0174: Shatterproof Your Business Legally with America's Legal Coach Scott Reib

Ea interviews, episode 174, inspiration, transformation, success stories and the imperfect action round. Seven days a week, join Mario Ficcini for today's expert authority effect interview. All right, expert authority world. I have another great episode for you today with America's legal coach Scott Reeb. And I'm excited to have him here because he's not only a Ziggler certified trainer, he's been helping entrepreneurs like you for the last 20 plus years shatter proof their business. And we're going to be talking about subscription based legal services. And I'm super excited about this because everyone wants to know about marketing. Everyone wants to know about the fancy shiny objects and this and that. And I even I get asked what's that Mike you're using and how did you do this? That the other thing, I get it, the glitz and the glam is sexy. But you know what the legal structure is what gives you a real business, keeps you profitable and protected. I'm excited to bring up Scott Reeb right after we thank our sponsor. How would you like to grow your wealth Easier than you think. With the change you probably don't notice anyhow automatically. That's why I started the compounding interest snowball investing with acorns and advise you do too get started simply and easily today@eainterviews.com ACORNS Here he is, ladies and gentlemen, Mr. Scott Reeb. How are you doing, Scott?

I am great, Mario. Thanks for having me.

So excited to have you here because like I was saying on the intro, so many people want to do all the sexy shiny object stuff and how do I make the website and just whatever. Everyone knows what I'm talking about. But not a lot of people in my experience get excited over the legal side of things. Why should they?

Well, it's what makes all the other glitz and glamour possible. If you're going to do all the glitz and glamour, the marketing, the conferences, all the things that we like to do that are sexy, then you better have the right foundation under your business. And unfortunately or fortunately for me, it's the legal side. You have to have that right or everything else in the end doesn't matter.

So take me through. We have a time for about, I don't know, three, four, five ways. I'm sure there's dozens. But I want to know how to shatter proof your business and my business and what should people be looking for?

Sure. And in my, in my book, five proven strategies to shadow preview of business, we take you through some real simple ways that you can do this. The first one is to assemble what I call a team of key advisors. You may have heard it called a board of advisors. And this isn't hard to do, right? It doesn't take rocket science and it doesn't take money necessarily to do this. Not a lot now, but the first person you want on that board of advisors is you want to have a cpa. The CPA is the person that's going to help you set up your books. If you're using QuickBooks or something like that, they create the chart of accounts for you. They help you learn how to manage your cash flow, how to read financial reports, how to put them together, and how to make financial decisions so that you can move your business forward. Really key to have that part of your structure in place on that board of advisors. The next thing that you want to have is you want to have a business coach, alright? If you're going to start this business, you need to have someone that can help you stay on the path. Now, maybe you've already got this planned out and have a path, or maybe you need it, maybe you have this vision but don't really know how to execute it. Well, a business coach can help you do that and hold you accountable to the action steps that you should be taking to get from A to C and then from C to E, right? It's all baby steps. And then the next key advisor that you need is you need a banker, right? And this isn't a bank. I mean, now there's a bank on every corner. A lot of them have people that haven't even had a shave yet. You need someone that's a real banker, right? That they know what they're doing. It's someone that you can have a personal relationship with, which preferably would mean that you could walk in and have a cup of coffee with them. And they know you and they know what you're trying to do. So that when you have a problem, whether it's just a problem with something on your bank statement, or if you need to write a check and don't have quite enough to cover it, they need to give you some sort of a line of credit to do that. You need that kind of person there because it can make all the difference on whether you're able to capitalize on opportunities as they arise in your business.

Let me pause you right there. How would you say? Because that's a great point you make and I see a lot of stuff for online banks and you're saying to have a personal Relationship, you're not going to have that with a chat room. And let's say I'm thinking of some banks right now, including mine, where I business, business, bank through and personal and other stuff. But.

You can't just walk into one. How would you choose which one is going to be the right one for you? Because there's a lot of good ones out there. I'd recommend who I'm with. But how do you know if. Just how do you know?

You know, for me, almost everything is about relationships. So I'm going to want to talk to other entrepreneurs in my geographic area and ask them who they're using for that. Right. So if I'm a real estate investor and I'm creating a real estate company, then I'm going to want to talk to other people in that business and ask them, who are you working with? Who is helpful? Who's the best at this? And then you go introduce yourself to them. And it may be a phone call at first, and then you open the bank account and get started. And it takes time to build a relationship. So you have to drop in with coffee donuts a couple of times and just get to know them. Or before they give you their cell phone number. Right. You have to date them a little bit before that's going to happen. But it's worth that time and investment. And that doesn't mean you can't take advantage of some things that online banks offer. But I would just highly recommend that you have someone local or at least someone that you have a relationship with. It could be that they've moved somewhere else, but that you can. That they have you on speed dial. And if you need them, they're going to take your call. Because most entrepreneurs have been in that spot where they just needed. They just needed them to wait till tomorrow for the deposit, to let them write the check today. It just happens in your business. And if you don't have that relationship, it doesn't happen. And I know lots of people that I've worked with over the years that would probably be out of business if it weren't for a good banker that really supported them in maybe a lean time.

That's great advice there. And so you're saying that's the second step is having that personal relationship with a banker? Banker. Not just the bank.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, just the bank. And then the last but not least is that you need to have a business lawyer. And it's not just that you maybe know of one. You need to have again, a relationship with one you Want to secure that relationship before you have a crisis. Most people are reactive and responsive when it comes to the legal side of their business. And that's where you get into trouble. And really in big dollars because it's to litigate. It's expensive to pay lawyers when you're in a crisis. If you'll go make that deal and that set up that relationship when you're not in a crisis mode and let them get to know you and your business in the context of what you do and set up the pay structure, then it's much less expensive. There's not surprises in the end. And my recommendation is that you find someone that can give you a fixed monthly fee for a set package of services so that you have no expectation. You have the expectation set. There's no surprise bills. You don't have to worry about paying them for every time you call them. But you know, it's in your budget and you know that you have secured that person to be on your team. Right? And if you set this team up right, then they should be talking to each other. So, you know, in my world, if a client has a problem during a call with me that I need information from a cpa, I don't have the client call the cpa. I, I call the cpa. My team does and we do the work and then let the client keep doing what they're supposed to be doing. And that's the way if you set that board of advisors up, let them all know that they exist and that they have access to each other to help you, you'll be amazed at what they can be doing while you're out selling or doing what it is that you need.

That sounds great to me because that's exactly what I've said to my team. You know, I do everything I can to empower them to say, hey, if you need, you know, for example, assets for the show or this or that, we're all connected and it's the same thing from the legal and the financial. It's like, I don't want to be in the middle of, well, for example, filming this show right now, and someone needs something. And I'm doing this all day like I do when I do my filming day as I do these back to back. And you're not going to get me while I'm doing them. So, you know, I don't want two or three days to go by just because you can't reach me. And that's a great piece of advice because. And I really want to stress it Because I see so many entrepreneurs when I'm helping them publish their business books, it's like, you know, one week they're all excited, they're moving gung ho with it, and the next week it's, I can just sense it, you know, I've done it long enough and I'm like, what's going on? And they're like, oh, whatever. And I'm like, why don't you empower them? And it's. I believe it's a trust thing. They, you know, it's like, you have to let go. Like I say, let go and let God. And it's like you have these people in your life to support you. And if they're not.

Maybe that's saying something else also, because everyone should be able to be empowered to basically work autonomously. I think that's the word, and hopefully I'm saying it right. But you want to empower your team. That is the point. And I love what you're suggesting. So thank you.

An example right now, with everyone with the PPP program out there, and this is most people are people approaching that eighth week of that money, having received that money. And so now they're concerned about how do I have to report that back to the government to get that loan forgiven. That's going to take some cooperation between your bookkeeper, your CPA, and very possibly your business lawyer. And so if you don't have that set up for that, for them to work in a synergistic way, it's going to be a real time drain for you as an entrepreneur where it shouldn't be. They should be doing that in the background.

How long would you say someone should expect? Because I know that managing expectations is probably one of the most overlooked things in business. You know, and you said you're given a lot of great expert authority insights here, truly. But someone might think it only takes a week and someone else might think it might take two months. What is a realistic expectation to go from wherever they're at to having it structured the way they should, like you're suggesting?

Oh, I think it could easily take you the first, the first 90 to 120 days of a startup business to find that team of advisors. It really could. And so if you had to prioritize them, I would want to get the CPA and lawyer online first so that you had those anchors of money and the legal structure set up. And then I'd very quickly want to bring on the business coach and banker. And then the last one, I'd want to Bring on that we hadn't gotten to yet is an insurance advisor that can tell you what coverages you need to fill in the gaps so that if when something does go wrong, it's not if, it's when, then you've got the coverage in place so that you don't have to panic and you know that there's going to be someone jump in and defend you and then pay, pay. If something's happened that you know was there was negligence, something happened. That's why the insurance there you wanted to take care of. But you have to know what coverages to get and, and most entrepreneurs don't know. You know, you need someone to advise you what's available and what makes the most sense. And so you need that person on that board.

Now what if someone isn't a startup and they've already been in business 5, 10, 15, 20 years and they're still not set up? Would it still be the same 90 to 120 days?

It should be faster.

It should be faster at that point because they should have some kind of a network already set up to be able to very quickly ask people who, who are the go to people in these key seats and then set up at least zoom calls with them. If not meet in person and ask them if they're willing to work with them in that capacity. And you have to explain what you're trying to do, right, that you're trying to set up this key team of advisors or a board so that the expectations right for these professionals because if they don't work that way, then you don't want them. So you need to make sure that they're willing to be part of a team approach to help you. And a lot of them are, but some people aren't. They are, they just want to do their thing and not to worry about anything else. So make sure you're asking those kind of questions when you're doing this. But yeah, if you're existing, I mean you should be able to ramp this thing up in 30 to 60 days. If you, if you really want to get this thing right, then you should be able to do that pretty fast.

Well, you just answered the next question and it was how long should it be? So you're saying 30 to 60 days, not 60 to 90 even?

Yeah, it should not be that hard if you've been in business five years.

Okay, excellent. So you're obviously giving great insights. How did you get into this?

Well, that's a, that's a long question. I got into the law kind Of a hard, kind of a weird way. I was selling phone phone systems for AT&T in Tulsa and had a contract issue with them back in 91. And when I went to a lawyer to see how to work it out, they told me that I had a great case, but that I couldn't afford to litigate it. So I did what every normal person would do. I applied for law school and started becoming a lawyer. I didn't want that to happen to me anymore. I wanted to be empowered. And so I took that opportunity. I was 25. Went back, went to law school, and it was a great experience. And then I started working as a lawyer and doing litigation, which I thought would be really fun. It looks fun on tv, but when you really get into it, it's really hard work. And that's okay. Hard work is good. But I would spend hour upon hour with. On these phone conferences with engineers and patent lawyers, billing my clients by the hour and just bored to death and feeling like I really wasn't giving the client any value. I was. Wasn't really helping. I mean, at some point I was. I guess it took a case to resolution, but it just didn't feel right. And so I started migrating to smaller and smaller business deals. And in 97, one year out of law school, I sold my first. I helped a client sell a company. It was an ambulance company in Fannin County, Texas, and was. I thought it was great. I got paid by a percentage of the sales price. So I was actually, I didn't get paid unless I delivered value. I loved that. And we did a great job. The senior partner at the firm helped me, and we put together a great package, sold it, and they were thrilled. And so I got a taste for the business side of things then. And so I started transitioning at that point to working with smaller businesses and doing contingent type work. Litigated a lot, did a lot more litigation at that point, but it still seemed like I was more personally connected, giving more value. And then I ran into a problem in 2012, or at least started realizing I had a problem and that I wasn't getting a lot of repeat business. My clients weren't calling me all the time. They didn't really like me that much, I guess. And so I started talking to business coaches because I had this idea of the problem was that they didn't like the way you pay lawyers. Traditionally, you pay lawyers by the hour, right? You give them a big retainer, they've got an hourly rate. Mine's 500 an hour. And you bill against that. And so every time you touch their file, you bill some minimum charge. If they call you, there's a minimum charge. Right. And so every time there's a built in incentive for the lawyer to spend more time on that project because they'll make more money. And the clients, I think inherently know that. And they also know that if they call you, money's gonna fly out of their pocket. So what my clients were doing was flipp a coin, going to Google, dialing a friend, calling Regis Philbin, whatever they could do besides call me, because they didn't want to spend money on that problem. And so they would make a mistake and then have to call me to fix it. And then it would cost way too much to fix it. And they'd be upset at the end even though we got the result they wanted because it cost too much and so they'd go away. So we created a subscription model so that there's a set monthly fee with set services that they can count on being able to communicate regularly with our team. We call it on demand legal. So you don't have to make decisions in a vacuum. You can make them with real legal advice, business advice, and make the best possible decision and move forward with confidence. Is it always going to be the right decision? No, not always, but you're going to make a lot better decisions than you would have before. And we're going to be set up in a way to jump on the ones that aren't perfect to resolve them more quickly. Because you've got part of your subscription plan is the pre litigation so that you're not having to go pay a retainer and deal with, you know, some demand letter or maybe someone owes you money. You're able to deal with that stuff. And so that's how we solve that problem. And that's kind of how we got to this point here in 2020 where we've been doing subscription model legal services for seven.

Wow, that's fantastic to hear. And I love the story because I at one point was looking into law school myself. I've always loved helping people and I saw it as a way that you can do that. And it sounds very much in the same vein of what you were saying as I wanted him be empowered and not be stuck in that position because so many people, you know, that's just what this case is, that they're good people and people take advantage of them simply because they just don't know what to do and can't get the help. I think it was Thomas Jefferson One of my favorite quotes, all it takes for good people to do. All it takes for evil to prevail is for good people to do nothing. And nowadays it seems like even when they try to do something, it's not that they're doing nothing. It's. There's so much litigation and this and that and red tape. It's like you need someone to navigate that. I'm proud to say my nephew Joseph is an attorney now, so we still have one in the family. I actually believe we have a couple, but he's the one who came to mind. And I think it's great that you're out there advocating for the entrepreneurs and the business owners because.

We prefer doing other stuff and you still need it and I know it's important, so thank you.

So as far as your subscription model is concerned, do you have one flat price or do you have different tiers depending on what someone's getting?

We have three different levels, depending on how much they want. You know, maybe you're very entrepreneurial and starting five or six different companies a year. And so you need to have some entity formation built in, or you have lots of contracts to review, then you're up. And you would start at a higher tier and then their highest tier. When we were basically at that point, you're outside legal. You're outside legal counsel and general counsel. It's very hands on at that point. And so it just depends what level the client is. Some of the times it's how much money they're making. Sometimes it's how. If they've already had lawyers before and kind of know how to use them. Because it's kind of. It's a learning curve. It's a culture change because they're not. They've never had a lawyer before and they don't really know what to do with one. It's like I'm trying to work with a new virtual assistant and I'm having trouble giving her things to do because I'm just not used to that. I'm used to having either doing it myself or my team here does it. And so it's just been a learning curve. And it's that way with hiring a lawyer if you've never used one. And so it takes a little time. So there's no reason to jump up to a really high level if you're not ready for that. And so people kind of move through the plan and sometimes they move down too, depending on what's happening.

And that's great. You have that option because like, you're saying anytime you do anything new, I mean, whether it's a virtual assistant.

Hire in a lawyer, that's tongue twister hiring a lawyer, publishing a book, doing a show, interviewing anything new, there's for sure going to be a learning curve. But then like you said, the key thing, the culture difference is how do you make this work for everyone? Because I've hired people that they just get me and get the workflow and they want to be a team player. And I was telling someone recently, good friend of mine who's another entrepreneur, and I was like, you can train almost anyone on anything. You need to have the right person, you know, because so many people say, well, I've had so and so for so many years or a team of people or this and that. And it's like, yeah, they might be the key person, but just like the prettiest girl in the room, she might know it and act like it.

And that may be desirable or not, depending on who you are.

And.

You have to have the right people in place. And I think it's great that you're mentioning that and realizing it. And I'll also tell you it does get a lot easier. You can do a lot with pre recorded video and there's even a software called Snagit that if you're doing anything on screen, you, you can click what explain it while you're doing it. And it helps tons. I use it with my team.

Yeah, yeah. When you're hiring, you want to. Don't hire for skill, hire for attitude. You can train people to do almost anything you need them to do. And if they've got the wrong attitude, you can't train them to do anything well enough.

I agree 100%. So I want to talk about transformation. I'm not sure you can mention them if you like to. If you're in NDA, you don't need to. But I want to know your biggest transformation and success story. Someone that was in a world of hurt before got hooked up with you and now they're very happy about it.

Yeah, that does get difficult in my business because I can't give a lot of details.

Here's one thing I've done with customer reviews. Client reviews. Mr. And Mrs. X.

Yes, yes, let's use Ms. And Mrs. X is in the real estate business and thought she had really no need for a lawyer. And through the first six months of working with her, we were able to get all of her legal documentation and legal systems in place so that she was able to teach her team how to do things in a legal way, not that they were doing it illegally, but to make sure that they were legally protected. And then have been able to solve several huge problems for her as she's grown and scaled her business. Another one that I can actually even talk about, the name an online fitness. I would say guru Shawn Garner came on board about two years ago. And in that online space, especially in the fitness space, you're doing a whole lot of different things. You're doing brand deals and modeling type things. And he was getting contracts. Right, left. And there was a contract that before he had us, he would have just signed. But right before he signed it, he sent that thing into the team. We, when we get contracts, we review them. You get back a memo that says, hey, here's the problem areas. Here's what we would recommend you. How you change it. They may or may not change it, but these are the recommendations. And when he read those recommendations, he realized that had he signed it, it would have cost him about $20,000 that he wasn't. That he didn't understand. And so he didn't sign that deal and save $20,000. And he's since then been a great referral source for us because he understands the value of just having that extra set of eyes on things especially. It's just outside, just a little bit outside of what you do. Right. I mean, he's really good at what he does, but he's not someone that is supposed to be reviewing contracts. And if you're doing that yourself, you can really make some big mistakes and not know it until it's too late.

Yeah. And. And that's another great expert authority insight, because every. I think everyone is trained now, look at the fine print. But if you can't interpret it or know what it means looking at it, I mean, there's stuff I've read, I'm like, cool. I mean, it makes enough sense. But yeah. And then I call someone who knows what they're doing, just like they call me for, you know, my expertise. And it's crucial because you said the key thing, it saved him $20,000. I mean, how much is that sentence worth for him, $20,000? For you, it might be 2,000 or 200,000. Either way, it's worth a look.

Yeah. And sometimes you won't know it could be saving you money and you not know it. He happened to be able to see it, it was real money, that he would have actually had it come out of his pocket. But, yeah, it's just. You just. Contracts are not written in friendly ways most of the time. So if someone sends you one and they're bigger than you are, it probably favors them and it's just a matter of figuring out where. That's not how we do contracts. If we're doing contracts for our clients, we try to prepare contracts that are very fair and transparent and set up the deal so that everyone understands what their obligations are. There's no gotchas. We want them to be fair deals that are. But that. That can be enforced if you have to. But a lot of contracts that you get now really do have those in them and so you have to watch for it.

That's great advice. I want to ask you one more question and we're going to go to the wheel of whatever right now before we thank the sponsor. And I teased you with it right when we were prepping. But.

It'S time. We're going to pretend the questions on here.

And always ends up right where I need it to. I love that. Who is someone you would love to have as a client and what would you like to help them with?

Oh, wow.

I was. I'm a. Since we're on a podcast and I love doing these podcast interviews. One of my podcasting heroes is JLD with Entrepreneur on Fire. I would love to have him as a client. I think he's just a down to earth guy. But one of my goals in life is to work with people who have a lot of influence. You mentioned at the first the show that I work with the Zig Ziglar company. The reason I work with them is because they have a huge influence. Zig influenced millions while he was alive and they still are. And then my value is exponential. Right. If I help them do a better job of what they do, then they get to help all those people. And you know, someone like JLD is just helping so many people in my market. Right. In small business entrepreneurs. I would just love to be able to work with him and help him do that in a better way.

Well, I will let him know. John's a good friend of mine and I think that that's an awesome answer because he does have a lot of influence and you would be making a. The ripple effect would be.

Incalculable, uncalculable. It would be big.

Excellent. Well, we're going to thank our sponsor and come back for the imperfect action round. Invest automatically, save for later and spend today. That's why I love acorns. I used to think spare change didn't make a difference and saving and investing was an old fashioned manual process. It's not and it's a good game changer. If you're not leveraging compounding interest in your business and life automatically, you're missing out. Acorns not only make saving and investing easy and automatic, it makes it even more valuable. By investing with diversified portfolios, spare change, extra cash and rounding up everyday transactions. You can even set recurring monthly investments in the amount you desire to make. Good. Great. There is also a debit card option that will continue to help you save and invest even further when you spend plus no minimum balance and overdraft fees. Now for the cherry on top. They have partnered with 250plus companies and brands and growing with their found Money program to invest back a percentage into your account with the everyday purchases when you shop, two of which you're probably listening to this right now through an Amazon or Apple device. Get started profiting from your everyday life and business simply and easily today@eainterviews.com.

Once again, that's eainterviews.com acorns and we are back with the Imperfect action round. Are you ready to take imperfect action?

I'm ready.

All right, number one. First a question. What is the fastest path to the cash?

The fastest path to the cash is the is selling something to the clients that you already have?

Excellent. Number two, what is the biggest problem you see your prospects making and the fastest way they can fix it?

They're doing handshake deals and the fastest way to fix it is to hire a lawyer to draft a basic contract to use for their their most regular deal.

Interesting. All right, audible time. This is for me. Do you, do you work with ip?

Yes.

Excellent. More on that after we're done.

Number three, what is the best way to maximize customer lifetime value?

It's communication. You need to stay in constant communication with your client base and be offering them value on a continuing basis. You can do that lots of ways. Right? You could do it through podcasts. I do some audio modules that they get and then I also have a written and digital newsletter to make sure I'm in front of them and giving them things of value. Not stuff just about me, but stuff that will help them.

Excellent. Very good. What are some books you could suggest for Expert Authority World that have made a big difference in your business?

I'll do three. One is, and probably is on lots of people's list is Gerber's E Myth Revisited that really kind of set me on this path. Another one is Chet Holmes Ultimate Sales Machine. There's some really good things in there about educational based marketing that I think every entrepreneur should know and be using. And then the third is kind of specific to me. It's the automatic customer and anyone that's doing subscription based stuff should read that. It's not to be sacrilegious, but it's basically the bible of this stuff.

Very good recommendations. I've heard good things about all of them.

Well, I have enjoyed this. I appreciate your time. And where would you like everyone to go to learn more about you?

You know, it'd be great if they would go to reblaw.com expertauthority and we've created a website there that they can go to and they can book a session with me for free. It'll be me, not someone else here. We'll do a 20 minute laser legal coaching session and really try to help you as an entrepreneur get value out of that time. And then you can Download my book Five Strategies that We've Talked About Today for free. So reblaw.com reiblaw.com forward/expert authority Excellent.

And I'll make sure there's a show note. There's a link in the Show Notes page on the website eainterviews.com thank you so much Scott. It has been a pleasure.

That's been really fun. Thanks Mario.

All right, Expert Authority World. We have another great episode here today. I'll see you tomorrow. Have a great day and God bless. Why Every Business Needs a Book, Including Yours Would you like to save five plus hours with every prospect? Generate more leads and profit in your business? Now visit businessbookchecklist.com and learn how you can implement this in your business today. Spare change? How's that going to make a difference? I know that's what I thought before I started investing. With Acorns, throwing change in a jar is not very leverage and time consuming. But what about all the transactions you don't use cash for? You know, like majority Acorns not only invest your spare change automatically with roundups, it also lets you add a preset amount to each transaction. Regardless, it's pretty inspiring to see how quickly and easily you can end up with a pile of cash instead. A pile of receipts. Get started simply and easily today@eainterviews.com Acorns Once again, that's eainterviews.com Acorns hey, thanks for listening to today's episode. I hope you got a lot out of it. I know I sure did. If you haven't done so already, I invite you to subscribe to the show and also be sure to check out eainterviews.com for complete show notes, the full interview video experience, links to the resources we mentioned, and more. Have a blessed day and I'll see you tomorrow.

I.