Your skills and network may be the primary factors bringing in clients for you. In the legal profession, generating business is no ordinary feat. There can be extended periods when you wouldn’t be approached by any new people who could be potential clients. Even when tables turn in your favor, a consistently long period of a profitable business is highly unlikely. Having said that, handling the clients you already have, and keeping them satisfied to the utmost is unanimously the most difficult task attorneys deal with. Law offices often make critical mistakes at managing clients. It is understood that no firm or practitioner can afford to lose their valued clients at all, that too, after putting in all the effort to make them stay. Here are a few pieces of advice for attorneys to get hold of the art of handling clients efficiently.
Never make promises you can’t keep
Being a polished practitioner with a stern grip over your area of practice, you would often be tempted to disclose favorable news to your clients to their utmost satisfaction. Fresh lawyers often make this mistake in their haste to retain the people that have approached them. Despite any such urges, you should never promise your clients for moon and stars, even when you can get these for them. In a field as unforeseen as litigation, things can always go off-track and stem into unpredictable results. Even if you do everything in your power to secure your clients’ best interests, the clients may still be upset if the outcome that was initially promised has not been met.In contrast, you should also not let the client go away in dejection just because you couldn’t provide him solutions. Remember that a lawyer is also a doctor for every disease unrelated to the body, which is why people tend to rely on them so much. It is hence best to under-promise and over-deliver. While promising, make it a rule of thumb to promise the clients your dedication and devotion to the case, rather than any certain outcome.
Know your client
Right when it’s about accepting a case or not, most attorneys will rely on the facts and merits of the issue rather than focusing on the person who brought it. A profound assessment of both things is equally important. Many attorneys, acting in desperation, may take up the case, but will be later disclosed with the reality of the person they’re representing, at times completely different than what the client initially “projected” themselves to be. You should always insist on knowing more about the clients as persons, despite being unrelated to the case. You can ask them to write down everything about their selves and give it to you. Personal knowledge of the clients has been found to improve the client-attorney relationship along with fully equipping the attorney to build a strong case for the client. Small details about the clients can also greatly help in quick evaluations and arguments on the case.
Keep your client informed
Based upon the nature of legal battles, clients are always expected to be concerned about their matters pending before courts. They can be clingy, wanting details of progress on their cases every now and then. Even worse, the digital age has made it easier for everyone to have hands-on knowledge about the basics of everything in general. Clients, too, have first-hand knowledge of the laws applicable in their cases at the distance of just a few clicks. It can thus be said that the long-standing “trust me, I’m your lawyer approach” has gone obsolete. For this very reason, clients must always be kept informed and updated on the status of their cases and any future steps that you will be taking. This doesn’t mean that attorneys need to engage in detailed phone-calls with clients on each date of their case. Rather, a short notification providing them even a basic understanding can work really well to keep them posted.
Make yourself available
Attorneys all over the world are found complaining about having fewer hours in their clocks. It definitely means that lawyers are almost always overwhelmed with work than bored. Expecting a busy professional to attend calls all day would end up in sheer disappointment and nothing. Having said that, excessive workload is never a reason good enough to avoid client calls and taking forever to give them a callback. You must make yourself available to clients at appropriate times for any concerns they may have about their cases or to discuss any urgent queries they may have at short notices. This will ensure that clients start relying on you for their important bits, a luxury enjoyed by most successful attorneys, and is prone to improve your relationship with them.
