Marketing

I asked the CLNC^® Pros to share their favorite easy-to-use exhibiting strategies for gaining new attorney-clients. Add these top 10 marketing ideas to your next exhibit with attorneys.

1. Make your legal nurse consulting exhibit eye popping, big and colorful. Not too busy, not too much information. You don’t want the attorneys to be confused or put off by having to read too much. Make sure you have enough light on the exhibit so that it can be easily seen, even from a distance. The display does not have to be huge. If done well, a simple table top display can be very effective and easier to manage.

“I have banners that hang in front of or behind my booth that include my business name, logo, phone number and website. They have grommet holes for easy attachment and they roll up easily for storage. They get the essential information out visibly, look great and aren’t expensive.

Last year I exhibited at a local event. It was small and not costly to exhibit. Although the attendee list was small, I ended up gaining two excellent attorney-clients from that event. I never sat down and made an effort to draw in every attorney that walked by my booth. One attorney told me that large exhibits did not impress him. He was much more interested in the personal touch and the conversation in which we engaged. He thought I had a lot of “guts” and that’s what drew him to me. He actually didn’t even live in my city. He lived 120 miles away and I now get every one of his cases. He is a very busy personal injury attorney, and he has referred many of his colleagues to me.”

Dale Barnes, RN, MSN, PHN, CLNC

2. Get the best location in the exhibit hall that your advertising dollars will buy. Your CLNC^® business will benefit when you are on a main aisle close to the entrance…or the food!
3. Promote your risk-free guarantee as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant on your display and when talking to attorney-prospects.
4. If you are exhibiting at a conference that has 500-1,000 attorneys attending, take someone with you so you don’t miss a single opportunity to promote your CLNC^® business.
5. Dress professionally and maintain a high level of energy. Energy is contagious. Having fun and being professional are not mutually exclusive. Stand in front of the booth, not behind the table and don’t sit down. This creates the space for the attorney-prospects to easily approach you. Even if you have to move out into the aisle approach the attorneys to invite them into your space.
6. Give attorney-prospects promotional materials or items that have your contact information and promote your legal nurse consulting business. People like to get free things to take with them (pens, Post It^® notes, audio CDs on topics such as electronic medical records, etc.). These are items that they will be using well into the future and when the day comes that they just can’t figure something out on one of their cases, they will remember you, and right at their fingertips will be your contact information. As they sit there twirling their pen, they will see that the answer to their prayers is right in their hand.

“One attorney told me that he couldn’t remember my name when he was struggling with a case, but when he took his pen out of his mouth, there I was. He always says that that was the best pen he has ever had.”

Nikki Chuml, RNC, FMC, PRN, CLNC

“Give away fortune cookies that have a catchy fortune and your contact information. The fortune can read, ‘Confucius says lawyers that understand the value of Certified Legal Nurse Consultants succeed where others fail!’”

Dorene Goldstein, RNC, CLNC


7. Include a drawing for a free case screening in exchange for the attorney-prospects’ business cards. This gives them a reason to stay connected. You can have as many winners as you have time for. Many Certified Legal Nurse Consultants use this strategy as a way to get their foot in the door. Most tell us that when they call the law firm to announce the free screening they get through to the attorney with ease. As one CLNC^® consultant says, “It works every time.” You can also have a drawing for an in-house presentation on a topic relevant to the law firm’s medical-related cases and again have as many winners as you have time for.
8. Never leave your CLNC^® booth and always exhibit to the very end. You’ll meet some of the best attorney-prospects near the end of the day. Also, stay during session time for the attorneys who skip a session to get an edge on the exhibits.
9. Attend all social functions sponsored by the association to which exhibitors are invited. Make it your goal to meet at least 5-8 attorneys at each function.
10. Stay off your cell phone and computer at all times when attorneys are in the exhibit space.

Use these top 10 exhibiting strategies from these CLNC^® Pros the next time you are in front of attorneys to guarantee you take home a new attorney-client every time.

Success Is Inside!

Exhibiting is a cost-effective way to get in front of a large number of attorneys in a very short time. I asked four Certified Legal Nurse Consultants to share the role that exhibiting plays in their marketing plans.

1. “I exhibit at the same legal conference year after year. One of my attorney-clients joins my exhibit and markets to new attorneys for me, telling them that they cannot afford not to use me! All I do is stand there, smile, collect their business cards and answer any questions they have about the CLNC^® services I offer. Having my attorney-client refer me in person really helps other attorneys see the benefit of hiring a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant.”

   Nikki Chuml, RNC, FMC, PRN, CLNC

2. “Recently a CLNC^® colleague exhibited at a legal conference and ended up with more cases than she knew what to do with, all cases coming from one attorney. Her recent email to me stated, “Be careful what you wish for; because it just may come true!” Exhibiting paid off handsomely for her.”

   Lawrence H. Frace, RN, CLNC

3. “I recommend exhibiting to promote your legal nurse consulting business whenever you can. The more often the better. Legal conferences for personal injury attorneys are my favorite. At one legal conference, I had five or six attorneys at a time at my table talking war stories. They are like nurses. When they get together, they like sharing war stories from their cases. I joined right in talking war stories of how I helped an attorney win a case and they loved it. I ended up with three attorney-clients from that one conference and we are still telling war stories today.”

   Nikki Chuml, RNC, FMC, PRN, CLNC

4. “In mapping out a new marketing plan for my CLNC^® business each year, I make sure to plan for three to four opportunities to exhibit at legal conferences or symposiums. I belong to a couple of organizations that offer exhibiting space at discounted rates for members. I’ve learned to think outside the box as to what may yield good revenue. I gained some good attorney-clients last year from exhibiting at a conference about class action suits. Many of those cases do not involve medical issues, but enough of them do. Many of the attorneys in attendance also handle medical-related cases, so those are the attorneys I focused on and it was a great opportunity to present my CLNC^® consulting services to them. Exhibiting can be a lot of fun and all Certified Legal Nurse Consultants should add it to their marketing plans.”

   Dale Barnes, RN, MSN, PHN, CLNC

Success Is Inside!

P.S.	Comment and share your successful exhibiting experiences at legal conferences.

Vickie, I just have to tell you about my recent exhibiting success. I started my Certified Legal Nurse Consultant business 5½ months ago after a long hiatus from nursing. I was fortunate to be able to work on my legal nurse consulting business full time and I made a concerted effort to use the marketing strategies I learned from the CLNC^® Certification Program. I got my first two cases on the same day within a week of my launch date just networking with friends. This networking brought me two attorneys and seven cases in the first three months.

To create immediate success for my legal nurse consulting business, I decided to exhibit at a statewide plaintiff attorney convention. I put to use the event marketing information in the Core Curriculum for Legal Nurse Consulting^® textbook, NACLNC^® Apprenticeship and Advanced CLNC^® Practice-Building Programs. I decided to spend the money to hire a graphic designer to create a professional tri-fold exhibit I could use repeatedly. I was thrilled with the final product and thanks to the information I received from Vickie Milazzo Institute, my exhibit booth looked attractive and professional.

I stood in front of my exhibit throughout the convention and introduced myself to most everyone who walked by. I passed out numerous business cards and brochures. I focused my conversations on how the attorneys were currently screening and developing their medical-related cases and how I could save them time and money. On the first day, I stayed until all attorneys and all but two exhibitors had left the exhibit hall. Ten minutes after returning to my hotel room, I got a call from an attorney-prospect who was waiting by my booth with medical records for me to review! Needless to say, I ran downstairs to meet with him. Believe it or not, I walked away from that convention with not one but two sets of medical records and retainers for both cases from that one attorney!

I received permission to follow up from every attorney with whom I spoke. I also gave free screenings to three attorneys who were particularly interested in my CLNC^® services. Two other attorneys asked me to call them after the convention to discuss a case on which they needed help. The day after I notified one attorney of his free screening, he called me to discuss a case he wanted me to handle. He needed help with several cases and wanted to get started. His firm handles a large number of malpractice and negligence cases so this opportunity really opened doors for my CLNC^® business.

I was surprised on the second day of the convention when one of the other two legal nurse consultant exhibitors shut down their booth (three RNs were exhibiting together). It was “tax-free shopping” that weekend so they closed their booth at 11:00am and went shopping! Needless to say, they had not attended the Vickie Milazzo Institute’s CLNC^® Certification Program. Since the convention was only 2½ days, they lost a huge opportunity to meet attorneys.

All in all, as a result of exhibiting at this one event I came home with the following:

• Two sets of medical records and retainer fees for each case from the same attorney.
• Requests from two attorneys to call regarding cases on which they need help.
• Request to screen a case for merit from a new attorney-client.
• Request to locate two testifying experts.
• Plus I received the attorney mailing list database from the association sponsoring the convention.

While exhibiting is not cheap nor easy, it definitely paid off for me. It gave my CLNC^® business statewide exposure and I will be hiring my first CLNC^® subcontractor to help with my rapidly increasing case load. I love my new career as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant and look forward to many years of exhibiting success.

Laura H. Beard, RN, BSN, CLNC is president of LHB Medical-Legal Consulting located in South Carolina and specializes in medical malpractice, personal injury, workers’ compensation cases and Medicare Set-Aside Allocations.

Attorneys were probably the last group of professionals to embrace email. For years they hid behind their assistants and never touched a computer, much less sent or received an email. While I still know a few dinosaurs, for most attorneys today, email is the preferred form of communication.

I love email and the efficiency of communicating by email. My staff teases me that they often receive succinct, one- or two-word email messages from me (Yes. No. Thanks! Do it!). I receive more email than most people in my office and quite frankly, some of it is simply horrific. (I can’t put in writing what comes to mind when reading some of it.) It’s often hard to believe that it was composed and sent by a professional.

With this in mind, I’d like to offer you my top 9 tips for communicating clearly and effectively with your attorney-clients. These tips will keep you from hitting “horrific” status with any of your attorney-clients or prospects.

1. Have a proper email address. Email is a business communication and your email address is part of your marketing. PinkBunny1969@whatever.com may be appropriate for your online dating profile but sends the wrong message to attorneys. Go to GoDaddy.com and register your legal nurse consulting business’s name, or a derivative of it as a domain name. Then follow GoDaddy’s simple steps to create an email account. Now you’re JesseCook@JMC-Consulting.com – much better plus it helps brand your business every time you send an email.
2. Use a clear subject line. Many people scan their email box by subject to determine not only the priority of the communication but also whether to classify it as spam or to file it. If you get an email with a subject such as “You need my services,” “A question for you” or “Re: Additional Issues in the Smith Case,” which one do you think you’d open first, if at all? If you don’t know the answer, you’ve got some homework to do. Address your subject clearly and succinctly. Your attorney-recipient should know just from the subject line what your message relates to, its priority and where to file it for later review.
3. When possible, keep it short. If it’s a longer communication consider putting it in a letter on your legal nurse consulting company’s letterhead and attach it as a PDF or Word^® document so that the attorney-client can print it for the file. Email is great for shorter communications but remember, many people read email in their preview window on their screen or on a cell phone. Shorter messages are easier to comprehend (that’s why the webpages of news organizations are short). If someone has to print your message to understand it, you may as well brand it on letterhead. If I have an important email I’m working on, I’ll often compose it in Word and then cut and paste it into my email. This allows me more control over my thoughts.
4. Compose sensitive and important email before filling in the “To” field. Have you ever accidently hit Send before you were ready or before you completed composing your important missive? I know I have. To remedy this, I recommend adding the recipients’ email addresses for the to, cc or bcc fields only when you’re sure you’re ready to send your final email.
5. Take a deep breath before replying. Not every email requires an immediate reply, especially one that raises your blood pressure. This is especially important if you haven’t yet cooled off before firing off that terse reply letting the recipient know exactly what you think. Remember, there’s not really an “undo” button and this tip combined with #4 above will help to keep you on good terms with all your attorney-clients and colleagues.
6. Don’t use text-messaging slang such as IMHO in a professional communication. Save them for Facebook, Twitter and texting. Remember you’re communicating professionally, not personally.
7. DON’T TYPE IN ALL CAPS – that’s still the Internet equivalent of shouting. It’s hard to believe in 2010 I still have to remind people of this. If your “Caps Lock” key is stuck, it’s time to buy a can of air and blow the brownie crumbs out of your keyboard. Here’s a link to Tom’s Tech Tip on cleaning your computer.
8. Proof your work. Yes, it sounds too simple but often, due to the perceived informal nature of email, people don’t proof it. I’ve often received email that contains incomplete sentences and thoughts that aren’t fully developed. This is simply because the sender was in a rush to click Send. If it’s an important email, I’ll print it and hand proof it prior to sending. Adhere to basic grammar rules. In today’s world you don’t have to be perfect, but likewise, you don’t want someone labeling you a grammar-barbarian.
9. Use a spell checker. Just about every email program has this capability. Make sure you turn it on. What is an attorney going to think of someone who can’t spell simple words or who sends their communications full of typos?

Every day I get email that breaks these rules – some even break all 9 at once! Email is probably your typical form of communication as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant. Make yours a reflection of your professionalism and your email will help you gain attorney-clients, not lose them at “helllo.” Yes, that typo was intentional.

Success Is inside!

I was asked to be the speaker at the February meeting for the Massachusetts Academy of Trial Attorneys. I arrived early to get prepared. Several people were late due to the weather. Only 10 attorneys braved the cold, rainy, snowy night to attend.

I began my presentation with information about legal nurse consulting, the CLNC^® services I provide and my nursing expertise. After my presentation, they all took my contact information and brochure. Then, they spent a lot of time talking about their cases.

The next day I got a call from one of the attorneys who had attended. He was looking for a wound care specialist. The day after that I got a call from another attorney for a case review. The phone has not stopped ringing since that night and the referrals from these attorneys have also been great.

What I want Certified Legal Nurse Consultants to know is that no matter how small the crowd, it will pay off!

Guest Blogger Profile:

Mildred Mannion, RN, BSN, CNOR, CLNC is the owner of M3 Legal Nurse Consulting, Inc. in Massachusetts. She has 22 years of nursing experience and currently works in the operating room of a large teaching hospital.

As a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant, I focus on helping hospitals reduce Medicare denials and win more Medicare Part A appeals. My photo and short bio on my websites generate four to five calls from hospital attorneys each month.

Hospitals want to be paid and I’ve learned that the first level of preventing Medicare denials is the assessment of the patient and the physician’s documentation of medical necessity. It’s usually the lack of this information that triggers a Medicare denial of payment.

The first rule to get the physicians to buy into what you are trying to teach them is to feed them. So, I contact the hospital administrators in question and explain that I have a plan that will help them reduce Medicare denials and change their doctors’ bad documentation habits. If lunch is not within the facility’s budget, then I work with ancillary vendors who might want to participate and provide lunch.

I use exhibit posters and flip charts to present during lunch (provided by the hospital). I also use a dry-marker board and include actual excerpts from Medicare’s denial documents. The exhibits show what was missing and how to correct it. My program includes hand-outs with the information from the posters, dry board and flip charts.

This educational approach usually works and I receive calls from physicians with questions for some time after each event. The marketing benefit is that people from different hospitals talk to one another, which often generates calls from other facilities wanting presentations and I get more clients.

My marketing strategies include:

• Bulletin board teasers with movie ad-like messages: “For Doctors: Coming soon to your hospital…” posted a couple weeks before the presentation.
• Hand-outs placed in facility mail boxes at least two weeks ahead of time.
• Posters on stands just inside the entrance to the presentation room at least 30 minutes before start time.
• Enlargements focused only on the most important pieces of Medicare rules on the subject that affects physicians.

One of the most rewarding experiences occurred while I was auditing a telephone conference regarding Medicare appeals with corporate attorneys for two of my hospital-clients. One hospital administrator on the call wondered why two facilities seemed to be doing much better than the others in overturning denials. The attorney explained, “That’s because they have a Camy,” as though I were a product brand name.

Another time a different hospital-client armed with the education and hand-outs I provided, was able to make enough immediate and lasting changes that they, effectively, stopped their denials cold. Most hospitals make changes slowly and with a lot of kicking and screaming. This hospital’s collective, firm resolve made the changes using the education they paid me to give them – and won big!

Medicare is my specialty and marketing, as I learned from Vickie Milazzo, is what sells my CLNC^® services.

Guest Blogger Profile

Camy Joyner, RN, BSN, CCM, CLNC, CEO and co-owner of C. Joyner and Associates, LLC. Consults/manages Medicare Part A appeals for acute general rehabilitation hospitals. Consults for records review/audit for physician medical pertinence. Also consults in non-Medicare negligence cases.

While I was pursuing my nursing degree in the late 90s, I was also working on my Spanish degree. Being from North Dakota where few people speak Spanish, Hispanic friends and colleagues often ask me how in the world I learned Spanish. I tell them I just fell in love with the language when I started taking Spanish in the 7th grade. I received my Spanish degree in 1998 and have been speaking Spanish since then.

I remembered what Vickie taught me in the CLNC^® Certification Program about using my unique selling position (USP). So, I started including the phrase, “I also have a degree in Spanish” in emails to attorney-prospects and paralegals. In one email to an attorney-prospect, I briefly told her about the services I offer as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant and mentioned that I have a Spanish degree. A couple of weeks later, I received an email from a paralegal at that law firm asking if I could attend an independent medical examination (IME) for his Spanish speaking client. Two months later, I received a voicemail from another paralegal at the same law firm requesting my services at an IME for a different Hispanic client and a different attorney.

Each CLNC^® consultant brings something unique to the table. Like Vickie says, we are in the business of marketing. After attending both IMEs, I realized that I always need to market my USP of speaking Spanish. Marketing your USP will save a lot of time and energy. I kick myself now for not using my USP the first day I began marketing to attorneys.

Maybe your USP is speaking another language. Maybe it’s the fact that you have 25 years of nursing experience and you’ve worked in every area of the hospital. Maybe your nursing specialty is forensics. Whatever it is, every Certified Legal Nurse Consultant has a USP. The question is, are you marketing your USP to attorneys?

Guest Blogger Profile

Brian Brandser, RN, BSN, CCRN, CLNC assists attorneys with personal injury and medical malpractice cases. Brian also serves as clinical coordinator in a critical care unit at a Washington state hospital. Brian has a Spanish degree and lives with his wife and two boys.

Everyone knows that a chain is only as strong as its weakest link. Every Certified Legal Nurse Consultant knows at least one CLNC^® consultant, if not more. If you’ve attended one of our CLNC^® 6-Day Certification Seminars, you’ve made lifelong CLNC^® friends. When you attend the NACLNC^® Annual Conference, you reconnect with CLNC^® consultants from all over the country. But all too often you only do it for those short periods of time. Not everyone capitalizes on their connections to make a strong chain or develop a mini-network.

In this information/communication-driven world of Facebook^®, Twitter^®, Skype^® and the Internet, the only thing holding you back is the lack of a plan. Given the myriad ways we can communicate these days there is nothing, and I mean nothing, stopping any Certified Legal Nurse Consultant from setting up their own CLNC^® Connection Chain (or “CCC” for short).

Set up your CCC in 5 easy steps:

1. Use Darwinian Selection. From your certified, but not certifiable, colleagues pick 5-8 other CLNC^® consultants you respect, who have different specialties than your own and who are in different parts of the country. This is Link 1 in your CCC.
2. Facebook’em Danno. Next, set up your own private group on Facebook and send an invite to each of the Certified Legal Nurse Consultants you’ve identified and ask them to join your group. You now have the second link in your CCC, a place where you and the CLNC^® members of your group can communicate freely and network with each other that doesn’t require any special skill. Remember to set your privacy settings to keep others from seeing your group’s discussions. CCC Link 2 is complete.
3. Get Yourself a Glam-Cam. Your next step is to go out and spend less than $60 and buy a USB web cam with embedded microphone for your computer (unless you’re lucky enough to have an Apple^® laptop or iMac with one built in). Install the camera. (Tom installed mine and claims it’s so simple even a caveman can do it.) Then sign up for the free version of Skype. This will allow you to have weekly video conferences in pairs or in groups with your CCC members. It’s much more fun than telephone conferences and much more rewarding in terms of retying the connections with the other CCCers. You can also use this to check in with your hi-tech attorney-clients. Link 3 checked off.
4. Tweet Like a Tweety-Bird. Join Twitter but be sure to protect your “tweets.” Protecting your tweets allows only those Twitter members you specifically approve to see your tweets. You can still follow Ashton Kutcher, but your tweets will only be seen by those you approve to view them. Use the initiation function of Twitter to send email invitations to your list of CLNC^® colleagues. If you have a texting plan for your smart phone, turn on the mobile tweets function of Twitter and select only those people in your group to update you via cell phone. You can read the rest of the twitterers using Tweetdeck or on Twitter. This way you’ll get texts of important updates from your CCC. Use Twitter to schedule your Skype calls, update your CCC on new attorney-clients or just to tell them what you’re doing. Link 4 in place.
5. Meet Up to Keep Up. When you attend the NACLNC^® Annual Conference, plan on flying in at least two days early to brainstorm with your CCC members. You’ll want to meet before the conference to get your face-to-face time in with your CCC members. Focus on learning from your group and grab new ideas for your legal nurse consulting business so you can rock back and enjoy the conference. Link 5 done and your CLNC^® Connection Chain is ready to pay off big!

Now put your CLNC^® Connection Chain to use. Set accountable and measurable objectives, and share them with your CLNC^® chain members. When you complete an objective, send out a tweet. Schedule at least two Skype calls a month so that everyone can update each other on the steps they’ve taken towards their accountable objectives. Research shows that being accountable to others for the action steps in your strategic plan help you implement them. Celebrate each others’ successes and brainstorm over what went well and what didn’t. This is your private brain trust, exclusive board of directors and personal planning committee – make use of them!

A CLNC^® Connection Chain is a great way to make sure your legal nurse consulting business succeeds. Here’s my challenge to Certified Legal Nurse Consultants – set up your own CCC and put it to the test for 60 days. I’ll be waiting to hear from you when you share with all of us how your CCC has helped your legal nurse consulting business.

Success Is Inside!

We all love social media. For example, I use Facebook to communicate to all Certified Legal Nurse Consultants and aspiring CLNC^® consultants. I love reading details of your lives and seeing the fun photos you post. One Certified Legal Nurse Consultant told me that what she loves most about Facebook is that she never has to worry about keeping up with her friends’ email addresses – because their Facebook address never changes. If she’s on Facebook, she’s always in touch with them. This is really a radical form of communication and allows connection with more and more people, including attorneys, who are joining Facebook every day.

Something I’ve noticed though – social media can quickly move from a means of communication to an obsession. One can get caught up in all of the things to do there – the games and other ancillary applications. That’s my issue with social media. Clicking your mouse to get points to build a hen house for your farm or sending someone virtual hugs, flowers or groceries seems like a crazy waste of time.

Where we focus is where we yield results, and let’s face it, building a better farm, sending pictures of flowers and answering meaningless quiz questions becomes a feel-good addiction that reaps little more than distraction from vision and purpose. Does “I got a new llama for my herd today” or “I answered a quiz about Pop-Tarts^®” really sound better to you than “I got three cases from a new attorney-client today”? The way you unwind is certainly your personal choice, but I prefer to find my relaxation in nature, taking a walk or listening to the clacking of my bamboo while enjoying a glass of wine in my backyard. Relaxation has a beginning and an end but the demands of a “virtual farm” never will.

For successful Certified Legal Nurse Consultants living in the real world, those meaningless feel-good addictions are something we avoid. We spend our time growing our legal nurse consulting businesses, not fertilizing our virtual farms. I’ve gone though and blocked just about every “application” I can on Facebook to keep those “requests to bale hay” from cluttering up my wall. I appreciate that someone loves me enough to want to send me a virtual pet – but I’m busy with my legal nurse consulting business and connecting with my family and friends – and I hope you are too.

Social media is a great thing. It’s changing the way we connect and communicate. Just make sure that you’re using it to advance your legal nurse consulting business or to truly connect and communicate with your “friends.”

Success Is Inside!

When you communicate to attorneys, whether by speaking or writing, you can choose the response you want. That’s not a typo – I don’t mean your response, I mean the response from the attorney with whom you’re communicating. You can guide the response you’ll get by the words you choose.

For example, if you want to instantly get the attorney’s full attention, use signal words such as, “here’s how to,” “the opposing attorney will probably argue” or “this will almost certainly be an issue in the case.” Phrases like these alert the attorney that important information is about to follow.

Because your goal is to maintain an associative relationship with your attorney-clients, you will also want to use collegial phrases. For example saying, “let me share something I learned” is more collegial than “let me tell you about this.” Hearing these words, the attorney expects to benefit from, and possibly be enriched by what you are about to say, versus feeling they’re about to receive a lecture.

When explaining a medically complex situation, preface with, “this is how I would explain it to a jury” or “if I were explaining this to a jury, I would tell them….” This allows you to get down to the attorney’s level without insulting the attorney’s intelligence.

In addition to “sharing,” you can also use words that stimulate thought, inspire creativity and transform passivity into action. Think about famous persuaders such as Abraham Lincoln, Winston Churchill, John F. Kennedy and Martin Luther King. How did these orators persuade us to their way of thinking?

First of all, great persuaders sprinkle their speech liberally with “fat” words – freedom, love, success, judgment, loyalty, privilege, honor, generosity and together. Try putting any of those words in your CLNC^® tote bag. You can’t see them or touch them, but they sure feel good when you hear them. “Fat” words are empty of content but full of meaning. Take the word pride. You can’t hold pride in your hands. You can’t see it, hear it or taste it, yet it has exquisite meaning. Tell someone “I’m proud of you” and notice their immediate response. Think about these phrases:

“I value your judgment.”

“It’s a privilege to be here.”

“Working together we can…”

When Lincoln said, “Truth is generally the best vindication against slander,” he used three fat words in a total of eight. Look for opportunities to use fat words to inspire or persuade friends, family and associates, then turn your efforts to your attorney-prospects and clients. Notice the difference between “thanks for your time” and “I’m honored you took the time.” Even though both phrases work; they impact differently.

Great persuaders also use presuppositions such as fortunately, unfortunately and luckily. Such words, at the start of a statement, presuppose the next part of the statement to be factual. “Fortunately, you have the stronger position in this case” “Unfortunately, this fact hurts the case.” Another form of presupposition includes such words as odd, aware, know and realize. They presuppose a situation while at the same time embedding a suggestion.

“Are you aware that the medical expert missed an important issue?”

When talking with a prospective attorney-client always say “when” instead of “if,” “When I take a case for you I’ll be sure to…” or “When we’re working together….” Be positive and assume they’re already in a relationship with you and your legal nurse consulting business.

Another powerful use of words is the use of “linking words,” such as and, but, while and even. Linking words suggest cause and effect. Great persuaders use linking words to link verifiable experience with suggestion, making their ideas more believable, more readily accepted.

Most of us use linking words in a negative context. The two most commonly used linking words are and and but. By merely changing your unconscious use of those two words to a more conscious application, you’ll gain persuasion power. When you tell a subcontractor, “I love your work, but I don’t like how you go into too much detail,” the negative message is what is retained. “I don’t like how you go into too much detail” is what comes through loud and clear. “I love your work” goes unnoticed. It gets cancelled by the linking word but. When you change your language to use the linking word and instead of but, you send a different message – one more appropriate, “I love your work and I prefer that next time you avoid so much detail.” Your communication is less damaging and it still sends a constructive message.

Even more effective is linking two verifiable bits of information to a suggestion. This powerful technique takes more thought but is very effective. Here’s an example – “Fuji apples are red” – that’s verifiable, you can see it. “They crunch when you bite them” that’s verifiable too – you can hear them crunch. “And they taste wonderful.” In sales terms this is called a “yes set.” The first two yeses invite the third. Here’s another example – “It’s a beautiful sunny day outside” – verifiable, “that’s a great photo of your family” – verifiable “and as a Certified Legal Nurse Consultant I can save you time and money on your medical-related cases.” Try this technique with an attorney-prospect and see how many more clients you get.

These word power techniques can help you communicate more effectively for your Certified Legal Nurse Consultant business. Now that you’re aware of how persuasive you can be by incorporating fat words, presuppositions and selective linking words into your vocabulary, you’ll want to put them into action for your CLNC^® business. These word power techniques do require practice, so you’ll need to think about what you want to say in advance so that you cannot only practice, but also think up the most persuasive way of saying what you want well before you sit down to talk with an attorney-prospect. It also helps to evaluate an interview afterward and think of ways you would handle it differently next time. Practice using these techniques in your introductions and elevator speeches. You can even incorporate them into your introductory letters and promotional copy.

Practice word power today to reap improved results for your CLNC^® business.

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