This post is basically pure brainstorming, so it might not go where I want it to. I keep coming back to the idea that I want to target a specific kind of clients instead of targeting a specific area of the law. I know that lots of people say that you should get into one practice area and get good at it, but I really am interested in serving a type of client more than a specific area.
Filling the need
I live in an area of Texas with a racial distribution of over 10% latinos, according to Wikipedia. Now, according to the Texas Bar, 644 attorneys are active in this county. The logic behind the next statement is probably easily arguable, but it seems that 10% of the attorneys in the area should be latino (and therefore, should speak Spanish). That said, according to the local bar and to most of the other attorneys that I know, only a few attorneys in the county speak Spanish.
So, instead of targeting a specific practice area, I am really interested in just targeting the Spanish speaking community, since I am fluent in Spanish. The abundance of Spanish speaking clients mixed with the dearth of Spanish speaking lawyers is a major draw for this client-base, but it isn’t the only one: Spanish speaking clients are purported to pay on time, this is probably a huge generalization, but I am willing to believe it; Spanish speaking clients are likely to tell their Spanish speaking friends about the great Spanish speaking lawyer they found; and, (another generalization) Spanish speaking clients probably are pretty decent people who have run into a little problem they can’t solve themselves.
Client base decided, now what?
That is the rub. Now that I have picked the client base, I have to figure out how to get my name out there. Like I mentioned previously, once I start getting a few Spanish speaking clients, I’ll probably get more by word-of-mouth, but how do I get the original set?
Some ideas I’ve had are:
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Flyers
My wife, a Spanish speaking Latina, keeps suggesting I come up with a flyer of some sort to leave in the Latino-owned businesses. I like the idea, but I struggle with what the content needs to be. Although I am not Latino, and don’t appear to be Latino, publishing that my first law license is from Mexico and that I speak Spanish will help. Not only that, I probably need to summarize the areas that I think are going to be the most useful and talk about the struggles that people may face in their daily lives, but I need to talk about them in Spanish. This option is probably the one I need to try first, because I think it is going to be relatively the cheapest.
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Radio Ads
There is a Spanish speaking radio station locally that I think will help to advertise. I need to come up with a decent ad and try to record it in Spanish so that I can get it broadcast on the radio. This is going to be a little more expensive, but I have heard that radio is a pretty effective media for publicity.
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Presentations at civic organizations
There is are a couple of Latino civic organizations locally. I think I might try to give some talks to those on an area of the law that affects the Latino community. I immediately think of immigration law, but I think that focus may be shortsighted, this community needs a lawyer that can help in all areas of the law, not just immigration. Also, I think I could advertise with the Catholic Church that is predominantly Spanish speaking – I have an ad in my own church’s bulletin and wouldn’t mind doing the same with the church down the road (although I have yet to see any result from my church bulletin).
I’m going to keep looking for different ideas that might help to break into this area, but I am also confident that word will get around. Because I am on the court appointment lists, I will get clients who are Spanish speaking through those, and those people will tell their friends and relatives that they know a Spanish speaking attorney.
I probably need to keep working on the idea, but the more I dabble in different areas of the law the more I begin to think that General Practice is really right for me. Now I just have to get good at everything.