Guest John McNair: A Solo Lawyer’s Guide to Elder Law and Online Marketing

What if you had the chance to step inside the intriguing world of elder law, guided by a seasoned expert? Our guest, John McNair, a certified elder law attorney with the Texas Board, is here to do just that. He offers a captivating insider's perspective of his journey, shifting from representing affluent estate planning and probate clients to carving out a niche in elder law. Listen as he takes us through the highs and lows of launching his own firm in 2019, his involvement with the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys, and the lessons he's learned along the way. This episode is a must-listen for anyone in the legal field, particularly those pondering the leap into solo practice or elder law specialization.

Ever wondered how online marketing can shape the trajectory of a law firm? Brace yourselves for an eye-opening discussion as John McNair delves into his innovative marketing strategies. Learn about the significant role Susan Rogers, a North Texas University gerontology graduate and a decade-long collaborator, plays in his firm. Discover how they've leveraged their partnership with IMS, and the impressive results of their webinar marketing funnel. Each nugget of insight John shares is a testament to his successful journey in elder law practice. So buckle up, this episode promises to be an exciting ride through the legal profession's less-traveled paths.

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Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

Hi and welcome back to the Marketing Lawcast. I'm Jennifer Goddard, your host, and I'm here today with my guest, one of our clients, john McNair. John is a certified elder law attorney in the Dallas area. He's also Texas Board certified in estate planning and probate. John, you want to tell us just a little bit about your practice.

Speaker 2: 0:25

Yeah, I was a traditional estate planning and probate attorney for many years and did a lot of high-end estate planning sophisticated, really wealthy clients and then about 20 years ago kind of stumbled I wouldn't use that word exactly into elder law but found out about it and I would say that I dabbled in it for a while. But about 15 years ago I decided to really get involved and so these days about 60 to 70% of my practice is truly elder law and I'm helping clients qualify for Medicaid, qualify for VA benefits, specialize in estate planning that needs to accompany those kind of engagements, so everything related to elder law. I do a lot of probate. I don't really do a lot of guardianships these days and I know some attorneys in this field do a lot of special needs trust planning. I don't do a lot of that. I do a lot of third-party special needs trust planning, but that's just estate planning, that's not first-party special needs trust is truly a specialized area and I really haven't been involved in that too much.

Speaker 1: 1:51

But right now you do quite a bit of mostly elder law, the majority, estate planning and probate right, right.

Speaker 2: 2:00

Those are the three pillars, for sure.

Speaker 1: 2:03

And you're super active in the NALA organization, the National Academy of Elder Law Attorneys.

Speaker 2: 2:10

In fact, you are the immediate past president of the Texas chapter right, I was the immediate past president until the first week of August, and now I'm no longer the immediate past president.

Speaker 1: 2:25

Once removed.

Speaker 2: 2:26

Once removed. Yes, so I was the president from 21 to 22, and then immediate past president from 22 to 23. Awesome, I'm nothing.

Speaker 1: 2:42

I wouldn't say you're nothing. Not by any means. We were just at the Texas chapters conference and I could see that you are all the people above around you asking your questions. You're still a very active member of that chapter. Tell me a little bit about your journey, because I know you've been in this field for about 40 years and you started your own. You went out on your own in 2019. So how did that transform for you, from being in another law firm for so long and then finally deciding to go out on your own?

Speaker 2: 3:20

So I was in a specialty niche law firm for 24 years. All we did was high end estate planning and probate. I did a ton of 706 estate tax returns. I did a lot of sophisticated estate planning and then part of the reason that I ended up in elder law other than I just enjoyed it was the fact that in the mid 2000s, congress and its infinite wisdom decided to increase the exemptions to the point where there is no middle class estate tax anymore. I was doing really well with a middle class estate tax. Now it's only on the mega wealthy, and there's this thing called the great recession that happened about the same time.

Speaker 2: 4:11

So I decided to scramble and get really involved in elder law. At that point I started marketing myself to elder care industry here in the Metroplex, the Dallas area. I started getting a lot of training and I slowly over time turned myself into an elder law attorney and after we amicably broke up in 2016, I believe, I was given an opportunity to be in a larger firm about 20 people and I'd never been in a large firm. That may not be large to a lot of attorneys, but it was to me and I thought that's something I wanted. And after a while. I realized, after being there about four years, it's not what I wanted and, more particularly, it's not what I needed.

Speaker 2: 5:04

They were very nice to me but, in particular, to market yourself as an elder law attorney, I believe that you need to be not buried in a larger firm, because those firms typically have a lot of areas of practice that don't have anything to do with elder law. Elder law can get buried and I really needed a way to market myself and I was not going to be able to do that in their firm. They were really nice. You have no hard feelings against them. I just felt like and I looked around and I saw that all of my peers in Texas, all of the elder law attorneys that I respect, they were either a solo practitioner or they were in very, very small firms, and I said I've got to do this. So in 2019, I said let's do this. And here I am Now, in 2023, still doing it.

Speaker 1: 6:00

So you decided to be the master of your own fate. I actually do see that a lot with both the state planning and elder law attorneys that there's advantages to being in that bigger firm. There's some resources, there's obviously some camaraderie, especially if it's a good firm. But oftentimes the estate planning and the elder law just doesn't get the opportunity to market the way that you need to, because you don't have those ongoing retainers, those ongoing fees, and you don't usually have that great big settlement either. So you're constantly having to get new clients.

Speaker 2: 6:39

And they had a terrible website. And nor did they care whether they had a terrible website, because they had a lot of very wealthy, closely held business owners that were just coming in over and over and over again for litigation or transactional work. They didn't need to market. So it was not a good environment for me to be able to do elder law.

Speaker 1: 7:02

Yeah, I actually see that quite a bit. So going out on your own, that's a little bit scary. What was your plan? Well, firstly, what were your biggest fears or worries about going out on your own?

Speaker 2: 7:18

You know, strangely enough I'd been practicing long enough at that point that I didn't have a lot of fears. My main concern was finding a reasonable space this luxurious box that I'm in that was recently priced in a place where I could see clients. I mean, elder law and estate planning is a very one-on-one personal practice. You have to have space where people can come in. They can find it fairly easily. It's fairly easy to drive to, and so finding the right spot was a little bit of a concern to me. But I actually found an executive suite situation that was perfect, and the other thing that I knew with 100% certainty was to be able to economically survive as a solo practitioner.

Speaker 2: 8:09

For the first time in my life I could not have a legal assistant. I had to do everything myself. So it was really important to me to get in place the technology and the software that I needed to be able to do that. So the very first person I called was the IT guy for the firm I was in for 24 years before I went to the large firm, and so Shane helped me set up my office and he helped me set up a home office when I had the foresight of creating a new solo practice roughly eight to nine months before a worldwide pandemic, and I had to work from home. So I already knew the software packages that I felt like I needed to be able to do that.

Speaker 2: 9:02

So getting all of that in place was my main concern. But I never felt concerned about clients coming to me because I had clients at the firm I was with for 24 years. I had clients at the large firm. It didn't matter where I was, I had my own practice. So I was comfortable that that practice would go with me, even into a solo practice. I did need to boost it. That's why I came to you guys.

Speaker 1: 9:38

We're so glad that you did. Going back to the concept about getting your technology in place, I think that is so smart because it really, as you said, you know you nailed it. It allows you to be efficient and keep your costs down. For some of those who might be listening to us, who are thinking about going out on their own, what are the software packages that you really knew you needed and have relied on and have worked well for you?

Speaker 2: 10:07

So Thanks to Even when I was in the 24-year firm, I had been practicing elder law for quite some time. One of the ways that I helped train myself was go to elder council training several times. There are boot camps for Medicaid and VA and other training and they have really, really good software for elder law and even basic estate planning. I do over 90 percent of my estate planning using elder law elder council software package.

Speaker 2: 10:49

It started out at Westlaw, I think it's Thomson Reuters. Now they have state-specific software packages and I knew that I needed them to do a ton of real estate documents, I do a ton of probate documents. I do some corporate and LLC documents for them. I needed them so I had to have those two software packages. For sure I had to figure out a billing system. I'd never used Clio before, but I had heard it was good. Shane the IT guy. He liked it so he thought that was a good idea. I use Clio for my billing and it's really, really easy to use.

Speaker 2: 11:43

One of the things that I have always hated is hourly billing. I think it's the scourge of the law practice. I think for the most part estate planning and probate and elder law attorneys. If they really think about it, 99.9 percent of the time they can do flat-feed billing for everything. I have gone to that point, even probates, and Clio is so easy to use. When you do flat-feed billing it is just bam, bam, bam, you're done. Now IMS has brought me into a different case management world and I'm using lawmatics probably not as well as I should, but I'm trying to use that as that helps get the cases started. I keep track of them where they are in the workflow through lawmatics.

Speaker 1: 12:49

We have some excellent recommendations there on software, and I do want to mention that neither John nor I get any kickbacks. This isn't a commercial, it's just walking through how you got set up in your solo practice. But it seems to me one thing that distinguishes your firm from a lot of others, John, is you had a particular asset by the name of Susan. You want to tell me a little bit about Susan and her role in your firm.

Speaker 2: 13:15

Right, Let me talk about the Susan origin story. As I mentioned, when I decided to really go out and become an elder law attorney, I was first and foremost worried about getting people to come into the office. I wasn't worried about. I know there's people that will sit there for weeks and months, people worried about getting the proper structure of software and all of that in place. I never worried about that. If people aren't coming in the door, I can't do the work. So there's no work to do. So I was worried about that. So I started marketing myself crazy.

Speaker 2: 13:54

I went to every networking event you can go to in the eldercare industry in the Dallas area for a really long time and I almost to the point of getting burned out on it. But at one of those events this lady that I knew from these marketing events came up to me and said you know, john, you need to hire me as your marketing person. And I thought, well, you know, that is something because I know that I have several rivals here.

Speaker 2: 14:29

really good friends of mine, but there are at least one of them is the other guy I don't know very well that have full-time marketing people and they mostly went out to nursing homes and tried to you know, persuade them to send work their way. But somebody that was very well liked in the eldercare industry in the Metroplex, and this lady was I mean, she was a saint, everybody just loved her. So she was recently widowed and she was burned out in the eldercare industry and so I said, okay, let's give it a shot. And it was fantastic. She helped me get a ton of business and then, six to eight months later, because she was a widow, her daughter decided to convince her to move to Wisconsin to be by her grandchildren. So she chose her grandchildren over me, can you?

Speaker 1: 15:28

believe that. I cannot believe that, but anyway.

Speaker 2: 15:32

I said as a parting gift. I know you have to go and I understand it, but I do have one request. Can you help me find somebody to replace you? And she said, sure, I don't even have to think about it, it's Susan Rogers. And so I said great, susan is also very beloved in the eldercare industry.

Speaker 2: 15:54

Here in this area. Everybody knows her. She had been. I think when I started working with her she'd already been in that field for 20 years in this area.

Speaker 2: 16:03

She has a degree and maybe even a master's in gerontology from North Texas University, and so for a long time she helped me with marketing. We did events. She helps me with setting up presentations. She does PowerPoints for me.

Speaker 2: 16:23

She can do a whole presentation without me being involved in it basically at this point, and she's been very involved with several organizations that we have become involved with, primarily the Dallas Area Gerontological Society, which is a social worker organization, and for a while there I was very heavily involved in that. I was on the board, I was a treasurer for a long time and we always exhibited at their main training event every fall, and she's still on the board there. I don't think she's on the board. I'm on the board of the National Placement and Referral Alliance people who help clients find assisted living and memory care and skilled nursing communities for their families and she's heavily involved in that and, as we started working with IMS, it also helps that she's brilliant with everything online, and so everything that we need to do related to sending out a weekly blog and newsletter and maintaining a contact list and anything and everything online. She's brilliant at that, so she's taken on a lot of those duties as well, and she's been with me for 10 years now.

Speaker 1: 18:09

One of the things that you mentioned about Susan is that she was beloved in that elder care industry. I want you to know she's beloved here at IMS as well. She is just invaluable and she's a great partner for us. It seems to me like you've got this team that's John, it's John's technology, it's software and it's technology, it's Susan and it's IMS and that's pretty much your law firm team, is that right?

Speaker 2: 18:42

That's it. Yeah, well, shane, shane, I was saying IT person Shane as well, Absolutely. I'm on the phone with him almost every day Because, unlike Susan, I'm an idiot when it comes to technology. I can use software packages. I can't install them or fix them or.

Speaker 1: 19:04

Well, one of the beauties, too, of the way that you're structured is you are an expert. I mean, you're like top notch in what you're doing. But when it comes to, we start talking about all of the marketing and I ask you questions. So, john, how's this working and how's that working? You're like ask Susan. So it really frees you to focus on what you do best.

Speaker 2: 19:28

Right. I see a lot of people that work with IMS and it seems like they are doing a lot of the functions that Susan does and I could not possibly practice law and do what Susan does at the same time. I don't know how I could do that.

Speaker 1: 19:44

We see, that too, kind of sort of from watching you know all that Susan does for you guys. We do now offer those kind of done for you service levels so that if you don't have a Susan, you know we can, we can fill in that gap for you through through a different service level. You know service package, but you're able to really leverage all of the tools because Susan is there to help, you know, make it all work. I looked up because we were talking about this the other day. You've been a client of ours since January of 2021. So we weren't quite sure, you know when we were talking the other day Exactly about a year and a half 21, 22, two and a half.

Speaker 1: 20:37

So all of us, all of us 2021, 22. So over those years, we've done quite a bit of different types of marketing with you, including your website and your blog and those things. Then we also launched the webinar funnel for you in December. So I know Susan probably has these numbers off the top of her head, but when you and I were talking the other day, I was like, well, I think we better go pull those so that we know what the numbers are. So you may not know this, but your webinar, john, has generated 754 leads so far and the average cost per lead is about $17, which is really, really outstanding for a webinar marketing funnel.

Speaker 2: 21:27

Rameez, is that how you pronounce his name?

Speaker 1: 21:29

Your coach. Yes, rameez.

Speaker 2: 21:30

Yes, rameez has been giving me those numbers and they're like okay.

Speaker 1: 21:36

Well, let me tell you you do not want that number to go over $35. So you're at about half, but yeah, we stay on top of that every day, try to make sure that it's optimized. Something else that's really interesting about your particular situation is you've got this webinar marketing funnel which is working for you all the time behind your back. You don't even know that it's working there, but about half of the traffic to your website is coming from organic search or that search engine optimization. We talk about that all the time. It's so important because we're looking at the leads from the webinar funnel running around $17 per lead. But these leads that come in from the SEO, we don't really have a number to apply to that. I hate to say they're free because there's a lot of work that goes into getting that SEO to work, but there's not like a cost per lead coming from that organic.

Speaker 2: 22:44

I think Susan is most responsible for the SEO, and you guys, well, has been when we started.

Speaker 1: 22:54

All that content that we're putting out there every day and Susan's posting it. We're doing that keyword research and the optimization there. It's all working together with your social media and your presence in the community, which gives you a tremendous amount of authority in Google's eyes. It all works together.

Speaker 2: 23:18

But I think Can I make a point about that? Yes, Somebody in my particular situation why that's important. So I was late to the game. Being an elder law attorney in this particular area. There were several well-established law firms that did it before I got involved. They I won't say tied up, but they had a lot of referral source, particularly nursing homes where they got all their business. That's how they still get all their business. They got these nursing homes that are just sending them automatically Medicaid cases day in and day out.

Speaker 2: 23:58

I knew that I had to find a different way to build a practice, because you can't penetrate that. There's no way. Susan and I can do as much as we can, but we're not going to be able to penetrate those relationships. Once people are established in a relationship like that, they feel no need to change it. They're not going to go looking for another attorney.

Speaker 2: 24:20

So it really is important to me and I think this is the future for all legal marketing is people are not. They still are getting going to find their attorneys and choose their attorneys through referrals, but they're also going to start doing a lot and eventually maybe just online, If I'm able to get to those people before they ever get to that nursing home or before they ever get to that referral to that other law firm. Because I'm working with IMS. That's really, really important to me because I was not an established player when I started in elder law in this area and once you're behind, you're never going to get caught up and if it's just the referral game, you have to have a different strategy and that's why this is useful to me.

Speaker 1: 25:15

We talked about the referrals when we visited the other day, and one of the things that you noted then was you do still get a lot of business from your referrals, but it can be feast or famine. You don't really have any control over when those referrals come in, and the online marketing has helped to even things out, take it up a notch and keep it more consistent.

Speaker 2: 25:39

And the online I think helps with the referral work too, because a lot of my work is referrals from people in the elder care industry here in the Dallas area and I think the fact that we drip on them more now and more efficiently and with our newsletter and our blogs through IMS, I think that keeps me top of mind more than it would otherwise.

Speaker 1: 26:05

Absolutely. We definitely see that kind of across the board, that online presence, especially when everything is integrated. It brings in the direct to consumer, but it also enhances your referral marketing as well, for sure. So, john, as someone who has a tremendous amount of experience you've been practicing in this area for 40 years. You're a past president of the Texas NALA chapter what words of wisdom do you have to other attorneys who are trying to take their practice in the state planning or elder law to the next level? But wherever they are right now, what kind of words of wisdom do you have to grow that practice?

Speaker 2: 26:50

So there's. I never thought that there was just one way, Right, I try to do as many different things as possible and I will never turn down an opportunity to talk to a group. I just got an email today from a former client who wants me to talk to her. I was in a group of online group of ladies who are talking about finances all the time and said, great, perfect, it's a perfect audience for me. I'm happy to do that. So I said you tell me a date and a time and I'll be there, I'm going to talk. I'm doing a presentation for the adult protective services organization in Texas, in Austin I think in November, December, and I've spoken to them before. I don't know that that will necessarily lead to something, but every presentation I can, I will do. I will do it.

Speaker 2: 27:48

I think the online stuff, as we've talked about, is critical for growing the practice. I think networking is still important. I just joined a. I was not looking to join a networking group, but somebody asked me and I checked it out and I thought, well, it's worth a year's time and I think the one that I'm in I think is a step above ones that I've been in before. It's more professionals, so I think that might be useful. I'll see where it goes.

Speaker 2: 28:25

So any and all avenues, to the extent that you have time and can still practice law. Yeah, I don't think there's one. I think that doing it online reduces the pressure on all of on relying on all of those other sources, but I would I don't think I should ever eliminate those either. I think you always have to go out and meet people, and occasionally I'll still have a lunch with a financial advisor. I did that last month, so I don't know if anything will come of that, but I do think that relying more on the online marketing and our whatever we've been doing networking in the elder care industry for low these many years is still the backbone of what we're going to do in the future.

Speaker 1: 29:18

And I think that's so important. I totally agree that the personal networking that you do, it can never be replaced, but you shouldn't be in a situation where you're totally relying on that Right. The online can just expand your efforts so much, particularly if it's done well. So, John, one more thing before we wrap up today what do you think about the future of opportunities in elder law and estate planning?

Speaker 2: 29:52

Well, if you just look at demographics, to the extent to that my baby boomer generation hasn't lived a life of debauchery and end up passing early, we're all going to end up being elderly and there will be lots and lots of work related to the legal issues of that very large contingent of baby boomers. Right now we're not working with baby, maybe the top end of baby boomers, the oldest baby boomers, but mostly my practice up to this point has been baby boomers taking care of their parents. They were born during World War Two, although that generation is almost gone. The Korean War generation, the people that during Vietnam, that generation, those are the parents that baby boomers are taking care of right now and eventually it'll just be baby boomers and I think demographics suggest that elder law for the foreseeable future is going to be a really good place to be.

Speaker 2: 31:01

And, of course, estate planning is going to always be there, because everybody has an estate to plan, whether they know they do or not, and typically people have planned their estates even though they don't realize it. They've set up a oh, I put my kid on my count, I'm taking care of, I don't need to do anything else. Well, actually that's a. That isn't a state plan. It's a terrible estate plan.

Speaker 1: 31:27

It is a terrible estate plan. John, you know it's always a pleasure. It's always a pleasure to visit with you. I want to be sure we get your website address out so that people want to contact you. They can visit you on your website and contact you. It's a McNair MCNIR-DallasLawcom. Mcnair-dallaslawcom.

Speaker 2: 31:54

I would say hyphen, but I think of that thing as a dash these days instead of a hyphen.

Speaker 1: 32:01

So I'll go with that. Terrific Well, thank you, John. Thank you so much. We love having you in our client family and it's always a pleasure to visit with you.

Speaker 2: 32:10

All right, thank you, appreciate it. Bye-bye, bye.

Speaker 3: 32:18

That's a wrap on this edition of the Marketing LawCast. Thanks for joining us. Head over to wwwimsrockscom for more growth-focused insights. If you're ready to skyrocket your firm's marketing, don't hesitate to book a free discovery call with our team right on our website. Here's to your success. See you next time.