the right service to upgrade and enhance the website so that customers can find it whenever they conduct a search on the internet for a process server. What little I do know, as I am not an expert in website design, the best thing one can do is to optimize the website so that search engines can easily pick it up.  This requires the ability to understand “key words” and to be able to know how to submit your website to the various search engines, like Google, Yahoo, etc.  I rely on a website hosting service to handle this for our company.  There are also businesses, who are not hosting companies, who specialize in search engine optimization (SEO).

Another way to draw traffic to the website is to consider exchanging links with other businesses as this is known to draw traffic toward your website.  But first and foremost, get the site up and running at the very least.  Then, if you have the funds, hire a “qualified” web professional who knows how to submit your website to the search engines and knows how to push traffic towards your website.  And what I mean by qualified, in my opinion, is ask someone who already has a website where the website is getting traffic on it.  The last thing you want to do is spend a lot of money to have someone set up a website for you and they promise to get the internet traffic to it, too, and then you find out that person or company doesn’t know what they are doing and they are just taking you for a ride on the information superhighway at your expense.  Research the purchase of this tool as you would any vital tool for your business.

If you've read my book “The Business End of Process, Running a Process Service Company From the Ground Up” I'd appreciate a review in the comments below or where it is available on Amazon.com. If you haven't read it yet, it's an easy read with what I consider to be some handy tips for running a process service business.  http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3A%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&ajr=0.

Marketing Your Process Service Business is a Daily Must

I continually remind myself that getting clients and keeping them is what I must do every day; it’s what keeps the doors of Record Time Retrieval & Investigations open. Should I forget to remind myself, I could receive a not so pleasant sign within a very short period in the form of a drop in business. With that drop comes a decrease in accounts receivable.  Even with a client base like ours that repeats, attorneys’ filing lawsuits, if you fail to give good customer service, face-to-face time and/or excellent service, there is someone else out there who will leaving you out in the cold. There are also things out of your control that shrink a client base -- clients going out of business, moving, retiring and/or (heaven forbid) passing through the pearly gates. So if you want to maintain your process service business you have to market your business. If you want to grow your process service business you have to market your business even more and market it with consistency. Market like a shark swims – constantly – or your business, like the non-swimming shark, may die.

Whether you’ve been in business for decades or you are just starting out, it is important to keep a fresh perspective on how you market your business. What may have worked for you one, five or even ten years ago may not work as well for you in today’s market. And nowhere in time is this more evident than today. And tomorrow. Technology is changing at an unprecedented pace modifying, updating, improving; and did I mention changing? With that comes a change in how your clients locate you and even perceive how you do business.

This is one area you don’t want to be a secret agent. Do you know what your on-line presence looks like? Have you checked lately? If not, you should. What’s being posted online could have a big impact on your traffic, both internet traffic and client traffic. Is all your information current? I maintain a website presence and write a blog. I participate in some of the various social media networks. Social Media networks include Facebook, LinkedIn, Google+, Google Hangout, Twitter, and more. I’m also listed 30+ times with specific links to Record Time Retrieval & Investigations. In writing this, I noticed a few of those need to have some slight updates. If you don’t have time to do it, consider outsourcing. Just make sure you have a solid online presence.

A strong online presence will help your business to be located. In our business location is a big thing. Local is important. Being listed where you can be easily found is important. Not just on a computer search, but on everything mobile, phones, tablets, notebooks, etc. Where do your clients look for you? That is where you want to be prominently recorded.

Other areas to be found that I’ve suggested in previous blogs include:

1.     Advertise in your local bar association newsletter.

2.     Yellow pages and business pages – particularly online

3.     Business cards – hand them out to all clients and potential clients. In particular, make sure your court clerks have at least two of your cards.

4.     Market to a list of the members of your local bar association.

5.     Associations – be a member; NAPPS, local, state bar associations.

           

The important thing to remember is find out where your clients “hang out” or seek your services and market there. Market consistently and continuously.

Next time – servicing your customer.

If you enjoy reading my posts, please leave me a comment. I always welcome feedback. If you haven’t yet taken a look at my book, check out “The Business End of Process Service: Running a Process Service Company from the Ground Up”. I think you’ll find a lot of helpful information for working on and growing your business. Thanks. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3A%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&ajr=0. 

Creating a Competitive Advantage

On my last blog I discussed setting a pricing strategy to acquire business and make a profit. Pricing, however, is not all inclusive to numbers. If you don’t provide a great service, it won’t matter where you have set your prices, you won’t remain in business.

That being said, I suggest you look at your competition. What are they doing to get and keep business? Look at their prices, response time and any other way that they reach out to and/or treat the clients.

Obviously, pricing is important and must be considered if you’re looking to have a competitive advantage. You don’t want to be the cheapest service, although an inexpensive service is good. Keep in mind that the difference between cheap and inexpensive is a matter of quality provided. And until you are well established, you probably don’t want to be the most expensive service provider.

Some process service companies feel they get the competitive advantage when they offer to not charge anything at all if the paper is not served. I strongly caution against this model as it is a double-edged sword.

Think about your pricing strategy. How will you cover your costs (there will be costs incurred) and just as important, how will you, if you don’t charge just because the papers could not be served?

But, you reply, by offering this bonus, word will get out and I can get a ton of business coming in quickly. That will make up for it and that’s good, right? Wrong!

If you get in too much work too quickly, your quality of service could suffer. But Bob, that’s not a problem; I’ll just hire more servers.

Say you do hire more; will you have the time to properly train them? What happens if they decide to “gutter serve” your papers. Gutter serving is what occurs when your server has said they served the paper, but they may not have. There have been instances where this has been known to happen. The server’s concern being that they will go to the time and expense (gas, parking, etc.) to attempt service and if it’s not served and you don’t charge, they won’t get paid because you’re not getting paid.

Say you decide to pay your server regardless. Did you factor this in with your pricing strategy?

The bottom line is, set a fair price using a pricing strategy that takes into consideration all the expense you will incur and what the marketplace will bear. Don’t be ruled by price alone. Be competitive, but focus on providing a worthwhile service in terms of service and quality and will be able to justify what you charge.

For more tips on running your process service business, check out "The Business End of Process, Running a Process Service Company from the Group Up". It's available on Amazon.com  http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3A%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&ajr=0. 

One more note, I just want to thank you for reading my posts. I appreciate your interest and I welcome your feedback. 

Creating the Right Pricing Strategy

How should you determine what rates to charge? Traditionally, the local sheriff or constable’s office set the standard on how much to charge for serving a single instrument (one court document). This comes from the fact that the sheriff (the local shire reeves – original pronunciation for a sheriff from the old English dialect) were the ones that served civil process before private process servers came into being.

I don’t consider them the only factor, as the private process serving industry came about in large part due to the volume of work available. If you couple that with a need for quality and speed that cannot always be provided by the overworked understaffed sheriffs and constables, and you can understand the industry growth.

Whether you are creating a strategy to price a product or price a service the process, and the thought behind it, are similar. The primary difference being that with a product you easily know the cost at which you will purchase said product. Selling a service however, is not quite as cut and dried when figuring out the “cost”. You do, however, have more flexibility when pricing service than when pricing products.

Process – The popular Cost-Plus pricing formula says you should take the cost + overhead + desired profit margin to arrive at a price to the marketplace. To simplify we can include overhead in our cost calculations to determine what to charge.  Cost + Profit Margin = Price of Service

Determine your costs; i.e., how much does it cost you to provide the service? The cost of producing any service is made up of the following three parts, according to advisement of the US Small Business Administration.

• Materials cost – what goods do you use in providing service?
• Labor cost – what direct labor costs do you incur in providing service? Reimbursed expenses associated with labor costs should be considered such as gas, wherein you may want to factor in distance traveled. It has been said that for every dollar per gallon of gas, you should factor in a cost of $5.00 for the service. With today’s rising prices of gas hovering around $3.00 a gallon that equates to $15.00 for a cost of service. Should prices rise toward $4.00 per gallon your cost of service will rise accordingly, i.e., $20.00.
• Overhead cost – these costs are incurred whether or not you are selling, be it a product or service. What are your indirect costs, such as non-server labor (yourself or other administration or management personnel), rent, taxes (income tax, property tax, franchise tax, etc.), insurance, advertising, office supplies, office equipment, depreciation, utilities, mileage, etc.?  Figure in a reasonable amount of your overhead costs for each service provided on either an hourly or percentage based on your business model.

 As an example, if you have an overall price of $60.00 per court document served in your local market, $30.00 would be for the actual serving part of the assignment (i.e., to cover your time to go from your office to the service address. The remaining $30 would break down to $15.00 to cover fuel costs and the other $15.00 to cover overhead.

Determine a fair profit margin. Profit margin is that amount added to the costs of doing business to ensure you are profitable. Take some time in determining your profit margin, as you don’t want to add so little that you find yourself shutting your doors from lack of profit, nor do you want to add so much that you find yourself shutting your doors because you priced yourself out of the market.

Check with me on my next post on Creating a Competitive Advantage. Have you checked out my book, “The Business End of Process, Running a Process Service Company From the Ground Up”? It’s available on Amazon.com.http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3A%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&ajr=0. It won’t’ tell you how to server process, but rather provides the nuts and bolts about how the processes and procedures I use to run a successful process service business.

Marketing your Process Service Business to Legal Association Members

The beginning process server business person referred to in my last blog also requested some guidance on marketing to Bar Associations. “Do I just hand out flyers or business cards introducing myself to the people that are there letting them know I’m offering a service? Is it okay for me to be marketing or promoting my business to these people in the association?”

That's a very good question, and one you always want to ask before promoting to any group you belong to. Do not just assume that it will be okay.

With regard to bar associations, as long as you are allowed to attend meetings, by all means, go and work on building relationships with other attendees. The key words in that last statement are “building relationships”. Networking is critical in most businesses, and the process service business is no different.  Networking requires the building of relationships; as in getting to "know, like and trust" one another. While you may not get any work right away, over time potential clients will get to know you. By building rapport, when they are looking for a server, they will already know you thus making your chances of being selected far greater than someone they would just have to pick out of a list of server companies.

I find networking events invaluable and attend them as often as I can find them. Do not be anxious to drop your business cards right away. If you have ever entered a room and had a stranger thrust their business card into your hand with hardly so much as a hello, you can understand why.  Do, however, take business cards with you. When, and only when, someone asks for a card, give them three; one card for them to keep and, the other two cards for them to share.

Remember, networking is not about the “hard sell”. It is a soft sell process achieved through the building of relationships over time where you discuss business as well as personal topics. Over time, by building rapport and trust, the potential client becomes a friend, or at the very least a good acquaintance, who in turn becomes a client or referral partner.

I hope these points have been helpful. For more helpful information such as this, read through my past blog posts or check out my book, “The Business End of Process, Running a Process Service Company From the Ground Up” available on Amazon.com. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3A%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&ajr=0.

Direct Mail Marketing for your Process Service Business

I recently received an email from a process server who recently started his own process serving business. He had read my book, “The Business End of Process Service” and had a few questions about marketing his business. I felt it might be helpful to others to share my response.

His first question was about direct mail and whether it mattered where or how his post cards were sent as long as they made it to the law office. He also wanted to know if there was a way to consolidate post card sending and gear it toward a specific target to increase chances of it being seen.

When it comes to direct mailing, the key is to go high volume to a specific target group. In this case your direct mail piece (post cards) would be targeted to law firms. It does not matter if the post cards are addressed to the attorney because the legal secretary will generally be the one to sort through the mail as it comes in. Post cards, or for that matter most any direct mail,  operates strictly by the numbers; the more you send the better your chances that someone who is in need of a process server will find your card in their mail box.

Typically, most established law firms will already be working with a process server. Sometimes, however, the server they are using may not be providing good service and the law firm may already be on the lookout for a replacement. If you are sending out high volume, chances are the very day they are thinking of replacing their server is the day they receive your post card.

By high volume send outs, I am referring to sending anywhere from 100 to 1000 per week. Once you have sent post cards to every attorney on your list, resend them to the entire list again, and again, and again. This is known as a marketing campaign, where you market to the same target over and over. You can use the same card or you may want to vary it a little to see which style of card brings about the best results.

The reason for being redundant and repetitive is that usually, from a marketing standpoint, a customer may not pay much attention to you the first time your postcard arrives. After they have seen it 4-5 times you are then, on a subconscious level, “on their radar”. High volume is more likely to equal having your post card land on someone’s desk at just the right time.

Next post, I’ll share my thoughts on attending association events to market your business. More information on this and other relevant topics to running a process server business are available in my book “The Business End of Process, Running a Process Service Company From the Ground Up” available on Amazon.com. http://www.amazon.com/s/ref=nb_sb_noss?url=search-alias%3Daps&field-keywords=%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&rh=i%3Aaps%2Ck%3A%22The+Business+End+of+Process%22&ajr=0.