Greg Eisenberg: Building a Scalable Law Firm Without Losing Your Identity

By Steve Fretzin on April 28, 2025

In this episode, Steve Fretzin and Greg Eisenberg discuss:

How law firm business models are quickly shifting due to tech and market forces
Why branding and visibility are critical for firms of any size
Ways small and solo firms can compete with major legal players
How legal entrepreneurship is evolving through collaboration

Key Takeaways:

Small law firms can remain competitive by joining collectives that centralize branding, marketing, and operational tools while allowing them to retain full ownership of their businesses.
Repeating a strong personal brand message through short-form video content across the right platforms helps attorneys become top-of-mind in their niche.
The most effective business development strategy combines strong referral networks and relationship-building with a smart digital advertising approach.
Law firms must stop treating marketing as a standalone fix and instead adopt a unified strategy that integrates operations, technology, finance, and client experience for long-term success.

“They say they don’t teach business in law school. I went to business school. They don’t teach business in business school—it didn’t make a huge difference. There’s just some stuff they can’t prepare you for.” — Greg Eisenberg

Got a challenge growing your law practice? Email me at steve@fretzin.com with your toughest question, and I’ll answer it live on the show—anonymously, just using your first name!

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Episode References:

The GaryVee Audio Experience: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/the-garyvee-audio-experience/id928159684

About Greg Eisenberg: Gregory Eisenberg won the award for “Worst (or Best) Doppelgangers” thanks to his resemblance to Beaker, Shaggy, and Screech. A failed comedian and worse political candidate, he found his calling helping law firms grow. With 10+ years in marketing, he’s worked with brands like Cinnabon, Carvel, and major universities. After starting LegalEase Marketing, he realized firms needed more than leads—they needed infrastructure. That led to Ready Firms, built to help small firms scale and stay competitive.

Connect with Greg Eisenberg:

Website: https://readyfirms.com/

Email: greg@readyfirms.com

LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/gregoryseisenberg/ & https://www.linkedin.com/company/readyfirms/

Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/readyfirms

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/readyfirms

Connect with Steve Fretzin:

LinkedIn: Steve Fretzin

Twitter: @stevefretzin

Instagram: @fretzinsteve

Facebook: Fretzin, Inc.

Website: Fretzin.com

Email: Steve@Fretzin.com

Book: Legal Business Development Isn’t Rocket Science and more!

YouTube: Steve Fretzin

Call Steve directly at 847-602-6911

Audio production by Turnkey Podcast Productions. You’re the expert. Your podcast will prove it.

FULL TRANSCRIPT

Steve Fretzin: [00:00:00] Hey everybody. Before we get to the show, I wanna do our usual q and a. Uh, this is coming from Sean in Naperville, Illinois, and he asks, how do I find the right events for growing my network? Uh, phenomenal question. I’m gonna give you a very simple answer. You really want to go where the prospective clients and strategic partners are hanging out.

So if you’re an estate planner, anyone could be a client for you, but maybe you wanna work with executives you wanna work with. Professionals. Um, so you’re gonna want to go to events where they are, or if you know that like good strategic partners for you are financial planners and divorce attorneys and, and CPAs, you’d want to go to events where those kinds of professionals hang out.

So I would say, you know, talk to people and figure out where the level of event is that you want to go. But really, most importantly, think about where your targets are. Hopefully that helps you, Sean, to be that lawyer, confident, organized, in a skilled rainmaker. Thanks everybody, and enjoy the show.

Narrator: You are listening to be that lawyer, life-changing strategies and [00:01:00] resources for growing a successful law practice. Each episode, your host, author, and lawyer coach Steve Fretzin, will take a deeper dive helping you grow your law practice in less time with greater results. Now, here’s your host. Steve Fretzin.

Steve Fretzin: Hey everybody. Welcome back to the Be That Lawyer with Fretzin podcast. We are just rounding up to almost 500 episodes. It’s happening soon. Greg, I feel like you were with me at the beginning when I started this whole thing.

Greg Eisenberg: I know, right? I appreciate being here as we get close to 500. It’s awesome. Keep cranking out that content.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. You know, I’m not afraid to, uh, put out a little content and help some lawyers accomplish what they wanna accomplish and. This is not the quote of the show, but I’ve been saying, you know, over 20 years that I’m gonna get what I want in life by helping enough other people get what they want in life.

So, you know, I think if you go into it with that kind of mindset, it’s hard to fail. And so that’s been kinda my credo, but I wanna welcome you back on the show. Is your first time on the show? I [00:02:00] worked on the show a whole bunch. I think this Okay. Okay. Be on it. Yeah. Behind the scenes with Jordan. But, uh, let’s jump in with your quote of the show.

And this one is either anonymous or we’re gonna say that it’s h Nelson Jackson and it’s, you can’t do today’s job with yesterday’s methods and be in business tomorrow. So again, welcome to the show and tell me why you like that quote. I just

Greg Eisenberg: feel like the world’s always changing and now faster than ever.

I think when we first started our marketing agency, you know, we had two or three copywriters on staff, and that was before chat. GPT was known to be in the mainstream existence. And I mean, it’s changed how everybody works. It’s changed how everybody functions to a degree, even using Google less. So to me you really gotta keep changing and evolving and thinking ahead of things because there’s so many brands of yesterday, there’s so many companies that were, that were around years ago and that were huge companies that [00:03:00] just aren’t even in existence today.

And it just shows how the companies that did evolve are still here. The ones that didn’t are nostalgic memories. Well,

Steve Fretzin: it’s funny ’cause like we’re recording this and it’s not gonna publish for let’s say a month. What is going on now economically, politically, you know, by the time this actually airs, it could be a lot worse and things could be in a much more of a tumultuous state.

Not to mention, you know, I just posted an article recently about, you know, KPMG getting into the market. The big four are gonna be, you know, buying into legal and, and really working that. And, you know, it’s just, it’s just showing how things are evolving and lawyers need to better protect themselves, which is what, you know, I think we’re gonna talk about quite a bit today.

I wanna mention that I did take the moment to look up why, other than the quote that he may or may not have said, why h Nelson Jackson is famous. I’ll tell you why. It’s really bizarre. He’s known as the first person to drive across the United States in a car. That’s what he is known for,

Greg Eisenberg: right?

Steve Fretzin: So he is the first one to make all those [00:04:00] bathroom breaks across the country.

Huh? That’s it. He figured out where all the bath bathroom stations should be and where the Tesla charging stations should be, you know? But, uh, four highways before the highway. Oh, yeah. Oh yeah. This is in the early 19 hundreds maybe, and, or, you know, 1920s, 1930s, I’m not sure. But. Anyway, that’s what he’s known for.

And I think it was because it was a bet. He bet someone betted, he couldn’t do it. So there, that’s how things got done. That’s how things got done a hundred years ago.

Greg Eisenberg: This fantasy football league, that was the loser’s punishment driving across the country.

Steve Fretzin: Exactly. It’s the SCO award, uh, for those who like, uh, the league.

Yeah.

Greg Eisenberg: Uh,

Steve Fretzin: otherwise you don’t know what that is. So fantastic having you on the show and let’s go. You know, for everybody listening, Greg Eisenberg’s a good friend of mine working together for many years, usually as he mentioned on the backend, helping me with my Matics and my website and just, we have really strong relationship, co-founder of Ready Firms.

And give us your background leading into, you know, from failed comedian all the way today.

Greg Eisenberg: Definitely. So through college I was always somebody that just dove [00:05:00] into random things. Standup comedy was one of, I ran for local office, don’t think I’d ever run for office again. It was a little bit different then, but I got experience in whatever I found interesting at the time, and that’s really how I fell into advertising and marketing after college and met a really close local friend, Jordan Ostroff, who I know you’ve had on many times.

And we started Legally Marketing together, really combining his understanding of law firms with my understanding of marketing and advertising. It’s been such a journey along the way. I’ve learned so much about the space. I feel like you can listen to your podcast, Steve, and just get the who’s who in the legal space.

You know, I’m sure after close to 500 episodes, everybody, that’s who in the space has been on one before. Yeah. So I really got to dive in and get a lot of exposure and what I realized is. Law firms really are like the epitome of how any business should run. It’s a simplified version of it. If you can get a law firm to run operationally sound, it really teaches you about how other [00:06:00] companies run, and even in their simplest form.

So we really started with marketing and advertising and learned more about the text side and the operations and how automations are changing, how not just law firms but small businesses are working and what we’re seeing in other industries with like this big corporate takeover. I think we’re gonna really start seeing in legal, and you’ve mentioned that you’ve posted about it tons.

You’ve been talking about it for years, and now we’re really starting to see it happen. I think that. Some of these laws originally were changing so that people like you and I, you know, people that really develop expertise in legal and helping law firms run and grow their business, I think they expected us to get in, but instead of course, like anything, you know, corporate, you got the big guys coming in there and they’re gonna ruin everything.

And that’s where we transitioned. We said, you know what? How do other companies fight against this? It’s, they develop collectives. They develop communities where people [00:07:00] are banning together that fight the big guy, you know? Mm-hmm. That David and Goliath situation, and that’s really what we are developing.

You know, we pivoted from legalese marketing where we take every law firm, treat ’em like a special butterfly, and we didn’t go the direction of templatizing and giving it to them. We’re taking the direction of creating the brands that they can go ahead and really license, and we can advertise them as a collective.

And give them the tools that we’ve developed that they need to succeed and really help them run their firms. As one. However, they really still maintain the ownership of it because I think that small business ownership’s going away, that’s really a big

Steve Fretzin: problem. And people don’t know that my, unless you take a deep dive in my LinkedIn that my background is franchising.

So you know the idea that, you know who competes against McDonald’s, the local burger shop. Okay, sure. And yes, they may have something different. McDonald’s, but ultimately people see the golden arches and [00:08:00] they start to salivate and they pull in the drive through and feel terrible directly after. In the world that you’re, that you’re going in, I think you’re trying to set up something where people’s eyes light up when they see the name of the community that they now trust, or that they now have used maybe in a different part of the country, but it’s, they’re knowing that they’re getting sort of the same experience at each, you know, whether you’re in Illinois or Indiana or Michigan or whatever.

Greg Eisenberg: Correct. And really here I was exposed to this pretty early on in my exposure to the legal world. ’cause I’m down here in Orlando and we have John Morgan down here, and John now is everywhere. I go up home to see family in Philadelphia. You got John Morgan, you have him everywhere. And how else are people gonna start competing with him?

You know, spending millions and millions and millions and millions of dollars on advertising. Yeah. How do you compete?

Steve Fretzin: You know, you can, well, I mean, I will tell you the way that I’m helping lawyers compete and, you know, this is, you know, networking, strategic partnerships [00:09:00] and the stuff that you can do on the ground that they’re not doing.

They’re just getting, you know, the Google ads and they’re getting maybe weaker leads. They’re getting a thousand times more, but they’re smaller, weaker leads, give or take. They’re gonna land a, a whale here and there. So there is a way to do it, but I get what you’re saying is let’s get the collective of, you know, 25, 50, a hundred firms together that have the budget then to compete against the bigger players, even though they’re gonna maintain their small firm status.

Greg Eisenberg: Sure. And really it’s about coupling those. It’s about if you’re focusing so much on your marketing and your advertising, how else are you going ahead and really becoming that rainmaker? How are you really having the time to get out there if you’re just shooting videos alone in your closet all day? You know, you have to find that balance.

And if you do have that collective, if you do have other firms that you really feel like you can jive with. It really comes down to collecting that advertising. [00:10:00] Now, a lot of times, here’s the problem, people have the ad budget, but now you have to spend money, make videos, and those videos have to be creative and they have to get attention, and they have to have all of those things that the Super Bowl commercials have that get you paying attention to like why I should have an estate plan, why I should go ahead and do some of these proactive legal services that people are providing.

It’s hard to stand out. And so really if you think about you need to be boots on the ground. You need to be working your network. You need to be. Really that rainmaker and at the same time, you need to spend money on advertising and if the thing you’re advertising doesn’t look good or get attention, that’s not gonna work.

It’s a lot of time and money spent all over the place.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah.

Greg Eisenberg: It’s what a lot of firms I think are doing to try and keep up. There’s. Time or money.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. But then we’ve talked a little bit about the solution, but I’m more of a problem than solution guy. So let’s go back and let’s talk about why small firms solos and small firms in particular and [00:11:00] even some bigger firms really struggle with the business side of it.

And, and we’ve covered this on the show, right? Ad na, but I wanna get your specific angle ’cause you have more time in the trenches with small firms than most people will in a lifetime.

Greg Eisenberg: Sure. Honestly, I think owning a business is hard as hell. I think they know my experience. Right? A hundred percent. And guess what they, you know how they say they don’t teach, you know, business and law school.

Yeah. I went to business school. They don’t teach business and business school did it make a huge difference? There’s just some stuff they can’t prepare you for. Yeah. And you know this, you’ve been through it and Oh yeah. Things have been through it. And your listeners have. Throw out the book. That’s just what it is.

So you have corporate America that is just, you know, proven and they move slow, but they have the recipes and they don’t change ’em often and they got the money to just do whatever the heck they want. And you have the rest of us that are, you know, scrapping at it, trying to be innovative, trying to not get knocked off by big corporate America and really do something we’re proud of, of, [00:12:00] you know.

And I think that the problem is when it comes to small business owners struggling is we’re learning and spending money. We don’t have the same coffers and we don’t have the same board of advisors, and we’re just all doing the best we can.

Steve Fretzin: Okay, so let’s go back and forth, you and I, and let’s come up with a list of things that, you know, solo, small firms, and even individual attorneys that work at mid-market, big firms that need to build their own brand within the brand of their firm Sure.

Could and should be doing today because we could talk about what worked. Five years ago. But the things that are to the beginning of the show, the things that worked five years ago are very different. I’m thinking about my marketing five years ago compared to today, of course, quite different in how I’m approaching the market, what I’m doing.

So let’s get into that. What is something that lawyers should be thinking about and doing as a way to grow business? Sure.

Greg Eisenberg: I think that the two big things that get coupled together is your personal brand, how people remember you, how you are putting yourself out there. [00:13:00] Then putting it out there as many times as you can.

You know, I didn’t do so well running for office myself ’cause I was a newbie. But there’s one thing that I learned from all these political commercials is that they take a really simple message and they run it to death. They make it so it is the only thing in your head. They make sure you can’t forget that they exist.

And I think that that’s important for people to remember is that really figure out what makes you you and then beat it to death. Make sure

Steve Fretzin: people know that it’s so, so what would, but what would be an example? Let’s say that it’s a local estate planning attorney and like what would be an example of something that they would put out there over and over and over again that would get attention for them and stick in someone’s ear?

Greg Eisenberg: I think what’s hard for a lot of people, but a lot of people need to do is dig in deep and see what makes them them. Mm-hmm. I think a lot of people. Don’t think about what drove them to law school and what drove them to practice the estate planning in this example, [00:14:00] but any other practice area. ’cause I think if you really dive in deep enough, there is a story there.

And if there’s not, again, I’ll go back to my political stance. Make one. Yeah.

Steve Fretzin: So like, so like is it similar to a differentiator? Like I have a patent attorney client, he’s amazing. Shout out to Greg Stone and he worked at the patent office so he makes sure that he, everyone he comes in contact with in his infomercial on his LinkedIn everywhere.

It’s that he worked at the US Patent Office because that’s unique and that, but I mean, I don’t know if that’s something he can beat the drum and get it in everyone’s ear. But I think maybe in his circles he is, that everyone knows him as that person, and I’m the be that lawyer guy, I guess. Right. That’s being pushed into people’s ears all the time.

But that’s all right. So I take that, I, I take what you’re saying, that I’ve got a brand and I’ve gotta lean into social media. I’ve gotta lean into video, lean into whatever I, podcasting, whatever it is to get that message ear wormed into the [00:15:00] audience, or the prospective clients or the people that would refer me so that they, they only think of me.

Sure.

Greg Eisenberg: And really the truth of that is instead of thinking of a hundred video topics that solidify that sometimes it’s easier to do what Corporate America does, and record one 15 second to 32nd video explaining that your trademark experience and just spending all of your budget, putting that into as many places and years as you can.

Because that’s really the thing is, you know, Budweiser and brands like that are creating content. Really, they’re taking this one 32nd ad and they’re running it on every station, every program. And when that’s beat to death, they cut it the 15 seconds and they keep running it. And that’s really what we’re seeing is think of the State Farm, Allstate, you know, uh, they have mayhem, they have flow, they have, yeah.

Progressive. Yeah. Flow. They take that persona flow is a worker at a store. They have a box of, of insurance. You have Jake from State Farm who represents the ideal [00:16:00] customer service. Mm-hmm. And May is what can go wrong. And they create these commercials. They create these campaigns, and they just run the heck out of them.

And that’s really all you are exposed to them, but you and that, and that works really

Steve Fretzin: well until you get to Jared with Subway. That right. That everything fell, falls apart back. He, he might need a lawyer. Yeah. Alright, so I think I get that. And then what’s So then, but there’s also so many channels and options and, and Sure.

You know, like I’m not a big fan of TikTok, so I don’t do anything with TikTok and I don’t have it on my phone for a number of reasons. Other people may absolutely need TikTok in order to hit their, their dynamic, you know, customer base or profile or whatever it might be. So I get having a strong 15 second message or ad or, or theme or whatever.

But then how do you figure out like what channels to

Greg Eisenberg: put it on? Sure. So as far as if you’re paying for advertising, I’m focusing on where my clients are or my potential clients are. If I’m focusing on [00:17:00] organic, I’m focusing on where I want to be. Because if I’m gonna be pumping out content, I have to wanna be there, or else it’s not.

It’s like when you want to go to the gym, but you’re really not really interested in going and you go a few times and stop what happens? You have to wanna be there. Advertising doesn’t matter. You don’t have to live there. We can just put money there with the creator there and it’s gonna run. So it’s really about figuring out where your audience is.

You know, you may wanna be in the magazines that you read or the publications you read, but if your audience isn’t there. You shouldn’t be there. But for example, if you don’t like TikTok or if you’re not interested in Reddit, but you have an audience there, it makes sense to still have a paid presence there, advertise there, drive ’em to where you’re at.

Still be there. That’s, yeah.

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Hey everybody, it’s Steve Fretzin as the, you know, I’m the host of the Be That Lawyer Podcast, and if you’re serious about growing your law practice, let’s talk. I’ve coached hundreds of attorneys to build bigger books of business without selling, chasing, or wasting time. This isn’t a sales pitch, it’s a real 30 minute.

Strategy session to explore what’s possible for you in your practice. Just head over to freson.com and grab a time that works for you and let’s make this your breakout year. And you know, something that we have in common a little bit is, I think before I met you, I mentioned that I, I did try getting into the marketing space for a few years.

Yeah. I worked with a partner and we try to find vendors that we could outsource websites to and outsource social media marketing and things like that. And I hated it because in the world I’m in. I’m teaching people to fish. I’m getting them to the level [00:19:00] where they don’t need me anymore and they’re just crushing it because they took what we’re working on so seriously and it, it changed the way that they, you know, ran their life.

And with marketing, you’re kind of doing it for them, but then if you need things from them, they can’t get it to you. If you expect them to give you time, they don’t give it to you. And it was a lot of like me waiting for stuff from them that I never got. And then I’m the bad guy because I didn’t get it done on time or whatever.

And I know you felt that too. What’s the new model that you’re working with? Because it’s not just marketing. You’re figure, you figured out that the marketing alone isn’t necessarily where you wanted to spend your time.

Greg Eisenberg: Sure. I think that there’s a few different ways that I’m looking at it. I think the marketing industry as a whole is really going to like a subcontractor type of market.

I think you’re gonna start getting a lot of specialists. I think that’s the way that good people do it. I think if you want a good design, you go to a graphic designer, go to an agency, you’re gonna get the graphic designer that is doing their best work on their [00:20:00] side work, and this is their nine to five, and they’re just churning away at it, right?

Mm-hmm. Go to. The ad manager directly the production company, to do your video, the designer to do your graphics. I think that that’s where things are going to be going when it comes to skills. ’cause I think people are just really trying to find their specialty so they don’t get replaced. You know, I think people are really trying to just do good work that they’re proud of, and there’s a lot of quantity out there, and a lot of people want to go into quality.

So I think that that’s really the first thing is really just making sure that like who you work with is really specialized in what they do. That’s gonna be where you’re gonna get the best results out of. But I think the other thing that’s a problem with marketing is it’s so focused on, like you said, solutions to that people are just reading online or trying to be the quickest to it, but it’s not solving the real problem.

It’s creating temporary fixes. It’s either creating maybe a jump in sales or if it’s worse, like a jump in impressions and no sales increase, right? It’s a lot of [00:21:00] vanity metrics. It’s a lot of just getting eyeballs, and I think that’s important, but when we were working with firms, the hard thing was there’s a lot that’s out of control of marketing.

I’m not there for the sales calls. I’m not there for the case management. I’m sometimes not there for the tech, but I’m there for the marketing or vice versa. There’s a lot that’s outta control and, and for us, we pivoted because we wanted to find a way to solve all these problems at once to give them the full solution.

Mm-hmm. That if they don’t really care about what name is on the building, they just care about owning their firm and making it the best they can and practicing all the best they can and scaling that. Making that doable. We wanted to work with them before it was hard ’cause everybody has that intention.

But like I said, owning a business is hard. So you can have all the best intentions, but your marketing can be kicking butt, but so many other things failing that it affects both.

Steve Fretzin: That’s really what I liked hearing from you when we spoke before the, before we got together today, was that it’s like. [00:22:00] You’re treating a part of the body when you really need to treat the whole body.

Correct. And you’ve got, you know, hey, the marketing is great, but you don’t, your technology, your operations, your finance, your sales, all the different pieces that make up what need to happen for any business to be successful. And if one of those slips, it affects everything, but you’re only helping them on one piece, the rest of it slips, and then the marketing is flushed down the toilet in many cases.

Greg Eisenberg: Correct. And then from a business owner’s perspective, you have your marketing guy, you got your bookkeeper, you got this, you got that. If one of them slips, I mean you’re managed, you’re still managing the tribe, like it’s still not easy. So again, we tried to come up with a solution that was gonna be almost managed for them, where we can have those best vendors in.

But for a small business owner and they’re out there just trying to figure out the best, keep bookkeeper. The best website designer, developer, you’re gonna hear the same stuff from everybody and it’s exhausting to [00:23:00] even go through it. You know, that pitch process is tiring.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah, I agree. So let’s sort of lean into then where we started, which is there are, you know, a lot of big players, whether that’s Morgan in Chicago, that could be Clifford in, in different regions, in different areas of practice.

There are behemoths and there’s people. Who own markets and, and own a significant market share. So what else can small firms do to compete? I mean, outside of what you’re gonna be getting into with, you know, sort of like the franchising of small solo practices, what else should they be looking to do to, to improve business and get on the right track to compete

Greg Eisenberg: Well, I think it’s really just taking the principles of even what we’re doing because.

Whether they’re doing what we’re doing or not, the principles are there. I think it’s one, creating a way to do exactly what you do, Steve, which is be that rainmaker, right, to be that lawyer. I think if you’re able to find a way to take some of these burdens [00:24:00] off of you so that you can focus on being that lawyer, mm-hmm.

Being that rainmaker, that’s gonna be a place of success. Like if you can figure out that self brandand that you wanna portray out there and be out there on the streets hitting at home, that’s gonna help. The other thing that could really help also is looking at that referral network you have. Look at those people you connect with.

Does it make sense to, to partner together? You know, a lot of people wanna be that solo, but if you have people that you would refer in the next county over, maybe it makes sense to almost do what we’re doing and, and do it on your own take. You know, the four other attorneys that you really refer a lot of business to that you trust.

Get on the same system, advertise yourself together under one brand. Mm. You know, really divvy up where the fees go based off of what area you’re in. I think that what we’re trying to do, we’re trying to do in a larger scale, but I think the principles of it really are there to either a, carve out how to be a, be that specialist [00:25:00] yourself, then bring in the other specialists to do the things around you, and possibly form that collective with others that is gonna allow you to expand reach.

In an easier way without it being on your shoulders.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. I love what you’re saying. I mean, I, nothing happens without the business coming in. So delegating everything you can to focus on the work that you bring in and bringing in new work. Right? That’s square one. Second part of it is, you know, developing that referral network, making sure that happens.

But again, you also have to have the backend in a place where you’ve got the technology and automation. Where a lot of this stuff is running behind the scenes without a lot of hands on it, without a lot of time invested. I mean, eventually, initially you might have to do that, but over time gets brought,

Greg Eisenberg: brought way down the hard part, to be honest, because one of the things that everyone’s gonna tell you on how small businesses can compete is being more agile to technology.

Right. But like technology is just so hard to keep up with. Now it gets crazy. [00:26:00] Chad GP is. And all of the AI systems, they’re so revolutionary and that’s just a blip of what’s gonna come. And yeah,

Steve Fretzin: like in a week they’re gonna say chat GBT is like slower than all the others. And there’s already much that are faster than it’s that have better answers.

Like, oh, okay, great, I’m glad I learned chat, GBT, I’m on the wrong model. I gotta go over to another one. But I think ultimately lawyers have to recognize that. The inability to stay consistent with how they develop their firm, grow their firm, and, and treat it sustainably with growth and with energy.

That’s gonna be one of the ways that you can combat some of the bigger players that are coming into the market. Yes, you can partner with other people and this, that, and the other, but ultimately, you know, I think maybe it’s a, maybe, you know, getting into like a boutique mm-hmm. Where yes. You’re smaller than the other folks, but you’re more well known because you’ve, you’ve decided to focus on not personal injury, but a particular sector of personal injury that [00:27:00] everyone knows you for.

Like, it could be like that micro specialization that you need to get that takes, that would take away the market share from the bigger players.

Greg Eisenberg: Exactly. Maybe you’re the motorcycle guy, you know, maybe it’s that that’s really your brand. You lean into that. You go to those events, you go in front of that community.

It makes you more valuable in a lot of different ways. You know, you’re really able to drum up that business and that assurance in, in more ways than just direct.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. So let’s take a few minutes before we wrap up, Greg, and let you share a little bit about what your ready firms is like. What is it, what’s it about, and, and how’s it gonna change the, the way that legal is done for many people that work with you.

Greg Eisenberg: Sure. We’re trying to build a law firm collective for, you know, the legal brands of tomorrow. We’re trying to really create brands that are both niched down and scalable. And attorneys can license them in a territory. Mostly it’s gonna be a [00:28:00] county, and what that comes with is they’re able to file A DBA and use our brand.

We’re gonna extend our advertising campaigns into their area, and they’re gonna get really great creative ads that drum up business. They’re gonna get the full tech stack to process those cases, and we’re gonna give them qualified leads that they’re gonna be processing under our brand while still owning under their firm.

The agreements will be signed between the client and them using that DPA. The fees that they collect go straight to them. We don’t collect a percentage. We get a flat fee each month for the license and all the systems and training and community that we’re providing, and they have to contribute advertising spend.

That’s it. We have all the, the ads ready to go. We have the brands ready to go. We have the systems ready to go. They get to come into a ready to grow law firm. You know, we have a few brands we’re gonna be launching this year in estate planning, uncontested divorce, bankruptcy, [00:29:00] and motor vehicle accidents.

We really create an easy way for these attorneys to contribute advertising to this collective and also maintain ownership of their firm, which is the big thing. You know, a lot of times you see the Morgan and Morgans in you. You can be an associate for for him, but you’re never gonna own your own firm.

We wanna give you the opportunity to have that collective, but still maintain ownership of what’s yours.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Well, and I think the biggest reason why lawyers don’t start their own firm and why they don’t. Become entrepreneurs is because of what we, again, where we started this whole thing is it is fricking hard to run your own business and to be an entrepreneur.

But I’m thinking like, all right, I get into a business like a franchise for a reason. They give you the systems, they give you the process, they give you the technology, they show you how to do everything, and that’s how the donuts get made. Every day the same way, because you’ve got someone that has done it before, has done it successfully, and all they’re doing is rinsing, repeating with you.[00:30:00]

You’re buying into that, into that collective. Right. Exactly.

Greg Eisenberg: And now the key difference is we’re taking a page from the franchise book, but we’re not franchises because we’re not gonna have a percentage of the company. Mm-hmm. Individuals still have wiggle room to add in a few other services that are along the lines of the practice area.

They still own. If they’re a firm, we don’t have any ownership of that. Yeah. They’re taking our license and I think it gives the most flexibility for these firms to really compete the way they want and scale the way they want.

Steve Fretzin: Well, really brilliant model, and I’m excited to see what happens next. And I’ll be keeping a close eye and I’ll be trying to help as I, as I try to do for for many people.

But Greg, you and I go way back and I have a special place in my heart for you based on our past and shared history. So, uh, I hope that I can be of, of service to you, my friend. Let’s, um, take a moment and just wrap up with our game changing podcast. This is someone I’ve been following for a long time and I know a lot of folks do Gary v the, uh, audio experience.

So is that his main podcast or does he have like multiple [00:31:00] podcasts?

Greg Eisenberg: That’s his main podcast and he takes a bunch of stuff and throws it on there, like his speech is on there, all that good stuff.

Steve Fretzin: Okay, got it. And so it’s, you know, Gary V you know, it’s interesting, like he started off what, in his parents’, like liquor store, wine Yeah.

Winery or something like that. And he just like. Just dug in as a a seemingly a DHD adult and just like he seems like he’s all over the place, but he’s also hyper-focused when he puts his mind to something. And I think his advice to young people, to entrepreneurs to is always, I’ve yet to like hear something he says and go, that sounds like a bunch of bull crap.

So maybe everybody should check out, if you haven’t heard of Gary V before, you’re probably live in under a Rock somewhere. But definitely check out his podcast.

Greg Eisenberg: I really love that he’s a, a doer. It’s whatever you take away from it. The biggest thing is like go out and do the thing. And that’s what really got me into entrepreneurship.

Like I, that’s what made me say, you know what? I’m done working for somebody else, even though we all work for somebody. You know, I said I was ready to take that plunge. And [00:32:00] I think a lot of people talk about, I’m gonna do this, I’m gonna do this. I have this idea of that idea. He’s one of the ones that really just clicked in my head to go do it.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah, just get on with it. Fan. Fantastic man. So let’s take a moment. Thank our sponsors, of course, uh, the Law, her podcast with Sonya Palmer. And let’s also just shout out to our friend Chris Dryer over at PIM Con, uh, happening in, uh, early October out in Scottsdale. You’re gonna wanna check that out, that personal injury, uh, conference.

And Greg, if people want to get in touch with you, they wanna learn more about Ready Firms, uh, what are the best digits

Greg Eisenberg: for them to reach you? Sure. Best thing to do is go to ready firms.com or greg@readyfirms.com. We’re starting to build that wait list. We’re starting to tell people about what we’re doing, show those assets.

I’d be excited to talk to anybody interested.

Steve Fretzin: Yeah. Awesome, man. Well, thanks for coming on the show and, uh, catching up with me. And, and I’m just excited for you and what you’re doing and, uh, you know, hopefully we’ll get to, are you coming to the tech show in, uh, in Chicago? Yep.

Greg Eisenberg: We’re trying to, we’re gonna

Steve Fretzin: be out there meeting people, taking meetings, so we’ll be out there.

All [00:33:00] right. All right. Well, I’ll see you there, my friend. All right. Thank you buddy. I appreciate you. I appreciate you, Steve. Thank you. Yeah, you got it. And thanks everybody for hanging out with Greg and I today on the Be That Lawyer with Fretzin and Podcast here. For your listening, pleasure and viewing pleasure, if you go to YouTube, check out some of our long form and short form, uh, podcasts, and also we write these blog casts If you go to Fretzin.com.

Slash blog, you can check out our blog posts where it’s basically the condensed version of these interviews. So, and the articles I write for above the law. So anyway, blah, blah, blah, blah. Lots of stuff about me. Who cares? Alright, thank you everybody. Take care. Be safe. Be well. We’ll talk again soon.

Narrator: Thanks for listening. To be that lawyer, life-changing strategies and resources for growing a successful law practice, visit Steve’s website Fretzin.com for additional information and to stay up to date on the latest legal business development and marketing trends. For more information and important links about today’s episode.[00:34:00]

Check out today’s show notes.

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