I’d like to grow my practice, but I can’t find the time.

I can’t find the time to take referral sources to lunch.

I can’t find the time to write articles for my blog, website, local business publication, family law section newsletter, etc.

I can’t find the time to figure out what to do about my listings on family law directories.

I can’t find the time to get involved with Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn.

But I’d really like to grow my practice.

STOP, STOP, STOP…Don’t say any more. Don’t tell me you want to grow your practice if you don’t have the time. If you’re already busy, then you shouldn’t want more work. Right? If you’re busy, then you should be busy with paying clients. You shouldn’t need any more marketing.

But unfortunately, when I meet lawyers who are too busy to market, they’re usually too busy doing things that don’t pay well. They’re busy doing things that aren’t helping them earn more money. What they’re really saying, when they say they want to grow their practice, is that they want to grow their income.

To grow your income, you’ve got to stop being too busy. That probably involves changing your pricing. You’re likely not charging as much as you should.

When you raise your rates, stop extending credit, stop compromising receivables, and start billing for all of your time and services, you’re going to see one of two things happen. Either (1) you’re going to suddenly make more money from the same clients or (2) you’ll have fewer clients.

If the former happens then my work here is done.

If the latter happens, then we’ve found the time to do the marketing.

So before you claim to be so busy that you can’t find the time for marketing, please do some evaluation of your situation. Are you busy with uncompensated or poorly compensated work? If that’s the case, it’s time to correct that situation and move on to the marketing you haven’t had time for in the past.