California criminal defense firm grows revenue 54% with Lawmatics

David Lehr Office
David Lehr
David Lehr
Managing Attorney
Strongest Defense
The results
11
hours saved per week
54
%
increase in revenue YoY forecasted
22
%
increase in consultations
200
%
increase in lead conversions
43
%
increase in marketing spend
3
new staff hired
Firm facts
Practice Area
Criminal Defense
Business Size
7 Staff
Location
Ventura, CA
Switched From
Case Status & James Marketing Amplifier
Meet David Lehr
David started his own criminal defense firm in 2007 following a 13.5-year career as a prosecutor in the district attorney’s office. Today, he manages a staff he cares deeply for, going as far as to invest in their professional growth and mental well being without a second thought. The same can be said for his dedication to his clients who he strives to get back on the right track by means of open and frequent communication. With 11 kids at home (no that’s not an exaggeration), David has a lot of mouths to feed. The more he can streamline his firm’s operations to make it run efficiently, the more he can be present with his clients, his staff, and his family.

The one thing you can't buy as a lawyer is more time. Lawmatics gets you more time. It breaks that rule.”

— David Lehr

The mission

David’s drive stems from a passion for humans to reinvent themselves. Having discovered that roughly 85% of cases he handled as a prosecutor for the District Attorney’s office were drug or alcohol related, David vowed to do his part to bring down the crime rate by nudging first time and repeat offenders towards sobriety.

To achieve this, he needed a scalable solution to stay in touch with all of his clients in order to make continuous progress on their cases. David asserts, “the more contact you have with the client, the better they feel cared for, and the greater their chance of success.”

Challenges

Support staff burnout

“My current staff has been with me for a while now. They're happy with Lawmatics. We're learning new things often and finding new ways to automate operations at our practice. And the less repetitive work they have to do, the lower their stress and the more we can work on real things that will help real clients make real progress.”

Hours of lost time per week

“The one thing you can't buy as a lawyer is more time, right, or as a human being is more time. Lawmatics gets you more time. So I guess that breaks the rule. You can buy more time as long as you're doing it with Lawmatics.”

Poor visibility into marketing performance

“Now I know which of my marketing lead sources are actually converting better and I can accurately forecast our performance. We're constantly finding new ways to use Lawmatics to politely and gently encourage folks to contact us and learn how much we can offer them.”

Lawmatics is so much more intuitive. The pictures, the way things work; everything was easier to program.”

— David Lehr

Benefit highlights

More paying clients

Prompt responses to inquiries via automated follow-up using Lawmatics have secured David’s firm a 300% increase in conversions. David shared, “Because leads are responded to faster, I'm converting three out of 30 warm leads into paying clients a month whereas I used to only convert one out of 30. That's one hundred percent Lawmatics.”

Operational consistency

Given the high volume of clients and range of case types from violent crimes to DUIs, juggling document delivery and deadlines was challenging for David’s staff. Lawmatics now automates all of that. “When a DUI client signs up, they immediately get the onboarding packets from Lawmatics timed the way we want them every single time. Now we don't have to guess whether or not we sent Bob Smith his paperwork or not,” says David.

Marketing effectiveness

With the ability to measure his cost per lead for every marketing effort, David has a strong understanding which of his lead sources are working and which aren’t. “I can now easily take $4,000 from a low-performing source, and put it into this other source that converts at a much higher rate. Lawmatics helps us constantly track and identify new, lucrative marketing channels that attract paying clients for less spend.”

Hours saved on intake

Unlike before, all new client data needs to be collected only once from the client via a custom form, after which it is stored in Lawmatics for review and follow-up — no duplicate data entry from law firm staff necessary. From there, it’s easy to send out a fee agreement with the client’s data pre-populated and stay in touch with them. Automating client intake with Lawmatics saves David’s firm two hours per day, on average.

Instant follow-up

Within moments of a new lead inquiry, Lawmatics sends prospective clients an automated welcome text or email and, given the time of day, a phone call. “Even if someone submits a ‘contact us’ form at 2:00 AM, we're sending them an email from Lawmatics saying, ‘Hey, welcome. This is what you have to look forward to.’ All of these things are automated, so they know we're on it right away and we get to them fast,” reveals David.

Work-life balance

The frequent communications facilitated by Lawmatics negates the need for clients to reach out to the firm with minor questions, or for David and staff to return dozens of phone calls each afternoon — particularly after a long day in court. “My return phone call stack used to be 15 people a day. With Lawmatics, clients only call if it’s truly urgent. That means I get an extra one to two hours more with my family that I didn’t used to have. That's irreplaceable!”

Power features

Client intake

Prior to Lawmatics, David’s firm would convert one out of 30 warm leads a month into clients. With a newly accelerated and streamlined intake process, his conversions have climbed an impressive 200%. In addition, the time saved using automatic delivery of a fee agreement, appointment reminders, and eSignature adds up to about ten hours saved per week across all staff.
Client Intake
Legal CRM

Legal CRM

The more contact you have with a client, the happier they are. The happier they are, the more business they refer to you. David and his staff have a leg up on their local competitors in that they are vastly more responsive to clientele and new inquiries. The ability to send deadline reminders, intake documentation, and consultation details quickly 24/7 via Lawmatics more often than not results in repeat and referral business.

Reporting & insights

With the in-depth marketing analytics provided by Lawmatics, David is able to track every dollar spent on marketing as well as the ROI of each individual effort. In doing so he eliminated costly lead sources that were underperforming, able to re-allocate marketing dollars to effective marketing campaigns and increase his marketing spend from $144k to $200k year over year.
Reporting & Insights

Because Lawmatics is so good at delivering intake information to prospective clients quickly, it improved our overall hire rate.”

— David Lehr

Future business goals

David has high ambitions for his firm, and justifiably so. In the coming 1-2 years, he aims to achieve the following, driven by the growth, resources, and forecasting capabilities at his disposal in part with the help of Lawmatics.
  • Market a new “Finish Your Probation” program
  • Expand into new practice areas
  • Annual revenue of $3M

We track every single dime that comes into this firm. With Lawmatics, it’s automatic.”

— David Lehr