10/7/13 Now that you have your 6 month goal selected, the next step is to write that down as your “Umbrella Goal”. Say for instance your goal is to make a 10% increase in your revenue in 6 months.
If you are making $5,000 in net revenue each month, then you want to increase that $500 a month or $3,000 in 6 months. It can be a trap to confine yourself to one month at a time because of the fluctuation of revenue for most solo and small firm attorneys. If, on the other hand, you receive a salary, then your goal would be to increase your salary by 10% in 6 months by getting a raise or bonuses or some other accommodation.
The Solos approach is to then look at the overhead and see if any item can be cut. Next, see if fees can be reasonably raised in any area. Then take a look at the receivables. Could a more aggressive approach get late receivables collected?
Then look at your marketing to see if an increase in that area is needed. Count where each referral has come from in the last year. Where is your best source of referrals? What can you do to “touch” your referral sources. That could be a newsletter, an email, a call or something else. This is the step that always should be taken first as these are your best referral sources.
If you practice in more than one area, pin point which area is the most lucrative and calculate how much. That may be the area you want to bolster or it may be the area you aren’t getting enough traffic in.
That should give you enough to work on this week. Next week we will go further into how to reach your goals and talk about other types of goals you may have. If you want to send me your Umbrella Goal, I can include some ideas as how to work with it in my blog.