How to save time and cut costs when you first hang your shingle.

1. © 2014 MyCase | Time And Cost Saving Tips For Solo Lawyers
www.mycase.com
1
Time And Cost Saving
Tips For Solo Lawyers
By Nicole Black, Director of Business Development at MyCase
Tips For Cutting Costs When You First Hang Your Shingle___________2
Four Technologies Solos Should Invest In__________________________3
Don’t Waste Your Money On These 3 Things_______________________4
Top 3 Time Saving Tips For Solos________________________________5
Don’t Overlook The Benefits Of These 3 Technologies______________6

2. © 2014 MyCase | Time And Cost Saving Tips For Solo Lawyers
www.mycase.com
2
“Keep your costs low and
focus on mission critical issues
for your law firm rather than
spending money on expensive
equipment and high end
office furniture. So, if you’re
a contract lawyer, ­investing
in a top of the line research
system is important — but
if you expect to conduct
research only once every few
months, use Google Scholar
— it’s free.”
—Carolyn Elefant, author of “Solo
By Choice: How to Be the Lawyer
You’ve Always Wanted to Be.”
Tips For Cutting Costs When
You First Hang Your Shingle
1) Carefully assess your needs and spend
money on things that are important to
the core of your practice, while cutting
corners in other, less critical areas.
2) Avoid investing in unnecessary
office expenditures, such as obsolete
technologies. Doing so will only cause you
headaches and end up costing more in the
long run.
3) Consider a home office, sharing
office space, co-working with other
new lawyers, or renting space from an
established law firm. New technologies,
especially cloud computing, make it easier
than ever for you to run your law practice
and practice law in just about any setting. Take advantage of the newfound
freedom and choices offered by 21st century technologies.

3. © 2014 MyCase | Time And Cost Saving Tips For Solo Lawyers
www.mycase.com
3
Four Technologies Solos Should Invest In
1) Purchase a reliable computer system, and ensure that your law office
has dependable, fast Internet access. These days, it’s impossible to run a
law practice without computers and access to the Internet. Wisely choosing
and investing in a powerful and up-to-date computer system will pay off in the
long run.
2) Invest in an affordable and easy-to-use law practice management
system. For more flexibility and cost-savings, consider a cloud-based system,
so you can manage your practice no matter where you are, any time of day or
night. Make sure to test drive a number of platforms so that you can choose
the one that seems most intuitive and works best for your law firm.
3) Make sure your office has a robust phone and answering system,
which may or may not include a receptionist. To cut costs, consider using a
free service such as Google Voice, a virtual receptionist service, or hiring a
receptionist part-time rather than full-time.
4) Also important is investing in a basic, professional website for your law
firm, since your firm’s website is the 21st century version of your front door.
These days, people skip the Yellow Pages and head right to Google, so make
sure that your firm’s website makes a good first impression.
“Things like fancy office space which were once considered critical are
now obsolete. Also obsolete are desktop-based law practice management
systems. For lawyers who want to take advantage of outsourced labor,
such as virtual assistants, desktop LPMs pose security and confidentiality
risks, since remote access to the firm’s servers allows users access to all
of the firm’s files. Select legal cloud-based systems, on the other hand,
have built-in tools to address security issues for multiple users by granting
permission-based access to only specific files and documents.”
— Carolyn Elefant

4. © 2014 MyCase | Time And Cost Saving Tips For Solo Lawyers
www.mycase.com
4
Don’t Waste Your Money On These 3 Things
1) Don’t bother investing in a fax machine. They’re obsolete and were
replaced years ago by efaxes, which are now being replaced by scanning
technologies and/or sharing documents via email or secure online portals.
2) Also not worth spending money on are unreliable or unproven online
marketing tools or consultants making baseless promises. Do research
ahead of time and make sure that any money you invest in SEO or paid online
lawyer directories will be money well spent.
3) Another way to save money is to avoid using full-time receptionists,
paralegals, or associates, when 21st technologies make it possible to use part-
time virtual receptionists and virtual legal assistants, thus offering what may
very well be a better, more affordable solution.
“Lawyers often waste money on paid SEO services. This is
particularly so when the law firm’s website is sub-par to begin with.
The best SEO in the world is useless if potential clients arrive at a
website with no relevant content. Paid directory services and lead
generation websites also generally tend to be a waste of money since
the return on investment is not good and people get locked into
long contracts given that short term ones are rarely available. People
spend thousands of dollars each month and the end results usually
aren’t good. For some lawyers, the same money could be better spent
by hosting a gathering for local attorneys and referral sources each
month, likely resulting in a better return.”
— Carolyn Elefant

5. © 2014 MyCase | Time And Cost Saving Tips For Solo Lawyers
www.mycase.com
5
Top 3 Time Saving Tips For
Solos
1) Save time by efficiently using mobile
technologies, including smart phones,
tablets, and mobile apps, such as scanner
apps and PDF annotation apps.
2) Take advantage of the flexibility, mobility
and affordability of cloud computing
platforms for practice management,
including time tracking, billing, contact
management, document management and
assembly, and secure online client portals.
3) Use collaboration tools in a secure
online environment to communicate
with clients, co-counsel and other people
important to your law practice and case
files. Doing so puts an end to phone tag and
makes it easy for keep everyone up to date
on the latest case developments.
“Mobile devices are ideal
for checking emails, social
media, etc. and makes your
time away from work more
productive since you can
squeeze more work into the
cracks. The cloud also makes
things easier. 20 years ago I
worked with lawyers in other
states and we communicated
by phone, email, and snail
mail. These days, the cloud
makes it simple and seamless
to pair up with a lawyer in
a different jurisdiction and
market, giving solos so much
more power and resources to
get things done.”
— Carolyn Elefant

6. © 2014 MyCase | Time And Cost Saving Tips For Solo Lawyers
www.mycase.com
6
Don’t Overlook The Benefits Of These 3 Technologies
1) Make use of the Internet and the vast resources it makes available. With
just the touch of a button, you can now easily access information that was
once only available in libraries or through costly subscriber-only databases.
Learn how to locate and take full advantage of all of the data available online.
2) Cloud technologies have revolutionized the way that business is
conducted. Instead of being confined to your office, you can now easily access
your law firm’s data and run your law practice from anywhere, as long as you
have an Internet connection. Don’t pass up the opportunity to put this 21st
century technology to work for your law office.
3) If it is available in the courts in which you practice, take the time to learn the
ins and outs of eFiling. Doing so will save you time and money, since you’ll
no longer have to make multiple copies of filings and then pay to have them
delivered to the courthouse. Instead, you can accomplish the same task with
just a click of your mouse.
“Solos need to take advantage of the many benefits of Google and
the Internet generally. For example family law attorneys can use
the Internet for research and investigations of the parties involved
in a case — something that, before the Internet, could only be
accomplished by hiring an investigator at great expense. Another
invaluable 21st century tool is eFiling. It has slashed the costs of filing
a case and you can dash something off your desk at 10 minutes to
midnight rather than making 30 copies and sending it off via costly
overnight mail.”
— Carolyn Elefant

7. © 2014 MyCase | Time And Cost Saving Tips For Solo Lawyers
www.mycase.com
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ABOUT THE AUTHOR:
Nicole Black is Director of Business Development at MyCase, a cloud-based law practice management
platform. She is an attorney in Rochester, NY, and is a GigaOM Pro analyst. She is the author of the
ABA book Cloud Computing for Lawyers, coauthored the ABA book Social Media for Lawyers: The
Next Frontier, and coauthored “Criminal Law in New York,” a West-Thomson treatise. She speaks
regularly at conferences regarding the intersection of law and technology. She publishes three legal
blogs and can be reached at niki@mycase.com.
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